ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the treatises on art written in the sixteenth century should be understood within the religious theology and philosophy of their time and that Giorgio Vasari’s maniera’s links to enargeia find resonance in the work of other sixteenth-century art theorists. In the hands of artists engaged by patrons, whose agendas were linked to the Roman Catholic Church’s retention of its control of the faithful, maniera’s enargeia could function as a powerful inducement to remain within the Church’s fold by bringing to life, in works of art, the Church’s specific spiritual history. The formal instructions to artists provided by the theorists was accompanied by theological, philosophical, scriptural, spiritual support for their pragmatic and practical advice. Establishing God as the primary artist was as important for most sixteenth-century theorists as it was for Vasari, when writing about the art of their time – the bella maniera moderna.
