How was Sandro Botticelli a Humanist?
For a Humanist artist, the idealized form of female beauty exists outside the specificity of character or type–what matters is that she is, for the artist, the “best”, that is, the most ideal or classical, representation of the Idea of Beauty of which he is capable, and she can then be assigned to whichever character the narrative demands. There is, in other words, no difference for Botticelli between mythical female beauty or Christian female beauty, only the change of attributes or decorum required by her character. She exists offstage, waiting to be called in for whatever part he needs her to play. Costume and context make her recognizable.
