Whether it’s a certain world-weary expression on a child’s face or a tangle of limbs in the Ukrainian parliament, sometimes a photo transcends its medium and becomes an accidental renaissance painting. The phenomenon is well-known enough to have spawned its own space on Reddit called Accidental Renaissance where people collect such images.
Of course, many of these photos aren’t “accidental” at all since photographers employ the same techniques of composition and an understanding of light that Renaissance artists mastered.
Now, because of the current crisis, many photos that achieve a Renaissance art quality are of self-sacrificing medical workers treating patients or people dealing with harrowing situations, but the same internet-specific appreciation applies.
Hey if it ain’t baroque, don’t fix it.
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Volunteers from Red Cross in Bergamo, Italy, checking up on a 88yo women suspected to have covid-19. Photo: Fabio Bucciarelli from r/AccidentalRenaissance
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A young man, illuminated by mobile phones, recites a poem while protestors chant slogans calling for civilian rule, during a blackout in Khartoum, Sudan from r/AccidentalRenaissance
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Italian nurse holding olive branch from r/AccidentalRenaissance
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Venus and her fallen children / 1495 Italy from r/AccidentalRenaissance
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da Vinci’s “Downtime of the Essential Overworker” from r/AccidentalRenaissance
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Took a picture of my son bored out of his wits by the lock down. Turned out to be my first picture worthy of this sub! from r/AccidentalRenaissance