St. Francis Preaching to the Birds Italian Tapestry

St. Francis Preaching to the Birds Italian Tapestry

St. Francis Preaching to the Birds is an Italian jacquard wall tapestry. The original artwork comes from Sermon to the Birds completed in 1297 by Italian painter Giotto di Bondone (1266 – 1337), known as Giotto. He is generally considered the first in a line of great artists who contributed to the Italian Renaissance. Giotto is credited as making the decisive break with the prevalent Byzantine style and as initiating "the great art of painting as we know it today, introducing the technique of drawing accurately from life, which had been neglected for more than two hundred years.