While much of Europe extended the already long Middle Ages on an artistic level, an axis was created linking Italy, via France, to Flanders. This is the axis between Masaccio and Van Eyck via Barthélemy D'Aix in France and Campin in Belgium. Perspective, nature, the human figure, classicism, light, achieve a revolution that will have no equal in the history of Western art. Cities, seigniories, bourgeoisies, artists' workshops, markets, banks and travel give context and substance to the artistic revolution, making it irreversible and preparing its spread throughout Western Europe. Although still innervated in the culture of the late Middle Ages and its iconography, the art of the 15th century has a change of forms that falls into the tradition of classicism. It does not slip into the 'manner'. Artists such as Masaccio, Piero and Angelico, thinkers such as Pico della Mirandola or Erasmus renew without making a rupture.