They were real, individual, flesh-and-blood creations. So what happened to Christian morality? Their " academic art " placed great emphasis on drawing from the nude, and thus kept alive the figurative tradition of Michelangelo and others. Heroes Contemporary — Photography. Romanesque and Gothic art was dominated by sculpture, especially ecclesiastical stone sculpturenotably column fine art naked men - none of which featured any nudity. Jean-Baptiste Pigalle caused a scandal with his magnificent nude statue of the aging Voltaire Unfortunately for admirers of the kouros and the koreand nude art in general, Christianity largely put a stop to it. Male Nudes in Renaissance Art The return to classical values and Greco-Roman culture during the Italian Renaissance reinstated the nude form male and female as the ideal standard of representational art. Male sexual relationships fine art naked men common practice.