The first Gothic painted murals were done by monks and other religious persons for the churches in Italy. They were modeled after the great mosaics, huge mural-sized artworks consisting of thousands of clay tiles pieced together to form religious scenes. These mosaics depicted the Christian iconography of both Byzantium, the capital of Eastern Orthodox Christianity and the Catholic Church of the Western World.
Gothic mural painting was heavily influenced first by Byzantine and then by Italian art. Early Gothic murals have many similarities to the Byzantine style. People and landscapes were one-dimensional and simplistic looking like modern day cartoon figures. For example, saints, the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus were often depicted with solid gold circles around their heads depicting halos. Also, body proportions are usually unrealistically on the thin side. In the late 13th century, Giotto and other Italian Gothic painters introduced a measure of realism into Gothic mural painting.
Gothic wall murals were mainly religious in nature and usually displayed stories of the Bible or other religious themes. A 15th century example is the "Dance of Death" mural in the Holy Trinity Church in Hrastovlje, Slovenia. It depicts multiple scenes of people from all walks of life dancing with skeletons. The stark lesson is that no matter whom a person is; good, evil, rich or poor; death visits all of us in the end.
Giotto is credited for starting the Italian school of fresco or wall mural painting in the late 13th century. His famous wall murals in the Papal Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi still survive today. Simone Martini is also considered a master of the late Gothic mural painting called International Gothic which spread across Europe to Bohemia, Austria, Germany, France and England at the end of the 14th century. Other great Gothic mural painters include Duccio, Cimabue and the Lorenzetti Brothers.