Baroque. Italian painting
Naturalism.
Italian painting in the Baroque It puts great attention to the effects of light and color to highlight the characters in the scenes as well as their message. They use dark backgrounds to highlight through the effects of focused light, the elements that wanted to highlight. Unlike Renaissance painting that care a lot about geometry and balance in the composition of scenes, Baroque naturalism however uses compositions in scorzo.
Escorzo: (Term used in paint and photography to indicate a body or element in oblique position or perpendicular to the visual level of the viewer, to accentuate the depth giving the impression that it is in third dimension. When the runoff is used, the hidden elements should not be left as well as use cuts that prevent the sensation of continuity, accentuating the depth.
Two main trends are developed in baroque painting in Italy that are essence opposed to each other. Naturalism and classicism. From both derives a current or style called decorative baroque, which is the last great Italian pictorial style that brings with it the overcoming of naturalism and classicism, the painters of this current favor the execution of a more remote painting, strongly decorative, as well as dynamic and voluptuous.
Baroque pictorial trends of Italian painting.
- Naturalismbased on the perfect and raw imitation of natural reality. From this trend an aspect highlights, the so -called ¨TeBrismo¨ with a certain taste for chiaroscuro. It is not exempt from a certain intellectualism and some veiled messages, although it is more affordable than the proposals of classicism. They use a raw description of reality without sweetening and idealized artifice.
- Classicismthat although it also develops a detailed realism in its execution, it shows nature, as it is, as it should be, it tends to idealize, sweeten the figures and scenes, as well as intellectualize the message. Inspired by Greco -Roman and Renaissance art devotees to ideal beauty. (We will address classicism in a separate article).
- The decorative baroqueSpecializes in broad decorations of vaults and walls, with a triumphant and great sense. Through forced scorzo and pictorial approach and spatial illusory in the scenes; These artists with good knowledge of optics, perspectives and architecture developed religious issues that seek to feel the viewer of depth vision in third dimension on vaults and domes. The space in his works is conceived to be seen from the bottom up, which generates a sensation of unreal spaces. (This decorative baroque trend will be addressed separately in another article).
Naturalism in Baroque art.
Painting with a naturalistic tendency puts the movement as the protagonist to accentuate drama and emotion, (use of the open line). As for the use of color, this predominates on drawing and on the line being a fundamental element. In color treatment there is an evolution, however: at first homogeneous and compact masses are represented. Later brushstrokes and the technique of the evening are used later. The color is used here to accentuate characters and elements.
Baroque naturalism uses continuous depth. In a very natural and realistic way: the figures merge with the environment. Use of asymmetric compositions, without order, naturalistic painters prefer the diagonal line. As for the issues used, religious issues are found, especially mystical (visions, miracles, etc.) and martyrdoms of saints. They usually appear elements that enhance sacred drama such as clouds, angels, strong light sources, etc. Mythological passages are also very represented. Frequent naked appear, providing a tribute to the human figure, representing it as it is not with sweeteners, perfections or corrections.
The landscapes that are represented can be urban or rural. Bodegons or lifes are so natural and retailers that they seem to be touched, perceived with our senses. In the portraits, not only the physical appearance of the portrayed but also its psychological aspect and its social stratum is captured. Other issues usually discussed in Baroque naturalism are gender or usual issues, where scenes of daily life are represented as well as historical events, the treatment of these issues transcends their influence towards other countries including colonies in America.
Naturalism in Italy.
Naturalism in Italy had its greatest exponent in the artist: Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, (1571) – (1610), important and prolific painter that synthesizes in his works with incredible raw and vulgar realism the description of reality with a vision not exempt from thematic conceptualization or intellectual reflection, but whose messages are very easy to capture by the spectator. Caravaggio created a new form of naturalism, combining closed figures with the physical, dramatic and theatrical observation of objects.
It was Caravaggio the introducer of the tenebrism, where the characters thanks to the treatment of light stand out on a dark background, giving their works a sense of theatricality that enhances drama and emotion, highlighting the objects, gestures and attitudes of the characters with the great use of color, which gives the sensation that is light. This painter is considered as the initiator of the painting properly of the baroque period.
Caravaggio dedicated himself to emphasizing realism in the execution of his figures, to the point of rejecting correct the imperfections of his models; For those who use real characters from the vulgar, he did not want to represent them in a way more according to the visions that the Church has of its saints as beautiful, idealized and perfect. This brought him from a conflict with his clergy clients. Preferably painting still lifes, mythological and more abundance issues religious issues.
He applies detail in the treatment of everyday elements. It gives as much importance to drawing objects as people. Some say that he dedicated the same time to paint a flower as a character. He was the first to abandon the realization of a conceptual, super intellectualized and aristocratic art such as manierism; which could only be understood by the upper classes, in favor of making a more understandable painting for popular classes.
His characters seem to move within the work, which come alive, as well as natural elements such as plants and flowers.
Caravaggio’s works include:
• Child with a fruit basket, (1593),
• Judit cutting the head of Holofernes 1598-1599.
• Crucifixion of San Pedro (1601).
• The disciples of Emaus (1601).
• San Juan Bautista. (1602),
• The vocation of San Mateo (1602).
• The burial of Christ (1604).
• The decapitation of San Juan Bautista, (1608).
• El Baco. (1596).
• The musicians (1595)
• The child playing the lute (1600).
• San Gerónimo writing. (1605)
The work of Caravaggio Influencio not only to his contemporary painters, but also laid guidelines in the treatment of figures with a detailed but natural realism, the use of color and his famous use of the dark clearing highlights him as a teacher of teachers also for future generations of painters. Among the painters influenced by Caravaggio who followed their trend called Caravaggism we have:
–Orazio Gentileschi (1563-1639) representative of the Roman school of Caravaggio. Its cleaning in the drawing and detail of the figures left us works of great beauty. Use the diagonal figures, some contorted to accentuate the movement. The expressions of his characters are dramatic and theatrical. Triangular compositions where light is also one of the protagonists.
– Artemisia Lomi Gentileschi (Born in Rome, July 8, 1593-and who died in Naples 1654) daughter of the Tuscan painter Orazio Gentileschi, follower of the limpid rigor of his father’s drawing, but added a strong dramatic accentuation, influenced by the works of Caravaggio, loaded with theatrical effects, a stylistic element that contributed to the dissemination of caravaggism in Naples, city He moved in 1630. Traumatic events of his life marked how to discuss the issues. Letting see some rebellion towards male preponderance, which reflects in his works.
– Bernardo Strozzi, nicknamed “El Capuchino” or the “Genoese friar”) (Genoa. 1581 – Venice, August 2, 1644) was an outstanding and prolific Italian Baroque painter, who worked both in Genoa and Venice. It belonged to the Genoese School of Painting in the Baroque period but work and greatly influence the Venetian. His first paintings, such as “San Francisco’s ecstasy”, show the dark scenes and emotional expressions of a Caravaggio even, but in the second decade seventeenth century, already living in Venice, Strozzi had developed a personal style that merged pictorial influences of the north with a more monumental realistic hardness. For example, in the picture:
“The adduction of Europe” made between 1640-1644.
He was never as dramatically dark in his representations as the caravaggists, since Venice infused a softer finish, a more acceptable style for local clients and patrons, but one that also shows the influence of painters in Venice that preceded him, such as: Jan Lys (1629) and Domenic Fetti (1626), who had also integrated the influence of Caravaggio Venetian, but less dark and softer and luminous.
Examples of this style can be found in Strozzi’s painting “Parable of the guests at the wedding” (1630) and that of the Christ delivering the keys from heaven to St. Peter (1630). His portraits included many of the most prominent Venetians. His students and painters strongly influenced by him include:
-Giovanni Andrea de Ferrari (1598-1669)
– Giovanni Bernardo Carbone. (May 12, 1614 – March 11, 1683)
– Valerio Castello. (1624 – October 1659)
– Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione. (1609-1664]
Of the outstanding Italian caravaggist painters we can also quote:
– Bartolomeo Manfredi (Ostiano, August 25, 1582 – Rome, December 12, 1622) was an Italian painter, an outstanding member of the “caravaggists.” He built his career around easel paintings for private clients, but his works were widely collected in the seventeenth century, and was considered the same of Caravaggio, or even superior. His Mars punishing Cupid is a work previously attributed to Caravaggio that is thought was executed by Manfredi. There are no works signed directly by him.
– Carlo Saraceni (Venice h. 1570- Venice, June 16, 1620). This Italian painter of the first baroque period in Italy assigned to the caraviggist trend. Maduro as a painter between 1606 and 1610 was influenced by the dramatic lighting of Caravaggio, his figures were …