History of painting 
Automatic translate
Painting is one of the ancient arts, which for many centuries has evolved from Paleolithic rock paintings to the latest movements of the 20th and even the 21st centuries. This art was born almost with the advent of mankind. Ancient people, not even fully realizing themselves as humans, felt the need to depict the world around them on the surface. They painted everything they saw: animals, nature, hunting scenes. For drawing, they used something similar to paints made from natural materials. These were earthy colors, charcoal, black soot. Brushes were made from animal hair, or simply painted with fingers.
As a result of the changes, new types and genres of painting arose. The ancient period was followed by the period of Antiquity. There was a desire for painters and artists to reproduce the real surrounding life, such as it is seen by man. The desire for accuracy of transmission caused the emergence of the foundations of perspective, the foundations of black and white constructions of various images and the study of this by artists. And they, first of all, studied how to depict volumetric space on the plane of the wall, in fresco painting. Some works of art, such as volumetric space, chiaroscuro, began to be used to decorate rooms, centers of religion and burials.
The next important period in the past painting is the Middle Ages. At this time, painting was more religious in nature, and the worldview began to be reflected in art. Creativity of artists was directed to icon painting and other melodies of religion. The main important points that the artist was supposed to emphasize were not so much an accurate reflection of reality, as a transfer of spirituality even in a wide variety of paintings. The canvases of the masters of that time were striking in their expressiveness of contours, racy and colorful. Medieval painting seems flat to us. All the characters of the artists of that time are on the same line. And so many works seem to us somewhat stylized.
The period of the gray Middle Ages replaced the brighter period of the Renaissance. The Renaissance era again brought a turning point in the historical development of this art. New moods in society, a new worldview began to be dictated to the artist: what aspects in painting to reveal more fully and clearly. Painting genres such as portrait and landscape will become independent styles. Artists express the emotions of man and his inner world through new ways of painting. The XVII and XVIII century accounted for an even more serious growth of painting. During this period, the Catholic Church loses its significance, and artists in their works increasingly reflect the true types of people, nature, everyday and everyday life. In this period, such genres as Baroque, Rococo, Classicism, mannerism were also formed. Romanticism arises, which is later replaced by a more spectacular style - impressionism.
At the beginning of the twentieth century, painting changed dramatically and a newer direction of modern art appeared - abstract painting. The idea of this direction is to convey the harmony between man and art, to create harmony in combinations of lines and color highlights. This art has no objectivity. She does not pursue the exact transmission of a real image, but rather - conveys what is in the artist’s soul, his emotions. An important role for this art form are shapes and colors. Its essence is to convey previously familiar objects in a new way. Here, artists are given complete freedom of their fantasies. This gave an impetus to the emergence and development of modern trends, such as avant-garde, underground, abstract art. From the end of the 20th century to the present, painting has been constantly changing. But, despite all the new achievements and modern technologies, the artists still remain true to the classical art - oil and watercolor painting, create their masterpieces with paints and canvases.
Natalia Martynenko
History of art
The history of painting is an endless chain that began with the very first paintings made. Each style grows from the styles that were in front of him. Each great artist adds something to the achievements of earlier artists and influences later artists.
We can enjoy painting for its beauty. Its lines, shapes, colors and composition (arrangement of parts) may please our feelings and linger in our memories. But the enjoyment of art increases when we learn when and why and how it was created.
The history of painting was influenced by many factors. Geography, religion, national characteristics, historical events, the development of new materials - all this helps to shape the artist’s vision. Throughout history, painting has reflected a changing world and our ideas about it. In turn, the artists provided some of the best records about the development of civilization, sometimes revealing more than the written word.
Prehistoric painting
Cave dwellers were the earliest artists. Color drawings of animals dating from 30,000 to 10,000 BC were found on cave walls in southern France and Spain. Many of these drawings are surprisingly well preserved, because the caves have been sealed for many centuries. Early humans painted the wild animals they saw around. Very rude human figures made in life positions were found in Africa and eastern Spain.
Cave artists filled the walls of the cave with drawings in rich bright colors. Some of the most beautiful paintings are in the cave of Altamira, in Spain. One detail shows a wounded bison, no longer able to stand - probably the victim of a hunter. It is painted in a reddish-brown color and is outlined simply, but skillfully, in black. The pigments used by cave artists are ocher (iron oxides that vary in color from light yellow to dark orange) and manganese (dark metal). They were crushed into a fine powder, mixed with grease (possibly with fatty oil), and applied to the surface with a brush. Sometimes pigments took the form of sticks, similar to crayons. Fat mixed with powder pigments made a paint and varnish, and the pigment particles stuck together. Residents of the cave made brushes from animal hairs or plants, and sharp tools made of silicon (for painting and scratches).
Even 30,000 years ago, people invented the basic tools and materials for painting. Methods and materials have been improved and improved in subsequent centuries. But the discoveries of the cave dweller remain the main ones for painting.
Egyptian and Mesopotamian painting (3400-332 BC)
One of the first civilizations appeared in Egypt. From the written records and art left by the Egyptians, much is known about their lives. They believed that the body should be preserved so that the soul could live after death. The Great Pyramids were complex tombs for the rich and powerful Egyptian rulers. Much Egyptian art was created for the pyramids and tombs of kings and other important people. To be absolutely sure that the soul will continue to exist, the artists created images of a dead man in stone. They also reproduced scenes from human life in wall paintings in funeral chambers.
Egyptian fine art techniques have remained unchanged for centuries. In one method, watercolor was applied to clay or limestone surfaces. In another process, the contours were carved on stone walls and painted with watercolors. A material called gum arabic was probably used to adhere paint to the surface. Fortunately, the dry climate and sealed tombs prevented some of these watercolor paintings from collapsing from dampness. Many hunting scenes from the walls of the tombs in Thebes, dating from around 1450 BC, are well preserved. They show how hunters chase birds or fish to fish. These plots can still be identified today because they were neatly and carefully painted.
The Mesopotamian civilization, which lasted from 3200 to 332 BC, was located in a valley between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in the Middle East. Houses in Mesopotamia were built mainly from clay. As the clay softens with rain, their buildings crumbled to dust, destroying any wall paintings that might be very interesting. What has been preserved is decorated ceramics (painted and fired) and colorful mosaics. Although mosaics cannot be regarded as paintings, they often influence it.
Aegean civilization (3000–1100 BC)
The third great early culture was Aegean civilization. The Aegeans lived on islands off the coast of Greece and on the peninsula of Asia Minor at about the same time as the ancient Egyptians and Mesopotamians.
In 1900, archaeologists began excavating the palace of King Minos at Knossos on the island of Crete. Excavations uncovered works of art written around 1500 BC. in an unusually free and graceful style of the time. Obviously, the Cretans were carefree, nature-loving people. Among their favorite topics in art were marine life, animals, flowers, sports, mass processions. In Knossos and other Aegean palaces, paintings were painted on wet gypsum walls with paints made of minerals, sand and earth ocher. The paint was saturated with wet plaster and became a permanent part of the wall. These paintings were later called frescoes (from the Italian word "fresh" or "new"). The Cretans liked the bright yellow, red, blue and green tones.
Greek and Roman classical painting (1100 BC - 400 BC)
The ancient Greeks decorated the walls of temples and palaces with frescoes. From ancient literary sources and from Roman copies of Greek art, we can say that the Greeks painted small paintings and made mosaics. The names of Greek masters and a little of their life and works are known, although very few Greek paintings survived the centuries and consequences of wars. The Greeks did not write much in the tombs, so their work was not protected.
Painted vases are all that survived from Greek painting today. Ceramics was a large industry in Greece, especially in Athens. Containers were in great demand, exported, as well as butter and honey, and for domestic purposes. The earliest vase painting was done in geometric shapes and ornaments (1100-700 BC). The vases were decorated with human figures in brown glaze on light clay. By the 6th century, vase artists often painted black human figures on natural red clay. Details were carved on clay with a sharp tool. This allowed the red to appear in the depths of the relief.
Red-figured style eventually replaced black. That is, vice versa: the figures are red, and the background has become black. The advantage of this style was that the artist could use a brush to create contours. The brush gives a looser line than the metal tool used in black curly vases.
Roman murals were found mainly in villas (country houses) in Pompeii and Herculaneum. In 79 AD, these two cities were completely buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. The archaeologists who excavated this area were able to learn a lot about the ancient Roman life from these cities. Almost every house and villa in Pompeii had paintings on its walls. Roman painters carefully prepared the surface of the wall, applying a mixture of marble dust and plaster. They polished the surface to a marble finish. Many of the paintings are copies of Greek paintings of the 4th century BC. The graceful poses of the figures painted on the walls of the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii inspired the artists of the 18th century, when the city was excavated.
Greeks and Romans also painted portraits. A small number of them, mainly portraits of mummies, made in the Greek style by Egyptian artists, have been preserved around Alexandria, in northern Egypt. Founded in the 4th century BC by Alexander the Great from Greece, Alexandria became the leading center of Greek and Roman culture. The portraits were painted using the encaustic technique on wood and were set in the form of a mummy after the death of the depicted person. Encaustic paintings made in paint mixed with molten beeswax are stored for a very long time. Indeed, these portraits still look fresh, although they were made in the second century BC.
Early Christian and Byzantine painting (300–1300)
The Roman Empire declined in the 4th century A.D. At the same time, Christianity was gaining strength. In 313, the Roman emperor Constantine officially recognized religion and himself adopted Christianity.
The emergence of Christianity greatly influenced art. Artists were instructed to decorate the walls of the churches with frescoes and mosaics. They made panels in church chapels, illustrated and decorated church books. Under the influence of the Church, artists were supposed to communicate the teachings of Christianity as clearly as possible.
The early Christians and Byzantine artists continued the mosaic technique that they learned from the Greeks. Small flat pieces of colored glass or stone were placed on wet cement or plaster. Other solid materials, such as pieces of baked clay or shell, were sometimes used. In the Italian mosaic, the colors are especially deep and full. Italian artists made the background with pieces of gilded glass. They depicted human figures in rich colors against a background of sparkling gold. The overall effect was flat, decorative and not realistic.
Mosaics of Byzantine artists were often even less realistic and even more decorative than the motives of the early Christians. "Byzantine" is the name given to the style of art that developed around the ancient city of Byzantium (now Istanbul, Turkey). The mosaic technique perfectly matched the Byzantine taste for the beautifully decorated churches. The famous mosaics of Theodora and Justinian, made around 547 AD, demonstrate a taste for wealth. The jewelry on the figures glisten, and the color court dresses sparkle against the backdrop of brilliant gold. Byzantine artists also used gold on frescoes and panels. Gold and other precious materials were used in the Middle Ages to separate spiritual objects from the everyday world.
Medieval painting (500-1400 years)
The first part of the Middle Ages, from about 6 to 11 centuries of our era, is usually called the Dark. At this time of unrest, art was stored mainly in monasteries. In the 5th century A.D. Warran tribes from Northern and Central Europe roamed the continent. For hundreds of years, they dominated Western Europe. These people produced art in which the main element is the pattern. They were especially keen on structures of interwoven dragons and birds.
The best of Celtic and Saxon art can be found in manuscripts of the 7th and 8th centuries. Book illustrations, lighting, and miniature painting, practiced since the late Roman times, became widespread in the Middle Ages. Lighting is the decoration of text, capital letters and fields. Gold, silver and bright colors were used. A thumbnail is a small picture, often a portrait. This term was originally used to describe a decorative block around the initial letters in a manuscript.
Charlemagne, who was crowned emperor of the Holy Roman Empire at the beginning of the 9th century, tried to revive the classical art of the late Roman and early Christian periods. During his reign, miniature artists imitated classical art, but they also conveyed personal feelings through their subjects.
Very few wall paintings have been preserved since the Middle Ages. The churches built during the Romanesque period (11–13 centuries) had several great frescoes, but most of them disappeared. In the churches of the Gothic period (XII-XVI centuries) there was not enough space for wall paintings. Book illustration was the main work of the Gothic painter.
Among the best illustrated manuscripts were books of watches - collections of calendars, prayers and psalms. A page from an Italian manuscript shows carefully crafted initials and a finely detailed marginal scene of St. George killing a dragon. The colors are brilliant and look like precious stones, as in stained glass, and gold flickers above the page. Exquisitely delicate leafy and floral designs border the text. Artists probably used magnifying glasses to do such complex, detailed work.
Italy: Cimabue and Giotto
Italian artists at the end of the 13th century still worked in the Byzantine style. Human figures were made flat and decorative. Faces rarely had expression. The bodies were weightless and seemed to float, rather than standing firmly on the ground. In Florence, the artist Cimabue (1240-1302) attempted to modernize some of the old Byzantine methods. Angels in "Madonna on the Throne" are more active than usual in paintings of the time. Their gestures and faces show a little more human feelings.Cimabue added to his paintings a new sense of monumentality or grandeur. However, he continued to follow many Byzantine traditions, such as a golden background and a patterned arrangement of objects and figures.
It was the great Florentine artist Giotto (1267-1337), who actually broke with the Byzantine tradition. His fresco series in the Chapel of the Arena in Padua leaves Byzantine art far behind. In these scenes from the life of Mary and Christ, there are real emotions, tension and naturalism. All the qualities of human warmth and sympathy are present. People do not seem completely unrealistic or heavenly. Giotto shaded the contours of the figures, and he placed deep shadows in the folds of clothes to give a sense of roundness and strength.
For his small panels, Giotto used pure egg tempera, a medium that was perfected by Florentines in the 14th century. The clarity and brightness of its colors should have greatly influenced people accustomed to the dark colors of Byzantine panels. Tempera paintings give the impression that soft daylight falls on the stage. They have an almost flat appearance, in contrast to the gloss of oil painting. Egg tempera remained the main paint until oil almost completely replaced it in the 16th century.
Late medieval painting north of the Alps
At the beginning of the 15th century, artists in Northern Europe worked in a style completely different from Italian painting. Nordic artists achieved realism by adding countless details to their paintings. All hair was gracefully contoured, and every detail of drapery or flooring was precisely installed. The invention of oil painting simplified the detailing of details.
The Flemish artist Jan van Eyck (1370-1414) made a great contribution to the development of oil painting. When tempera is used, colors must be applied separately. They cannot shade each other well, because the paint dries quickly. With oil that dries slowly, the artist can achieve more complex effects. His portraits of 1466-1530 were performed in Flemish oil technology. All details and even specular reflection are clear and precise. The color is durable and has a hard, enamel-like surface. A primed wood panel was prepared in the same way that Giotto prepared his panels for tempera. Van Eyck created the painting in layers of a subtle color called glaze. Tempera was probably used in the original understory and for glare.
Italian renaissance
While van Eyck was working in the North, Italians were moving into the golden age of art and literature. This period is called the Renaissance, which means rebirth. Italian artists were inspired by the sculpture of the ancient Greeks and Romans. The Italians wanted to revive the spirit of classical art, which glorifies human independence and nobility. Renaissance artists continued to paint religious scenes. But they also emphasized earthly life and the achievements of people.
Florence
Giotto’s achievements in the early 14th century marked the beginning of the Renaissance. Italian painters of the 17th century continued it. Masaccio (1401-1428) was one of the leaders of the first generation of Renaissance artists. He lived in Florence, a wealthy trading city where Renaissance art began. At the time of his death in the late twenties, he revolutionized painting. In his famous fresco "The Tribute Money", he puts solid sculptural figures in a landscape that seems to go far into the distance. Masaccio may have studied perspective from the Florentine architect and sculptor Brunelleschi (1377-1414).
The mural technique was very popular in the Renaissance. It was especially suitable for large paintings, because the colors on the mural are dry and perfectly flat. The image can be viewed at any angle without glare or reflection. Also, murals are affordable. Usually, artists had several helpers. The work was carried out in parts, because they had to be finished while the plaster was still wet.
Masaccio’s full “three-dimensional” style was typical of the new progressive direction of the 15th century. The style of Fra Angelico (1400-1455) is a more traditional approach used by many artists of the early Renaissance. He was less preoccupied with the prospect and more interested in decorative patterns. His “Coronation of the Virgin” is an example of tempera in the most beautiful performance. Fun, vibrant colors against a gold background and accented with gold. The picture looks like an enlarged miniature. Long narrow figures have little in common with Masaccio. The composition is organized in wide lines of movement circling around the central figures of Christ and Mary.
Another Florentine who worked in a traditional style was Sandro Botticelli (1444-1515). Flowing rhythmic lines connect the sections of the "Spring" Botticelli. The figure of Spring carried by the westerly wind sweeps to the right. Three graces dance in a circle, the fluttering folds of their dresses and the graceful movements of their hands express the rhythms of the dance.
Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) studied painting in Florence. He is known for his scientific research and inventions, as well as for his paintings. Very few of his paintings have been preserved, partly because he often experimented with different methods of creating and applying paint, rather than using proven and reliable methods. The Last Supper (written between 1495 and 1498) was made in oil, but, unfortunately, Leonardo painted it on a damp wall, which caused the paint to crack. But even in poor condition (before restoration), the picture had the ability to excite emotions in everyone who sees it.
One of the distinctive features of Leonardo’s style was his method of portraying lights and darkness. The Italians called it dim light “sphumato”, which means smoky or foggy. The figures in the "Madonna of the Rocks" are veiled in a sphumato atmosphere. Their shapes and features are softly shaded. Leonardo achieved these effects using very subtle gradations of light and dark tones.
Rome
The culmination of Renaissance painting took place in the 16th century. At the same time, the center of art and culture moved from Florence to Rome. Under Pope Sixtus IV and his successor, Julius II, the city of Rome was gloriously and richly decorated by Renaissance artists. Some of the most ambitious projects of this period were launched during the papacy of Julius II. Julius commissioned the great sculptor and painter Michelangelo (1475-1564) to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and carve a sculpture for the tomb of the Pope. Julius also invited the painter Raphael (1483-1520) to help decorate the Vatican. With his assistants, Raphael painted four rooms of the Pope’s apartments in the Vatican Palace.
Michelangelo, a native Florentine, developed a monumental style of painting. The figures in his painting are so solid and voluminous that they look like sculptures. The Sistine ceiling, which took 4 years from Michelangelo, consists of hundreds of human figures from the Old Testament. To complete this grandiose fresco, Michelangelo had to lie on his back in the woods. The pensive face of Jeremiah among the prophets who surround the ceiling, some experts consider Michelangelo’s self-portrait.
Rafael came to Florence from Urbino as a very young man. In Florence, he absorbed the ideas of Leonardo and Michelangelo. By the time Rafael went to Rome to work in the Vatican, his style became one of the greatest in beauty. He especially loved his beautiful portraits of the Madonna and Child. They have been reproduced by thousands; they can be seen everywhere. His Madonna del Granduka is successful because of its simplicity. Timeless in its peace and purity, it is as attractive to us as it is to Italians of the Raphael era.
Venice
Venice was the main northern Italian Renaissance city. He was visited by artists from Flanders and other regions who knew about the Flemish experiments with oil paint. This stimulated the early use of oil technology in the Italian city. The Venetians learned to paint on tightly stretched canvas, rather than on the wooden panels commonly used in Florence.
Giovanni Bellini (1430-1515) was the greatest Venetian artist of the 15th century. He was also one of the first Italian artists to use oil on canvas. Giorgione (1478-1151) and Titian (1488-1515), who is the most famous of all Venetian artists, were apprentices in the Bellini workshop.
Master of oil engineering Titian painted huge canvases in warm, saturated colors. In his mature paintings, he sacrificed details to create stunning effects, such as in "Madonna Pesaro." He used large brushes to make large strokes. His colors are especially rich because he patiently created glazes of contrasting colors. Usually, glazes were applied to a brown tempered surface, which gave the picture a uniform tone.
Another great 16th-century Venetian artist was Tintoretto (1518-1594). Unlike Titian, he usually worked directly on canvas without preliminary sketches or contours. He often distorted his forms (twisted them) for the sake of composition and drama of the plot. His technique, which includes broad strokes and dramatic contrasts of light and darkness, seems very modern.
The artist Kyriakos Teotokopoulos (1541-1614) was known as El Greco ("Greek"). Born on the island of Crete, which was occupied by the Venetian army, El Greco was trained by Italian artists. As a young man, he went to study in Venice. The combined influence of Byzantine art, which he saw around him in Crete, and Italian Renaissance art, made El Greco’s work outstanding.
In his paintings, he distorted natural forms and used even stranger, more unearthly colors than Tintoretto, whom he admired. Later, El Greco moved to Spain, where the gloom of Spanish art influenced his work. In his dramatic vision of Toledo, a storm rages over the deathly silence of the city. Cold blues, greens and blue-white shades spread cold over the landscape.
Renaissance in Flanders and Germany
The golden age of painting in Flanders (now part of Belgium and northern France) was the 15th century, the time of van Eyck. In the 16th century, many Flemish artists imitated Italian Renaissance artists. However, some Flemings continued the Flemish tradition of realism. Then, genre painting spread - scenes from everyday life, which were sometimes charming and sometimes fantastic. Jerome Bosch (1450-1515), who preceded genre artists, had an unusually vivid imagination. He invented all sorts of strange, grotesque creatures for The Temptation of St. Anthony. " Peter Bruegel the Elder (1525-1569) also worked in the Flemish tradition, but added to his genre scenes the perspective and other characteristics of the Renaissance.
Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528), Hans Holbein the Younger (1497-1543) and Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553) were the three most important German artists of the 16th century. They did a lot to mitigate the gloomy realism of early German painting. Dürer at least once had a visit to Italy, where he was impressed by paintings by Giovanni Bellini and other northern Italians. Through this experience, he instilled in German painting a knowledge of perspective, a sense of color and light, and a new understanding of composition. Holbein learned even more Italian achievements. His sensitive drawing and ability to choose only the most important details made him a portrait painter.
Baroque painting
The 17th century is known in art as the Baroque period. In Italy, the artists Caravaggio (1571-1610) and Annibale Carracci (1560-1609) presented two contrasting points of view. Caravaggio (real name Michelangelo Merisi) has always taken inspiration directly from the realities of life. One of his main problems was to copy nature as accurately as possible, without glorifying it in any way. Carracci, on the other hand, followed the ideal of beauty of the Renaissance. He studied ancient sculpture and the work of Michelangelo, Raphael and Titian. Caravaggio’s style delighted many artists, especially the Spaniard Ribera and the young Velazquez. Carracci inspired Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665), a famous French painter of the 17th century.
Spain
Diego Velazquez (1599-1660), the court painter of the Spanish king Philip IV, was one of the greatest of all Spanish artists. A fan of Titian’s work, he was a master at using rich, harmonious colors. No artist could better create the illusion of rich tissue or human skin. The portrait of the little Prince Philip Prosper shows this skill.
Flanders
The paintings of the Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) represent the embodiment of the full-color baroque style. They are bursting with energy, color and light. Rubens broke with the Flemish tradition of painting small paintings. His canvases are huge, filled with human figures. He received more orders and larger paintings than he could complete. Therefore, he often drew only a small color sketch. Then his assistants transferred the sketch to a large canvas and finished the painting under the guidance of Rubens.
Holland
The achievements of the Dutch painter Rembrandt (1606-1669) are among the most outstanding in history. He had a wonderful gift - to accurately capture and convey human emotions. Like Titian, he worked for a long time on the creation of multi-layer paintings. Earthly colors - yellow ocher, brown and brown-red - were his favorites. His paintings are made mainly in dark colors. The importance of dark multi-layer parts makes his technique unusual. The emphasis is conveyed by bright lighting relative to bright areas.
Jan Vermeer (1632-1675) was in one of the groups of Dutch artists who wrote modest scenes of everyday life. He was a master at drawing any textures - satin, Persian carpets, bread crusts, metal. The general impression of Vermeer’s interior is a sunny, cheerful room filled with iconic household items.
18th century painting
In the 18th century, Venice produced several beautiful artists. The most famous was Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696-1770). He decorated the interiors of palaces and other buildings with grandiose colorful murals representing scenes of wealth. Francesco Guardi (1712-1793) was very skilled with a brush, with just a few spots of color he could conjure up the idea of a tiny figure in a boat. Spectacular views of Antonio Canaletto (1697-1768) sang the past glory of Venice.
France: Rococo style
In France, a taste for pastel colors and intricate finishes in the early 18th century led to the development of the Rococo style. Jean Antoine Watteau (1684-1721), the court painter of King Louis XV, and later Francois Boucher (1703-1770) and Jean Honore Fragonard (1732-1806) were associated with the trends of Rococo. Watteau painted dreamy visions, a life in which everything is fun. At the heart of the style are picnics in parks, forest parties, where funny gentlemen and elegant ladies have fun in nature.
Other 18th-century artists depicted scenes of ordinary middle-class life. Like the Dutch Vermeer, Jean Baptiste Simeon Chardin (1699-1779) appreciated simple home stories and still lifes. Its colors are sober and calm compared to Watteau.
England
In the XVIII century, the British first developed a separate school of painting. The core consisted mainly of portrait painters, influenced by artists of the Venetian Renaissance. Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792) and Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788) are the most famous. Reynolds, who traveled around Italy, followed the ideals of Renaissance painting. His portraits, charming and touching, are not particularly interesting in color or texture. Gainsborough, on the other hand, had a brilliance. The surfaces of his paintings glow with a radiant color.
19th century painting
The 19th century is sometimes seen as the period during which contemporary art began to take shape. One of the important reasons for the so-called revolution in art at that time was the invention of the camera, which forced artists to reconsider the purpose of painting.
A more significant development was the widespread use of prefabricated paints. Until the 19th century, most artists or their assistants made their own paints by grinding pigment. Early commercial paints were inferior to hand paints. Artists at the end of the 19th century found that the dark blue and brown tones of earlier paintings became black or gray for several years. They again began using pure colors to preserve their work, and sometimes because they tried to more accurately reflect sunlight in street scenes.
Spain: Goya
Francisco Goya (1746-1828) was the first great Spanish artist to appear from the 17th century. As a favorite artist of the Spanish court, he made many portraits of the royal family. The royal characters are equipped with elegant clothes and beautiful jewelry, but on some of their faces all that is reflected is vanity and greed. In addition to portraits, Goya painted dramatic scenes such as May 3, 1808. This painting depicts a performance by a group of Spanish rebels by French soldiers. Bold contrasts of light and dark and gloomy colors, pierced by red splashes, cause a gloomy horror of the spectacle.
Although France was a great center of art in the 1800s, English landscape painters John Constable (1776-1837) and Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) made a valuable contribution to 19th-century painting. Both were interested in the painting of light and air, two aspects of nature that artists of the 19th century fully explored. The constable used a technique known as division, or broken color. He used contrasting colors over the foreground color. He often used a palette knife to apply color tightly. The painting "Hay Wain" made him famous after the show in Paris in 1824. This is a simple village haymaking scene. Clouds drift over meadows covered with spots of sunlight. Turner’s paintings are more dramatic than that of Constable, who painted the majestic sights of nature - storms, seascapes, glowing sunsets,high mountains. Often, a golden haze partially hides objects in his paintings, making them seem floating in infinite space.
France
The period of Napoleon’s reign and the French Revolution marked the emergence of two opposing trends in French art - classicism and romanticism. Jacques-Louis David (1748-1825) and Jean-Auguste Dominique Ingres (1780-1867) were inspired by ancient Greek and Roman art and the Renaissance. They emphasized details and used color to create solid shapes. As a favorite artist of the revolutionary government, David often wrote historical events of that period. In his portraits, such as Madame Recamier, he sought to achieve classical simplicity.
Theodore Gerico (1791-1824) and the romantic Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) rebelled against the style of David. For Delacroix, color was the most important element in painting and he did not have the patience to imitate classical statues. Instead, he admired Ruben and the Venetians. He chose colorful, exotic themes for his paintings, which sparkle with light and are full of movement.
The artists of Barbizon were also part of the general romantic movement, which lasted from about 1820 to 1850. They worked near the village of Barbizon on the edge of the Fontainebleau Forest. They drew inspiration from nature and finished paintings in their studios.
Other artists have experimented with everyday ordinary objects. The landscapes of Jean Baptiste Camille Corot (1796-1875) reflect his love of nature, and his studies of the human body show a kind of balanced calm. Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) called himself a realist because he portrayed the world as he saw it - even its harsh, unpleasant side. He limited his palette to just a few gloomy colors. Edouard Manet (1832-1883) also took the basis for his stories from the outside world. People were shocked by its colorful contrasts and unusual tricks. On the surfaces of his paintings there is often a flat, patterned texture of strokes. Manet’s methods for applying light effects to form have affected young artists, especially the impressionists.
Working in the 1870s and 1880s, a group of artists known as impressionists wanted to portray nature exactly as it was. They went much further than Constable, Turner, and Manet in studying the effects of light in color. Some of them have developed scientific color theories. Claude Monet (1840-1926) often wrote the same look at different times of the day to show how it changes in different lighting conditions. Whatever the subject, his paintings consist of hundreds of tiny brush strokes located next to each other, often in contrasting colors. At a distance, the strokes mix to create the impression of solid shapes. Pierre Auguste Renoir (1841-1919) used the methods of impressionism to capture the holiday of Parisian life. In his Dance at the Moulins de la Galette, people in brightly colored clothes crowded and danced merrily.Renoir painted the whole picture in small strokes. Dots and strokes of paint create a texture on the surface of the painting, which gives it a special look. Crowds of people seem to dissolve in sunlight and flickering color.
20th century painting
A number of artists soon became dissatisfied with impressionism. Artists such as Paul Cezanne (1839-1906) felt that impressionism did not describe the strength of forms in nature. Cezanne loved to draw still lifes, because they allowed him to concentrate on the shape of fruits or other objects and their arrangement. The objects of his still lifes look solid because he reduced them to simple geometric shapes. His technique of staining paint stains and short, rich-color strokes side by side shows that he learned a lot from the Impressionists.
Vincent Van Gogh (1853-90) and Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) reacted to the realism of the Impressionists. Unlike the Impressionists, who said that they objectively considered nature, Van Gogh cared little for accuracy. He often distorted objects to express his thoughts more creatively. He used impressionist principles to place contrasting colors next to each other. Sometimes he squeezed the paint from the tubes directly onto the canvas, as in The Field of Yellow Corn.
Gauguin did not care about the spotty color of the impressionists. He gently applied color to large flat areas that he separated from each other with lines or dark edges. Colorful tropical peoples provided most of his stories.
Cezanne’s method of creating space using simple geometric shapes was developed by Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), Georges Braque (1882-1963) and others. Their style became known as Cubism. The Cubists painted objects as if they could be seen from several angles at once, or as if they were dismantled and assembled on a flat canvas. Often objects were not like anything existing in nature. Sometimes cubists carved figures from fabric, cardboard, wallpaper or other materials and pasted them onto the canvas to make a collage. Textures also varied, adding sand or other substances to the paint.
More recent trends have focused less on the topic. Composition and image technique began to gain more emphasis.
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