Portal:Painting
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The Painting Portal
Painting is a visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and airbrushes, may be used.
In art, the term "painting" describes both the act and the result of the action (the final work is called "a painting"). The support for paintings includes such surfaces as walls, paper, canvas, wood, glass, lacquer, pottery, leaf, copper and concrete, and the painting may incorporate multiple other materials, including sand, clay, paper, plaster, gold leaf, and even whole objects.
Painting is an important form of visual art, bringing in elements such as drawing, composition, gesture, narration, and abstraction. Paintings can be naturalistic and representational (as in still life and landscape painting), photographic, abstract, narrative, symbolistic (as in Symbolist art), emotive (as in Expressionism) or political in nature (as in Artivism).
A portion of the history of painting in both Eastern and Western art is dominated by religious art. Examples of this kind of painting range from artwork depicting mythological figures on pottery, to Biblical scenes on the Sistine Chapel ceiling, to scenes from the life of Buddha (or other images of Eastern religious origin). (Full article...)
Selected general articles
- Image 1The Peintres de la Réalité [pɛ͂tʀ də la ʀealite] (French for "Painters of Reality") were founded after the Second World War by Henri Cadiou to connect artists who were specialized on still life and genre motifs. It later evolved to the Mouvement trompe l'oeil / Réalité. The painting of the group is no reappearance of antiquity or of the 17th century, but the logical consequence of the place in the 20th century development of a realism that has taken over the sequence of surrealism to the modern trompe-l'œil to lead.
1973, the group exhibited at the Cultural Center of New York and the Corcoran Gallery in Washington. In 1989, after the death of Henri Cadiou, Pierre Gilou continued his father's work within the group. In 1993, the group had a sensational success as part of the Grand Palais in Paris, the exhibition "le triomphe du trompe-l'oeil" had more than 65,000 visitors in two weeks. (Full article...) - Image 2Oil painting reproductions are paintings that have been created by copying in oils an original oil painting by an artist.
Oil painting reproductions are distinct from original oil painting such as are often of interest to collectors and museums. Oil painting reproduction can, however, sometimes be regarded as artworks in themselves. (Full article...) - Image 3
Grand manner refers to an idealized aesthetic style derived from classicism and the art of the High Renaissance. In the eighteenth century, British artists and connoisseurs used the term to describe paintings that incorporated visual metaphors in order to suggest noble qualities. It was Sir Joshua Reynolds who gave currency to the term through his Discourses on Art, a series of lectures presented at the Royal Academy from 1769 to 1790, in which he contended that painters should perceive their subjects through generalization and idealization, rather than by the careful copy of nature. Reynolds never actually uses the phrase, referring instead to the "great style" or "grand style", in reference to history painting:
:How much the great style exacts from its professors to conceive and represent their subjects in a poetical manner, not confined to mere matter of fact, may be seen in the cartoons of Raffaelle. In all the pictures in which the painter has represented the apostles, he has drawn them with great nobleness; he has given them as much dignity as the human figure is capable of receiving yet we are expressly told in Scripture they had no such respectable appearance; and of St. Paul in particular, we are told by himself, that his bodily presence was mean. Alexander is said to have been of a low stature: a painter ought not so to represent him. Agesilaus was low, lame, and of a mean appearance. None of these defects ought to appear in a piece of which he is the hero. In conformity to custom, I call this part of the art history painting; it ought to be called poetical, as in reality it is.
Originally applied to history painting, regarded as the highest in the hierarchy of genres, the Grand Manner came thereafter also to be applied to portrait painting, with sitters depicted life size and full-length, in surroundings that conveyed the nobility and elite status of the subjects. Common metaphors included the introduction of classical architecture, signifying cultivation and sophistication, and pastoral backgrounds, which implied a virtuous character of unpretentious sincerity undefiled by the possession of great wealth and estates. (Full article...) - Image 4
Live painting is a form of visual performance art in which artists complete a visual art piece in a public performance, often at a bar, music concert, wedding reception, or public event, accompanied by a DJ or live music. The artwork which is created live may be planned or improvisational. This live art form is often contrasted with more studied fine art compositions from the same artists, which are generally executed in an artist studio or other private space.
Artists in a number of genres have performed live painting, including LeRoy Neiman creating a painting during the 1976 Summer Olympics. In the 1990s and 2000s, live painting became a hallmark of street art and graffiti artists. (Full article...) - Image 5
Raking light, the illumination of objects from a light source at an oblique angle or almost parallel to the surface, provides information on the surface topography and relief of the artefact thus lit. It is widely used in the examination of works of art. (Full article...) - Image 6
Digital painting is an art medium created with computer technologies. It employs pixels (picture elements) which are assigned a color to create imagery. It is also known as raster graphics. It is called digital painting because it initially distinguished itself from vector graphics in its ability to render gradiated or blended colors in imagery which mimicked traditional drawing and painting media. (Full article...) - Image 7
A self-portrait is a portrait of an artist made by themselves. Although self-portraits have been made since the earliest times, it is not until the Early Renaissance in the mid-15th century that artists can be frequently identified depicting themselves as either the main subject, or as important characters in their work. With better and cheaper mirrors, and the advent of the panel portrait, many painters, sculptors and printmakers tried some form of self-portraiture. Portrait of a Man in a Turban by Jan van Eyck of 1433 may well be the earliest known panel self-portrait. He painted a separate portrait of his wife, and he belonged to the social group that had begun to commission portraits, already more common among wealthy Netherlanders than south of the Alps. The genre is venerable, but not until the Renaissance, with increased wealth and interest in the individual as a subject, did it become truly popular.
By the Baroque period, most artists with an established reputation at least left drawings of themselves. Printed portraits of artists had a market, and many were self-portraits. They were also sometimes given as gifts to family and friends. If nothing else, they avoided the need to arrange for a model, and for the many professional portrait-painters, a self-portrait kept in the studio acted as a demonstration of the artist's skill for potential new clients. The unprecedented number of self-portraits by Rembrandt, both as paintings and prints, made clear the potential of the form, and must have further encouraged the trend. (Full article...) - Image 8
Abstract art uses visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world.
Western art had been, from the Renaissance up to the middle of the 19th century, underpinned by the logic of perspective and an attempt to reproduce an illusion of visible reality. By the end of the 19th century many artists felt a need to create a new kind of art which would encompass the fundamental changes taking place in technology, science and philosophy. The sources from which individual artists drew their theoretical arguments were diverse, and reflected the social and intellectual preoccupations in all areas of Western culture at that time. (Full article...) - Image 9
French standard sizes for oil paintings refers to a series of different sized canvases for use by artists. The sizes were fixed in the 19th century. Most artists[weasel words]—not only French—used this standard, as it was supported by the main suppliers of artist materials. Only some contemporary artist material suppliers continue to use these standards today, as most artists no longer differentiate canvas sizes by subject.
The main separation from size 0 (toile de 0) to size 120 (toile de 120) is divided in separate runs for faces/portraits (figure), landscapes (paysage), and marines (marine) which more or less keep the diagonal. That is, a figure 0 corresponds in height to a paysage 1 and a marine 2.
In modern times in the USA size is usually stated height by width, where as in this article it is width by height. (Full article...) - Image 10The idea of founding a theory of painting after the model of music theory was suggested by Goethe in 1807 and gained much regard among the avant-garde artists of the 1920s, the Weimar culture period, like Paul Klee. (Full article...)
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In the art world, if an artwork exists in several versions, the one known or believed to be the earliest is called the prime version. Many artworks produced in media such as painting or carved sculpture which create unique objects are in fact repeated by their artists, often several times. It is regarded as a matter of some importance both by art historians and the art market to establish which version has "priority", that is to say was the original work. The presumption usually is that the prime version is the finest, and perhaps the most carefully done, though some later versions can be argued to improve on the originals.
In many periods the later "repetitions" were often produced by the workshop of the master, with varying degrees of supervision and direct attention from him. This was especially the case with official portraits of monarchs and politicians, which in the Early Modern period were often ordered in large numbers of versions from the court artist as diplomatic gifts. "Prime version" is normally only used when there is another version by the same artist, or his workshop. Other versions by other artists are called copies. Sometimes "reduced versions" that are considerably smaller than the prime one are made. Especially in the case of 19th-century repetitions, the term autograph replica is used of repetitions by the original artist. (Full article...) - Image 12
Signwriters design, manufacture and install signs, including advertising signs for shops, businesses and public facilities as well as signs for transport systems. (Full article...) - Image 13
Painterliness is a concept based on German: malerisch ('painterly'), a word popularized by Swiss art historian Heinrich Wölfflin (1864–1945) to help focus, enrich and standardize the terms being used by art historians of his time to characterize works of art.
A painting is said to be painterly when there are visible brushstrokes in the final work – the result of applying paint in a manner that is not entirely controlled, generally without closely following carefully drawn lines. Any painting media – oils, acrylics, watercolors, gouache, etc. – can produce either linear or painterly work. Some artists whose work could be characterized as painterly are Pierre Bonnard, Francis Bacon, Vincent van Gogh, Rembrandt, Renoir, John Singer Sargent, and Andrew Wyeth (his early watercolors). The Impressionists, Fauvists and the Abstract Expressionists tended strongly to be painterly. (Full article...) - Image 14In painting, local color is the color of an object when seen under flat white light with no adjustment for form shadow or colors of light or secondary light sources. An example would be the assumption that an apple is "red" when it is actually dependent on the color of the light hitting it, color of objects around it, glossiness, and variations within the colors on the surface of the apple itself. Local color is learned in childhood to help simplify and make sense of the world. Coloring books reinforce the idea of simplifying colors. "The sky is blue", "grass is green", etc. when there are actually myriad variations in hue, chroma, within these areas. In order to represent objects realistically, painters must look beyond the simplifications of local color. Demonstrations of color constancy show how flawed local color assumptions can be when the light source has a color shift.
In contemporary sculpture local color is the original color of the raw material that remains unpainted in the completed work. (Full article...) - Image 15A problem picture is a genre of art popular in late Victorian painting, characterised by the deliberately ambiguous depiction of a key moment in a narrative that can be interpreted in several different ways, or which portrays an unresolved dilemma. It has some relation to the problem play. The viewer of the picture is invited to speculate about several different possible explanations of the scene. The genre has much in common with that of book illustration, then at its most popular, but with the text belonging to the illustration omitted.
The genre began to emerge in the second half of the nineteenth century, along with the development of book illustrations that depicted "pregnant" moments in a narrative. One of the earliest problem pictures is John Everett Millais' Trust Me, which depicts an older man demanding that a young woman hand him a letter she has received. Either character might be uttering the words. The significance and content of the letter is left to the imagination. Their relationship is also unclear; in view of their ages, they might be a married couple, or a father and daughter. (Full article...) - Image 16
Tenebrism, from Italian tenebroso ("dark, gloomy, mysterious"), also occasionally called dramatic illumination, is a style of painting using especially pronounced chiaroscuro, where there are violent contrasts of light and dark, and where darkness becomes a dominating feature of the image. The technique was developed to add drama to an image through a spotlight effect, and is common in Baroque paintings. Tenebrism is used only to obtain a dramatic impact while chiaroscuro is a broader term, also covering the use of less extreme contrasts of light to enhance the illusion of three-dimensionality. (Full article...) - Image 17
Architectural painting (also Architecture painting) is a form of genre painting where the predominant focus lies on architecture, including both outdoor and interior views. While architecture was present in many of the earliest paintings and illuminations, it was mainly used as background or to provide rhythm to a painting. In the Renaissance, architecture was used to emphasize the perspective and create a sense of depth, like in Masaccio's Holy Trinity from the 1420s.
In Western art, architectural painting as an independent genre developed in the 16th century in Flanders and the Netherlands, and reached its peak in 16th and 17th century Dutch painting. Later, it developed in a tool for Romantic paintings, with e.g. views of ruins becoming very popular. Closely related genres are architectural fantasies and trompe-l'oeils, especially illusionistic ceiling painting, and cityscapes. (Full article...) - Image 18A range-finder painting, sometimes called range-finding painting, is a large landscape painting produced as a training device to help gunners improve their accuracy. Historically, the best-documented use of such paintings was in the United States during World War I. (Full article...)
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Genre art is the pictorial representation in any of various media of scenes or events from everyday life, such as markets, domestic settings, interiors, parties, inn scenes, work, and street scenes. Such representations (also called genre works, genre scenes, or genre views) may be realistic, imagined, or romanticized by the artist. Some variations of the term genre art specify the medium or type of visual work, as in genre painting, genre prints, genre photographs, and so on.
The following concentrates on painting, but genre motifs were also extremely popular in many forms of the decorative arts, especially from the Rococo of the early 18th century onwards. Single figures or small groups decorated a huge variety of objects such as porcelain, furniture, wallpaper, and textiles. (Full article...) - Image 20
Pinxit (from Latin: 'one painted') is a stylized amendment added to the signature depiction of the name of the person responsible for a work of art, found conventionally in the Late Middle Ages and the Renaissance. It is sometimes abbreviated P, PIN, or PINX, as in some paintings by Raphael. The locution me pinxit is found on a 12th-century crucifix, not in a sense connected to individual authorship but rather as a more impersonal devotional statement, a "pious [formula] appropriate for liturgical gifts".
Its use by Duccio c. 1255–1260 – c. 1318–1319) on the Maestà in Siena Cathedral is seen as an "audacious" claim by the author, who asserts an individual status on a par with that of the city. By the Late Middle Ages in Venice and elsewhere pinxit (or other forms of pingere, in Gothic lettering) had become customary, and was often found on a cartellino, "any form of fictive paper carrying an inscription", established in Venice by the 1440s. Other verbs used to establish authorship include conjugations of facere ("to make"; fecit ("made by") was frequently used by Titian) or fingere ("to conceive"). (Full article...) - Image 21
Genre painting (or petit genre), a form of genre art, depicts aspects of everyday life by portraying ordinary people engaged in common activities. One common definition of a genre scene is that it shows figures to whom no identity can be attached either individually or collectively, thus distinguishing it from history paintings (also called grand genre) and portraits. A work would often be considered as a genre work even if it could be shown that the artist had used a known person—a member of his family, say—as a model. In this case it would depend on whether the work was likely to have been intended by the artist to be perceived as a portrait—sometimes a subjective question. The depictions can be realistic, imagined, or romanticized by the artist. Because of their familiar and frequently sentimental subject matter, genre paintings have often proven popular with the bourgeoisie, or middle class.
Genre subjects appear in many traditions of art. Painted decorations in ancient Egyptian tombs often depict banquets, recreation, and agrarian scenes, and Peiraikos is mentioned by Pliny the Elder as a Hellenistic panel painter of "low" subjects, such as survive in mosaic versions and provincial wall-paintings at Pompeii: "barbers' shops, cobblers' stalls, asses, eatables and similar subjects". Medieval illuminated manuscripts often illustrated scenes of everyday peasant life, especially in the Labours of the Months in the calendar section of books of hours, most famously the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry. (Full article...) - Image 22
Oil painting is a painting method involving the procedure of painting with pigments with a medium of drying oil as the binder. It has been the most common technique for artistic painting on canvas, wood panel or copper for several centuries, spreading from Europe to the rest of the world. The advantages of oil for painting images include "greater flexibility, richer and denser colour, the use of layers, and a wider range from light to dark". But the process is slower, especially when one layer of paint needs to be allowed to dry before another is applied.
The oldest known oil paintings were created by Buddhist artists in Afghanistan and date back to the 7th century AD. Oil paint was used by Europeans for painting statues and woodwork from at least the 12th century, but its common use for painted images began with Early Netherlandish painting in Northern Europe, and by the height of the Renaissance, oil painting techniques had almost completely replaced the use of egg tempera paints for panel paintings in most of Europe, though not for Orthodox icons or wall paintings, where tempera and fresco, respectively, remained the usual choice. (Full article...) - Image 23Historic paint analysis, or architectural paint research, is the scientific analysis of a broad range of architectural finishes, and is primarily used to determine the color and behavior of surface finishes at any given point in time. This helps us to understand the building's structural history and how its appearance has changed over time.
Historic paint analysis shares a common methodology with the conservation and restoration of paintings used to conserve and restore two- and three dimensional works of art. This involves the identification of components such as organic or inorganic pigments and dyes contained in the pigments. Historic paint analysis also identifies the pigments' media of suspension such as (water, oil, or latex and the paints' associated substrate. A variety of techniques are used to identify and analyze the pigment layers and finish exposure, including Finish Exposure, optical microscopy, fluorescent light microscopy, polarized light microscopy, and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy. (Full article...) - Image 24The paint and sip industry is a set of experience-based businesses that hire professional artists to provide step-by-step instructions to reproduce a pre-selected work of art while they drink wine or other beverages. When class attendees finish, they get to keep their creations. (Full article...)
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The Boston School was a group of Boston-based painters active in the first three decades of the twentieth century. Often classified as American Impressionists, they had their own regional style, combining the painterliness of Impressionism with a more conservative approach to figure painting and a marked respect for the traditions of Western art history. Their preferred subject matter was genteel: portraits, picturesque landscapes, and young women posing in well-appointed interiors. Major influences included John Singer Sargent, Claude Monet, and Jan Vermeer. Key figures in the Boston School were Edmund C. Tarbell, Frank Weston Benson, and William McGregor Paxton, all of whom trained in Paris at the Académie Julian and later taught at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts. Their influence can still be seen in the work of some contemporary Boston-area artists. (Full article...)
Selected painting techniques
- Image 1Speed painting is an artistic technique where the artist has a limited time to finish the work. The time can vary, usually a duration is set from several minutes to a few hours. Unlike sketches, speed paintings may be considered "finished" after the time limit is up.
Speed painting is particularly common among digital media artists, because digital painting mediums allow for a work to circumvent drying times of traditional media. Digital media artists primarily use speed painting to practice working quickly and efficiently. Speed painting techniques are also frequently used in concept art, particularly in the early stages of a production when the polish of an individual image matters less than a clear basic presentation of many candidate concepts for consideration. (Full article...) - Image 2
Fresco-secco (or a secco or fresco finto) is a wall painting technique where pigments mixed with an organic binder and/or lime are applied onto dry plaster. The paints used can e.g. be casein paint, tempera, oil paint, silicate mineral paint. If the pigments are mixed with lime water or lime milk and applied to a dry plaster the technique is called lime secco painting.
The secco technique contrasts with the fresco technique, where the painting is executed on a layer of wet plaster.
Because the pigments do not become part of the wall, as in buon fresco, fresco-secco paintings are less durable. The colors may flake off the painting as time goes by, but this technique has the advantages of a longer working time and retouchability. In Italy, the fresco technique was reintroduced around 1300 and led to an increase in the general quality of mural painting. This technological change coincided with the realistic turn in Western art and the changing liturgical use of murals. (Full article...) - Image 3Shaped canvases are paintings that depart from the normal flat, rectangular configuration. Canvases may be shaped by altering their outline, while retaining their flatness. An ancient, traditional example is the tondo, a painting on a round panel or canvas: Raphael, as well as some other Renaissance painters, sometimes chose this format for madonna paintings. Alternatively, canvases may be altered by losing their flatness and assuming a three-dimensional surface. Or, they can do both. That is, they can assume shapes other than rectangles, and also have surface features that are three-dimensional. Arguably, changing the surface configuration of the painting transforms it into a sculpture. But shaped canvases are generally considered paintings.
Apart from any aesthetic considerations, there are technical matters, having to do with the very nature of canvas as a material, that tend to support the flat rectangle as the norm for paintings on canvas. (Full article...) - Image 4
A licked finish is a hallmark of French academic art. It refers to the process of smoothing the surface quality of a painting so that the presence of the artist's hand is no longer visible. It was codified by the French Academy in the eighteenth century in order to distinguish 'professional' art from that produced by amateurs.
Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres summed up the academic technique: "The brushstroke, as accomplished as it may be, should not be visible: otherwise, it prevents the illusion, immobilizes everything. Instead of the object represented, it calls attention to the process: instead of the thought, it betrays the hand." (Full article...) - Image 5
Drybrush is a painting technique in which a paint brush that is relatively dry, but still holds paint, is used to create a drawing or painting. Load is applied to a dry support such as paper or primed canvas. The resulting brush strokes have a characteristic scratchy and textured look that lacks the smooth appearance that washes or blended paint commonly have. This technique can be used to achieve a blurred or soft appearance.
The technique of drybrush painting can be achieved with both water-based and oil-based media. With water-based media such as inks, acrylic paints, tempera paints or watercolor paints, the brush is usually dry or squeezed dry of all water. The brush is loaded with paint that is highly viscous or thick and then applied to a dry support. With other water-based media, the brush is loaded with paint and then squeezed dry. When using oil-based media,such as oil paint, similar techniques are used, although instead of water, the brush is used dry or any oil or solvent is removed. Because oil paint has a longer drying time than water-based media, brushing over or blending drybrush strokes is often avoided to preserve the distinctive look of the drybrush painting technique. (Full article...) - Image 6Mischtechnik or mixed technique is a term spanning various methods of layering paint, including the usage of different substances. The term gained popularity after Max Doerner's 1921 book The Materials of the Artist and Their Use in Painting: With Notes on the Techniques of the Old Masters However, Doerner made some conclusions about the usage by painters and Mischtechnik which today are no longer considered completely accurate. (Full article...)
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Tempera (Italian: [ˈtɛmpera]), also known as egg tempera, is a permanent, fast-drying painting medium consisting of pigments mixed with a water-soluble binder medium, usually glutinous material such as egg yolk. Tempera also refers to the paintings done in this medium. Tempera paintings are very long-lasting, and examples from the first century AD still exist. Egg tempera was a primary method of painting until after 1500 when it was superseded by oil painting. A paint consisting of pigment and binder commonly used in the United States as poster paint is also often referred to as "tempera paint", although the binders in this paint are different from traditional tempera paint. (Full article...) - Image 8
In painting, imprimatura is an initial stain of color painted on a ground. It provides a painter with a transparent, toned ground, which will allow light falling onto the painting to reflect through the paint layers. The term itself stems from the Italian and literally means "first paint layer". Its use as an underpainting layer can be dated back to the guilds and workshops during the Middle Ages; however, it came into standard use by painters during the Renaissance, particularly in Italy.
The imprimatura not only provides an overall tonal optical unity in a painting but is also useful in the initial stages of the work, since it helps the painter establish value relations from dark to light. It is most useful in the classical approach of indirect painting, where the drawing and underpainting are established ahead of time and allowed to dry. The successive layers of color are then applied in transparent glaze or semi-transparent layers. (Full article...) - Image 9Fat over lean refers to the principle in oil painting of applying paint with a higher oil to pigment ratio ('fat') over paint with a lower oil to pigment ratio ('lean') to ensure a stable paint film, since it is believed that the paint with the higher oil content remains more flexible.[dead link]
Oil paint dries at different rates due to the differing drying properties of the constituent pigment. However, everything else being equal, the higher the oil to pigment ratio, the longer the oil binder will take to oxidize, and the more flexible the paint film will be. Conversely, the lower the oil content, the faster the paint dries, and the more brittle it will be. Ignoring this practice, even in some alla prima painting, may result in a cracked and less durable paint film.[dead link] (Full article...) - Image 10Leaf painting is the process of painting with dyed leaves. Deriving from Japan, China or India, it became popular in Vietnam. Its two main forms are: Cutting and pasting dry leaf to make leaf paintings or using paint to draw onto the surface of dry leaf to make leaf paintings.
Every product is unique, quite different from the others because of the leaves' veins, the forms, and the colors before or after dying. (Full article...) - Image 11Marouflage is a technique for affixing a painted canvas (intended as a mural) to a wall, using an adhesive that hardens as it dries, such as plaster or cement. (Full article...)
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Painting is a visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called the "matrix" or "support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush, but other implements, such as knives, sponges, and airbrushes, may be used.
In art, the term "painting" describes both the act and the result of the action (the final work is called "a painting"). The support for paintings includes such surfaces as walls, paper, canvas, wood, glass, lacquer, pottery, leaf, copper and concrete, and the painting may incorporate multiple other materials, including sand, clay, paper, plaster, gold leaf, and even whole objects. (Full article...) - Image 13Nōtan (濃淡) is a Japanese design concept involving the play and placement of light and dark elements as they are placed next to the other in the composition of art and imagery. (Full article...)
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Grisaille (/ɡrɪˈzaɪ/ or /ɡrɪˈzeɪl/; French: grisaille, lit. 'greyed' French pronunciation: [ɡʁizaj], from gris 'grey') is a painting executed entirely in shades of grey or of another neutral greyish colour. It is particularly used in large decorative schemes in imitation of sculpture. Many grisailles include a slightly wider colour range.
A grisaille may be executed for its own sake, as an underpainting for an oil painting (in preparation for glazing layers of colour over it) or as a model from which an engraver may work (as was done by Rubens and his school). Full colouring of a subject makes many demands of an artist, and working in grisaille was often chosen as it may be quicker and cheaper than traditional painting, although the effect was sometimes deliberately chosen for aesthetic reasons. Grisaille paintings resemble the drawings, normally in monochrome, that artists from the Renaissance on were trained to produce; as with drawings, grisaille can betray the hand of a less-talented assistant more easily than would a fully coloured painting. (Full article...) - Image 15
Sfumato (English: /sfuːˈmɑːtoʊ/ sfoo-MAH-toh, Italian: [sfuˈmaːto]; lit. 'smoked off', i.e. 'blurred') is a painting technique for softening the transition between colours, mimicking an area beyond what the human eye is focusing on, or the out-of-focus plane. It is one of the canonical painting modes of the Renaissance. Leonardo da Vinci was the most prominent practitioner of sfumato, based on his research in optics and human vision, and his experimentation with the camera obscura. He introduced it and implemented it in many of his works, including the Virgin of the Rocks and in his famous painting of the Mona Lisa. He described sfumato as "without lines or borders, in the manner of smoke".
According to the theory of the art historian Marcia B. Hall, which has gained considerable acceptance, sfumato is one of four modes of painting colours available to Italian High Renaissance painters, along with cangiante, chiaroscuro, and unione. (Full article...) - Image 16
In art, craft, and engineering, masking is the use of materials to protect areas from change, or to focus change on other areas. This can describe either the techniques and materials used to control the development of a work of art by protecting a desired area from change; or a phenomenon that (either intentionally or unintentionally) causes a sensation to be concealed from conscious attention.
The term is derived from the word mask, in the sense that it hides the face from view. (Full article...) - Image 17
Shigajiku (Japanese: 詩画軸, "poem-and-painting scrolls"), are a form of Japanese ink wash painting. These hanging scrolls depict poetic inscriptions at the top of the scroll and a painted image, usually a landscape scene, below. Buddhist monks of the gozan 五山 or Five Mountain monasteries of the early Muromachi Period (1336-1573) first introduced the poem-and-painting scrolls.
Shigajiku is a modern category given to the visual and literary culture of the Muromachi Period rooted in the Zen tradition. The most common visual aesthetic for shigajiku is a monochrome water and ink style of painting, suibokuga 水墨画, with only occasional traces of color throughout the scroll. (Full article...) - Image 18Overspray refers to the application of any form of paint, varnish, stain or other non-water-soluble airborne particulate material onto an unintended location. This concept is most commonly encountered in graffiti, auto detailing, and when commercial paint jobs drift onto unintended objects. (Full article...)
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Fingerpaint is a kind of paint intended to be applied with the fingers; it typically comes in tubes and is used by small children, though it has occasionally been used by adults either to teach art to children, or for their own use. (Full article...) - Image 20Underdrawing is a preparatory drawing done on a painting ground before paint is applied, for example, an imprimatura or an underpainting. Underdrawing was used extensively by 15th century painters like Jan van Eyck and Rogier van der Weyden. These artists "underdrew" with a brush, using hatching strokes for shading, using water-based black paint, before underpainting and overpainting with oils. Cennino D'Andrea Cennini (14th century most likely) describes a different type of underdrawing, made with graded tones rather than hatching, for egg tempera.
In some cases, underdrawing can be clearly visualized using infrared reflectography because carbon black pigments absorb infrared light, whereas opaque pigments such as lead white are transparent with infrared light. Underdrawing in many works, for example, the Annunciation (van Eyck, Washington) or the Arnolfini Portrait, reveals that artists made alterations, sometimes radical ones, to their compositions. (Full article...) - Image 21A rotary atomizer is an automatic electrostatic paint applicator used in high volume, automatic production painting environments. Also called a 'paint bell', "rotary bell atomizer" or 'bell applicator', it is preferred for high volume paint application for its superior transfer efficiency, spray pattern consistency, and low compressed air consumption, when compared to a paint spray gun. It can be mounted in a fixed position, reciprocating arm, or an industrial robot. (Full article...)
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An atelier (French: [atəlje]) is the private workshop or studio of a professional artist in the fine or decorative arts or an architect, where a principal master and a number of assistants, students, and apprentices can work together producing fine art or visual art released under the master's name or supervision.
Ateliers were the standard vocational practice for European artists from the Middle Ages to the 19th century, and common elsewhere in the world. In medieval Europe this way of working and teaching was often enforced by local guild regulations, such as those of the painters' Guild of Saint Luke, and of other craft guilds. Apprentices usually began working on simple tasks when young, and after some years with increasing knowledge and expertise became journeymen, before possibly becoming masters themselves. This master-apprentice system was gradually replaced as the once powerful guilds declined, and the academy became a favored method of training. However, many professional artists continued using students and assistants as they had been in ateliers; sometimes the artist paid the student-assistants, while sometimes they paid the artist fees to learn. (Full article...) - Image 23
A double-sided painting is a canvas which has a painting on either side. Historically, artists would often paint on both sides out of need of material. The subject matter of the two paintings was sometimes, although not normally, related.
Restoring and displaying double-sided paintings can pose additional challenges for museums and galleries. When repairing canvases, restorers must ensure that their restoration efforts do not damage the image on either side. They must also use stretcher bars that do not obscure either side of the image, and they cannot use crossbars to help keep tension. (Full article...) - Image 24
Ombré /ˈɒmbreɪ/ (literally "shaded" in French) is the blending of one color hue to another, usually moving tints and shades from light to dark. It has become a popular feature for hair coloring, nail art, and even baking, in addition to its uses in home decorating and graphic design.
In contrast to ombré, sombré is a much softer and gradual shading of one color to another. (Full article...) - Image 25
A wash is a term for a visual arts technique resulting in a semi-transparent layer of colour. A wash of diluted ink or watercolor paint applied in combination with drawing is called pen and wash, wash drawing, or ink and wash. Normally only one or two colours of wash are used; if more colours are used the result is likely to be classified as a full watercolor painting.
The classic East Asian tradition of ink wash painting uses black ink in various levels of dilution. Historically associated with the four arts of the scholar-officials, the technique was often applied to landscapes in traditional Chinese, Japanese, and Korean painting. (Full article...)
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General images
- Image 1The oldest known figurative painting is a depiction of a bull that was discovered in the Lubang Jeriji Saléh cave in Indonesia. It was painted 40,000–52,000 years ago or earlier. (from Painting)
- Image 2An Ethiopian illuminated Evangelist portrait of Mark the Evangelist, from the Ethiopian Garima Gospels, 6th century AD, Kingdom of Aksum (from History of painting)
- Image 4Barnett Newman, Untitled Etching 1 (First Version), 1968, Minimalism (from History of painting)
- Image 9Jean Metzinger, La danse (Bacchante) (c. 1906), oil on canvas, 73 x 54 cm, Kröller-Müller Museum (from Painting)
- Image 13Pettakere Cave are more than 44,000 years old, Maros, South Sulawesi, Indonesia (from History of painting)
- Image 14Francisco de Zurbarán, Still Life with Pottery Jars (Spanish: Bodegón de recipientes) (1636), oil on canvas, 46 x 84 cm, Museo del Prado, Madrid (from Painting)
- Image 15Sesshū Tōyō, Landscapes of the Four Seasons (1486), ink and light color on paper (from Painting)
- Image 20Muromachi period, Shingei (1431–1485), Viewing a Waterfall, Nezu Museum, Tokyo. (from History of painting)
- Image 21Krishna and Radha, might be the work of Nihâl Chand, master of Kishangarh school of Rajput Painting (from Painting)
- Image 24Prehistoric cave painting of aurochs (French: Bos primigenius primigenius), Lascaux, France (from Painting)
- Image 29Loquats and Mountain Bird, anonymous artist of the Southern Song dynasty; paintings in leaf album style such as this were popular in the Southern Song (1127–1279). (from History of painting)
- Image 32An artistic depiction of a group of rhinos was painted in the Chauvet Cave 30,000 to 32,000 years ago. (from Painting)
- Image 33Spring Morning in the Han Palace, by Ming-era artist Qiu Ying (1494–1552 AD) (from History of painting)
- Image 36Pictographs from the Great Gallery, Canyonlands National Park, Horseshoe Canyon, Utah, c. 1500 BCE (from History of painting)
- Image 37Gwion Gwion rock paintings found in the north-west Kimberley region of Western Australia c. 15,000 BC (from History of painting)
- Image 39Mother Goddess A miniature painting of the Pahari style, dating to the eighteenth century. Pahari and Rajput miniatures share many common features. (from History of painting)
- Image 40Khan Bahadur Khan with Men of his Clan, c. 1815, from the Fraser Album, Company Style (from Painting)
- Image 41Diego Rivera, Recreation of Man at the Crossroads (renamed Man, Controller of the Universe), originally created in 1934, Mexican muralism movement (from History of painting)
- Image 44Rudolf Reschreiter, Blick von der Höllentalangerhütte zum Höllentalgletscher und den Riffelwandspitzen, Gouache (1921) (from Painting)
- Image 45Bharat Mata by Abanindranath Tagore (1871–1951), a nephew of the poet Rabindranath Tagore, and a pioneer of the movement (from History of painting)
- Image 48The Sakyamuni Buddha, by Zhang Shengwen, 1173–1176 AD, Song dynasty period. (from History of painting)
- Image 49Andreas Achenbach, Clearing Up, Coast of Sicily (1847), The Walters Art Museum (from Painting)
- Image 51Joan Miró, Horse, Pipe and Red Flower, 1920, abstract Surrealism, Philadelphia Museum of Art (from History of painting)
- Image 52Hand stencils in the "Tree of Life" cave painting in Gua Tewet, Kalimantan, Indonesia (from History of painting)
- Image 53Two Scribes Seated with Books and a Writing Table Fragment of a decorative margin Northern India (Mughal school), ca. 1640–1650 (from History of painting)
- Image 56Nino Pisano, Apelles or the Art of painting in detail (1334–1336); relief of the Giotto's Bell Tower in Florence, Italy
- Image 59Max Beckmann, The Night (Die Nacht), 1918–1919, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf (from History of painting)
- Image 64Mona Lisa (1503–1517) by Leonardo da Vinci is one of the world's most recognizable paintings. (from Painting)
- Image 66Jean de Court (attributed), painted Limoges enamel dish in detail (mid-16th century), Waddesdon Bequest, British Museum (from Painting)
- Image 69A fresco showing Hades and Persephone riding in a chariot, from the tomb of Queen Eurydice I of Macedon at Vergina, Greece, 4th century BC (from History of painting)
- Image 70The Eternal Father Painting the Virgin of Guadalupe. Attributed to Joaquín Villegas (1713 – active in 1753) (Mexican) (painter, Museo Nacional de Arte. (from History of painting)
- Image 71Cueva de las Manos (Spanish for Cave of the Hands) in the Santa Cruz province in Argentina, c. 7300 BC (from History of painting)
- Image 72Piet Mondrian, Composition en rouge, jaune, bleu et noir (1921), Gemeentemuseum Den Haag (from Painting)
- Image 74Marcel Duchamp, Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2, 1912, Philadelphia Museum of Art (from History of painting)
- Image 75Honoré Daumier, The Painter (1808–1879), oil on panel with visible brushstrokes (from Painting)
- Image 78Hellenistic Greek terracotta funerary wall painting, 3rd century BC (from History of painting)
- Image 80Silk painting depicting a man riding a dragon, painting on silk, dated to 5th–3rd century BC, Warring States period, from Zidanku Tomb no. 1 in Changsha, Hunan Province (from History of painting)
- Image 83Francis Picabia, (Left) Le saint des saints c'est de moi qu'il s'agit dans ce portrait, 1 July 1915; (center) Portrait d'une jeune fille americaine dans l'état de nudité, 5 July 1915: (right) J'ai vu et c'est de toi qu'il s'agit, De Zayas! De Zayas! Je suis venu sur les rivages du Pont-Euxin, New York, 1915 (from History of painting)
In the news
- 5 May 2024 –
- With the closing performance of the Celebration Tour at Copacabana Beach, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, American singer Madonna attracts 1.6 million people in a free concert and breaks the record for the most attended stand-alone concert by any artist, and the all-time highest attended concert by a female artist. (Billboard)
- 19 April 2024 –
- Taylor Swift releases her new album The Tortured Poets Department as a double album. On Spotify, the album breaks the record for most-streamed album in a single day and Swift becomes the most-streamed artist in a single day. (CBS News)
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General painting topics
- 20th-century Western painting
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Painting techniques
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