What is the name of the artist's signature on the painting?

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

It often happens that, considering the picturesque works of old masters, we cannot determine with accuracy who is the author of this or that picture. modest "N. X." (unknown artist) in the lower right corner, as a rule, causes considerable annoyance. It is a little more pleasant to see an inscription beginning with the words "master …", but it is not particularly informative, because, as a rule, it is followed by the name of some little-known town or parish.

It all starts with the Renaissance

Artists of the Middle Ages hardly took the time to leave a sign on the picture indicating their authorship. This was facilitated by a number of reasons: work with a specific customer, the secondary position of the artist in comparison with God, who is the creator of all things, and, as a result, the lack of creative ambition and the desire to achieve fame.

It's another matter - ancient artists and sculptors who boldly signed their works sometimes with not one, but two signatures at once - a potterand an artist, which served as a kind of prototype for modern advertising.

Perhaps for this reason, it was Italian artists who were the first to lose their pretense of modesty, and by the end of the 15th century, almost all of them - masters of the Renaissance - left not only signatures on their works, but also indicated the time of creation and gave the necessary explanations to canvases. One of the clearest examples of artists' signatures in the paintings of this period is the signature of Albrecht Dürer, whose even earliest works were always accompanied by a detailed commentary.

I, Albrecht Dürer of Nuremberg, painted myself with eternal colors at the age of 28.

This signature was left by the master on his “Self-portrait in the image of Christ”, written in 1550

To the question of the term

Before looking at other examples of artists' signatures on paintings, let's understand the concepts. What is the correct name for these signatures?

In the glossary of terms presented on the website of the Russian Academy of Arts, such a concept as a signature is indicated. This is any designation by the artist of his authorship, which can be presented in the form of a signature, monogram or any other sign chosen at the discretion of the artist. It is clear that it is difficult to overestimate the value of the signature, because it is the evidence that the work belongs to a particular artist, allowing descendants and art historians to observe, study and study painting in relation to its author and period.

Naturally, the signatures of great artists in the paintings, as well as dating, increased the value several timesthese paintings, and hence their value. This was used by some especially self-confident artists. For example, the infamous Pablo Picasso. There are many legends about his excessive passion for money. Here is one of them.

Already reaching the pinnacle of his fame and gaining wide popularity around the world, Pablo continued to be very scrupulous about money. He tried to use every opportunity to keep his hard-earned money with him and famously circled the fingers of the owners of numerous restaurants, where he liked to relax in the company of his friends. Often, when the waiters brought the bill to the artist, he would make a sly face and answer in this way: "How about I just leave a small drawing on this form?"

But back to falsification. Often the signatures were forged, which misled viewers. But there were cases when fake signatures were good. For example, one of the paintings by the Dutch artist Josef Israels, presented in the collection of Christie's, was signed in the name of another Dutch artist - Bernardus Johannes Blommers. The falsification was committed during the Second World War, probably in order to hide the Jewish origin of its author and protect it from destruction.

In the early 2000s, the identity of the creator was definitely established, and the real signature of the artist on the painting was returned. The history of art knows many other similar examples, but in general, the falsification of signatures caused justified indignation of their creators, who were forced to defend their authorship in courts.

Now let's look at some signatures of artists in the paintings of the 19th century.

Pierre Auguste Renoir

For many impressionists, including Renoir, it was characteristic that throughout their career as an artist, the signatures in the paintings practically did not change.

Renoir put in the paintings only a neat stroke of his last name and added the year the painting was painted. In very rare cases, he used only the first letter - R. Interestingly, Renoir's autograph was quite different from the signature left by the artist in the paintings.

Gustav Klimt

The signature of this Austrian artist is beyond doubt, despite the fact that it looks very original and concise. Klimt divided his first and last name into two lines, placing one above the other. The writing itself is so unusual that now there is even a special font called Klimt.

Vincent van Gogh

The painting of the artist, so beloved by many contemporary art admirers, was focused during the years of his life on French society. However, during the Dutchman's visit to Paris, he noted that for many French, the pronunciation of his surname - van Gogh - seems very difficult. Because of this, the artist's signature in the painting was shortened to just the name, so as not to create additional phonetic difficulties for French friends.

Edvard Munch

Norwegian painter also preferred to sign all hispaintings, as well as photographs and letters. His signature ranged from a simple EM monogram to writing his full name. The most famous and common signature is a partially abbreviated form of the name - E. Munch or Edv. Munch.

Munch was an admirer of Van Gogh's work, and therefore he borrowed the idea for writing one of his paintings, "Starry Night", from an idol. Wanting to hide this circumstance, in the second version of "his" picture, he preferred to leave a barely noticeable signature, while on the first version it is completely absent.

Ivan Aivazovsky

Few people know that the real name of the artist is Hovhannes Ayvazyan. His father, having moved to Feodosia, for some time wrote his last name as "Gayvazovsky", allegedly in the Polish manner. And until the 1840s. the artist's signature on the painting was often simply designated "Guy", that is, an abbreviation for the father's surname. Later, he nevertheless decides to finally change his surname, he signs his later paintings with the familiar “Aivazovsky”.

It is also noteworthy that at the beginning of his career, Aivazovsky used the Cyrillic alphabet in his signature, but then, when his popularity gradually spread around the world, he began to resort to the Latin alphabet.

Fortunately, thanks to the development of the Internet, today there are many resources where photos of artists' signatures on paintings are freely available, which means that anyone who is interested in this topic can easily find themand explore. It's very simple.

Now that we know the names of the artist's signatures on the painting, we can decide for ourselves which of them has the most beautiful and original signatures.