Middle Ages Painting (briefly)

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

The Middle Ages are often described as dark and gloomy. This was facilitated by religious wars, acts of the Inquisition, undeveloped medicine. However, the Middle Ages left many cultural monuments worthy of admiration for posterity. Architecture and sculpture did not stand still: absorbing the features of the time, they gave rise to new styles and trends. Along with them relentlessly went the painting of the Middle Ages. We will talk about her today.

In close cooperation

From the 11th to the 12th century, the Romanesque style dominated all European art. He received his main expression in architecture. The temples of that time are characterized by a three-, rarely five-nave structure of the basilica, narrow windows that do not give much light. Often the architecture of this period is called gloomy. The Romanesque style in painting of the Middle Ages was also distinguished by some severity. Almost entirely artistic culture was devoted to religious themes. Moreover, divine deeds were depictedin a rather formidable manner, in keeping with the spirit of the times. The masters did not set themselves the task of conveying the details of certain events. The focus of their attention was the sacred meaning, so the painting of the Middle Ages, briefly dwelling on the details, first of all conveyed a symbolic meaning, distorting the proportions and ratios for this.

Accents

Artists of that time did not know the perspective. On their canvases, the characters are on the same line. However, even with a fleeting glance, it is easy to understand which figure in the image is the main one. To establish a clear hierarchy of characters, the masters made some of them significantly superior in growth to others. So, the figure of Christ has always towered over the angels, and they, in turn, dominated the common people.

This technique also had a downside: it did not give much freedom in depicting the environment and background details. As a result, the painting of the Middle Ages of that period paid attention only to the main points, without bothering to capture the secondary. The paintings were a kind of scheme, conveying the essence, but not the nuances.

Plots

The painting of the European Middle Ages in the Romanesque style was replete with images of fantastic events and characters. Preference was often given to gloomy plots telling about the coming punishment of heaven or the monstrous deeds of the enemy of the human race. Scenes from the Apocalypse have become widespread.

Transition

Finethe art of the Romanesque period outgrew the painting of the early Middle Ages, when, under the pressure of historical events, many of its types practically disappeared and symbolism dominated. Frescoes and miniatures of the 11th-12th centuries, expressing the primacy of the spiritual over the material, paved the way for the further development of artistic trends. The painting of that period was an important transitional stage from the gloomy symbolic art of the fall of the Roman Empire and constant barbarian raids to a new qualitative level that originates in the Gothic era.

Favourable changes

Gothic painting of the Middle Ages largely owes its appearance to the transformations of religious life. So, by the beginning of the 13th century, almost all altars were supplemented with an altarpiece, consisting of two or three paintings and depicting scenes from holy scripture. The production of such works required from the master a deep understanding of his responsibility to God and parishioners, and at the same time provided great scope for using his own skills.

The growing order of the Franciscans also indirectly contributed to the development of painting. The charter prescribed a modest life for followers, and therefore mosaics were not suitable for decorating monasteries. She was replaced by wall painting.

The ideologist of the order, Francis of Assisi, brought changes not only to religious life, but also to the worldview of medieval man. Guided by his example of love for life in all its manifestations, artists began to pay more attention to reality. On artisticcanvases still of religious content began to appear details of the situation, written out as carefully as the main characters.

Italian Gothic

Painting of the Middle Ages on the territory of the heiress of the Roman Empire acquired many progressive features quite early. Here lived and worked Cimabue and Duccio, the two founders of visible realism, which until the 20th century remained the main trend in the fine arts of Europe. Their altarpieces often depicted the Madonna and Child.

Giotto di Bondone, who lived a little later, became famous for his paintings depicting quite earthly people. The characters on his canvases seem alive. Giotto was ahead of the era in many ways and only after a while was recognized as a great dramatic artist.

Murals

Painting of the Middle Ages in the Romanesque period was enriched with a new technique. Masters began to apply paint over the still damp plaster. This technique was associated with certain difficulties: the artist had to work quickly, writing out fragment after fragment in those places where the coating was still wet. But such a technique bore fruit: the paint, soaking into the plaster, did not crumble, became brighter and could remain intact for a very long time.

Perspective

Painting of the Middle Ages in Europe slowly gained depth. A significant role in this process was played by the desire to convey reality in the picture with all its volumes. Slowlyhoning their skills over the years, the artists learned to depict perspective, to give bodies and objects a resemblance to the original.

These attempts are clearly visible in the works related to the international or international Gothic, which had developed by the end of the 14th century. The painting of the Middle Ages of that period had special features: attention to small details, some refinement and sophistication in the transfer of the image, attempts to build perspective.

Book miniatures

The characteristic features of the painting of this period are most clearly visible in the small illustrations that adorned the books. Among all the masters of miniatures, the Limburg brothers, who lived at the beginning of the 15th century, deserve special mention. They worked under the auspices of Duke Jean of Berry, who was the younger brother of the King of France, Charles V. One of the most famous works of artists was the "Magnificent Hours of the Duke of Berry". He brought glory to both the brothers and their patron. However, by 1416, when the trace of the Limburgs was lost, it remained unfinished, but the twelve miniatures that the masters managed to write characterize both their talent and all the features of the genre.

Quality transformation

A little later, in the 30s of the XV century, painting was enriched with a new style, which subsequently had a huge impact on all fine arts. Oil paints were invented in Flanders. Vegetable oil, mixed with dyes, gave new properties to the composition. Colors are much more saturated and vibrant. In addition, the need to rush, which accompanied the painting with tempera, disappeared: the yolk that formed its basis dried out very quickly. Now the painter could work measuredly, paying due attention to all details. Layers of strokes, applied on top of each other, opened up hitherto unknown possibilities for the play of color. Oil paints thus opened up a whole new, unknown world to the masters.

Famous artist

The founder of a new trend in painting in Flanders is Robert Campin. However, his achievements were overshadowed by one of the followers, known today to almost everyone who is interested in the visual arts. It was Jan van Eyck. Sometimes the invention of oil paints is attributed to him. Most likely, Jan van Eyck only improved the already developed technology and successfully began to apply it. Thanks to his canvases, oil paints became popular and in the 15th century spread beyond the borders of Flanders - to Germany, France and then to Italy.

Jan van Eyck was a great portrait painter. The colors on his canvases create that play of light and shadow that many of his predecessors so lacked to convey reality. Among the famous works of the artist are "Madonna of Chancellor Rolin", "Portrait of the Arnolfinis". If you look closely at the latter, it becomes clear how significant Jan van Eyck's skill was. What are the meticulously written folds of clothes alone worth!

However, the main work of the master is the "Ghent Altar", consisting of 24 paintings anddepicting more than two hundred figures.

Jan van Eyck is rightfully called a representative of the Early Renaissance rather than the late Middle Ages. The Flemish school as a whole became a kind of intermediate stage, the logical continuation of which was the art of the Renaissance.

The painting of the Middle Ages, briefly covered in the article, is a huge cultural phenomenon both in time and in significance. Having gone from alluring, but inaccessible memories of the greatness of Antiquity to new discoveries of the Renaissance, she gave the world a lot of works that largely tell not about the formation of painting, but about the quest of the human mind, its understanding of its place in the Universe and its relationship with nature. Understanding the depth of the fusion of spirit and body, characteristic of the Renaissance, the significance of humanistic principles and some return to the basic canons of Greek and Roman fine arts will be incomplete without studying the era that preceded it. It was in the Middle Ages that a sense of the magnitude of the role of man in the Universe was born, so different from the usual image of an insect, whose fate is completely in the power of a formidable god.