Analysis Of The Electric La Belle Jardinière

922 Words2 Pages

“The Electric La Belle Jardinière compared with the mysterious Charity”
Raphael’s piece titled La Belle Jardinière (122x80cm), created in 1507 depicts Virgin Mary surrounded by two infants Jesus and John the Baptist. The present location of Raphael's painting is on the 1st floor of Musee du Louvre under the Roman section. It employs the classic pyramidal composition that is simple yet balanced and captivating. Art History has proven that the artist worked and mastered the gradated style, using classical imagery in a modern context, giving new meaning to a visual language. His imitation and expanding of Roman moodiness mixed spiritual and vernacular sensibilities to create work acceptable to patrons that also functioned as exercises in the portrayal …show more content…

He will then use implicit lines which are the strands of Virgin's hair that direct viewers’ eyes to the middle of the painting right above the rich tone of red in Mary's dress that highlights the natural beauty of the “Lady". Blocks of hair that are horizontal and vertical in certain places of her head echo the shape of her dress. Therefore, both lines and shift in color are used together in some places and separate in other places to create the shapes in the artwork. The light color of the empty space is visually light; therefore, it does not have as much weight as the darker, amber colors of the rest of the Virgin's dress. This visual lightness along with Virgin’s dress is strong enough to balance the multitude of the blue folding draper that fold down by her right solder and most part of the landscape that is on her back. In this piece, the light source is not seen. However, the natural light source coming from left of the artwork (if we face the Virgin) because Raphael uses a light ochre color on top of the brown color that is already present on the left side of Virgin’s face which makes it seem like a glow is cast upon her face. These warm colors make her stand out from the background. Also, the warm colors against a calming blue background give Virgin an ethereal quality. The other two figures in the artwork which happen to be in front of Virgin makes the viewer

Open Document