Velázquez, Painter and Courtier by Jonathan Brown is a voyage through the life of one of the great Baroque artists, Diego de Silva y Velázquez. Brown considers Velázquez life from both an artistic point of view and a biographical point of view. The purpose for Brown is to place Velázquez work "in the wider context of seventeenth century painting and theory." According to Brown, this is somewhat difficult to do because Velázquez was certainly not the normal artist for the time.
Velázquez was different in a number of ways. For one, Velázquez was very well educated, especially for an artist. Second, he had extensive time in which he travelled around Europe viewing foreign artists and their works. Finally, and most importantly, the patronages he received from Philip IV removed him from the normal "mainstream" of Baroque art in Spain. Brown claims that these reasons also contribute to Velázquez "attempting to find a new approach to the goals and methods of the art of painting." Still, Brown points out that their is little written evidence of Velázquez as either an artist or thinker on art. It is very difficult to understand the inner life of Velázquez because we lack the personal documents necessary. This makes it hard to understand Velázquez as a person with emotion instead of merely a man who can paint.
Brown felt that it would be especially interesting to understand Velázquez the man later in life as his career as a painter is changed. As Velázquez career progresses, the quality of his work noticeably declines. Brown attributes this mostly to the fact that Philip IV wanted Vel&#...
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...this new style was cut short with the change in his career as Court Decorator. Still, the understanding of this change in his life is vital to the understanding of Spain during the Baroque. Brown's points out that the Baroque was not only a time of painting, but a time of religious turmoil and change.
Overall, the book combined two central aspects to Velázquez career. It discussed not only the many different works which he created, but his life surrounding the production of these works. This concept is truly important in the understanding of the person behind the painting and certainly furthers the readers understanding of the Spanish Baroque. Furthermore, the straightforward manner of Brown's writing allowed the inexperienced reader of Baroque art understand and appreciate the time. This, ultimately was Brown's goal.
The tendencies of Baroque translated differently in parts of Europe. In Italy, it reflected the return of intense piety through dense church ornamentations, complex architecture, and dynamic painting. Calabrese’s work exhibits the combined artistic stimuli of the 17th century and culminates in the acquired Caravagesque style that alters how paintings were composed from then on. Executed at the height of Calabrese’s most creative phase, St. John the Baptist Preaching is indicates the monumentality of change in urbanization as well as the return of Catholic permanence in the 1600’s. Aside from the Baroque power of the artwork, Calabrese’s St. John is a piece worth gravitating to and stands as reminder of the grandiose excesses of Baroque art.
...olour scheme used showed how much value was engaged in the style and material that were presented in the painting. In evaluating the chapter comparing to the painting the author felt that the beginning of the era the skill level was often not acknowledged whereas materials were, but at the end of the era, skill level played a larger factor in who was chosen to complete the artwork. Therefore, the significance of the applicability of the chapter to the fresco painting changed as a deposit of relations of the artist and art they created with there talent, style, and skills.
water-seller himself stands to the far right of Velazquez’s painting, occupied with pouring water into a glass for the boy. He has lived longer than the other males in the painting and therefore has the most knowledge and the most experience of them all. The
Velazquez’s Juan de Pareja and Peale’s George Washington differ greatly in their presentations and subject matter, as well the contexts in which they were painted. While George Washington was a famous and powerful leader, rendered with bright colors and a high level of precision, Juan de Pareja was a slave, painted with loose brush-strokes and in plain colors. Despite the apparent differences between these two works, they share a common purpose that is intrinsic to portraits, the exaltation of their subjects.
Ultimately, it can be seen that all artists are influenced or incorporate issues and events of their time in their works, whether this is from the desire to portray Greek perfection to that of religious beliefs and the creation of the camera. To become renowned like Polykleitos, Michelangelo and Pablo Picasso, this statement must be followed.
Diego Velazquez was a very influential painter during the baroque era ("Velázquez (1599 - 1660) - Spanish Baroque Painter"). His paintings display the regality of the nobility and show how great the Spanish royalty is. Although his views are biased, his paintings do tell a story, which leave the viewer curious and stumped on the interpretation of his paintings. Additionally, Velazquez leaves his viewers to wonder what Velazquez really wanted them to learn from his art, the glory of being royal, or how the viewer should appreciate art and its peculiarities. All in all Velazquez uses the elements of baroque style, detailed colors, and precise positioning to convey a message that having a high social status is very crucial.
The end of the 1640’s and 1650’s were Murillo’s busiest years as an artist, even though there were many obstacles in his life. In 1658 Murillo made another trip to Madrid, where his studies had a major impact on his future works.
Pablo Picasso is one of the most famous and well-documented artists of the twentieth century. Picasso, unlike most painters, is even more special because he did not confine himself to canvas, but also produced sculpture, poetry, and ceramics in profusion. Although much is known about this genius, there is still a lust after more knowledge concerning Picasso, his life and the creative forces that motivated him. This information can be obtained only through a careful study of the events that played out during his lifetime and the ways in which they manifested themselves in his creations (Penrose).
...ic landscapes. The baroque marked the time in which painters considered using subjects other than scenes from the Bible and from classical traditions. The baroque period also was the period in which artists painted portraits, and everyday life scenes. Baroque artist broke away from trying to make the calm balance known to the renaissance artists. Artists from the baroque era were interested in no longer tried in the extreme. They wanted to paint subjects possessing strong emotions; they wanted to capture those emotions and feelings in their work. Instead of just extremes of feeling sometimes, these strong emotions were personal. More often artists tried to portray intense religious emotions. Baroque art attempted to explain how and why their subjects fit as strongly as they did by representing their emotional states as vividly and analytically as possible.
...laced on the style and materials presented in the painting. While evaluating and comparing various paintings the author feels that at the beginning of the Renaissance era the skill level of the artist was often not acknowledged whereas materials were, but at the end of the era, skill level played a larger factor in who was chosen to complete the artwork. Therefore, fresco painting, which emerged near the end of the period, changed this so called “deposit”, along with the relationship of the artist and the patron, allowing for the talent and skill of the artist to shine.
... the way that the artwork is resembled in the religious background of the gospel but reconstructed in to a celebrating impression. Throughout the fresco painting it depicts the myth of the Christ’s three fold temptations relating back to the article that “distinction between fresco and panel painting is sharp, and that painters are seen as competitors amongst themselves discriminating also, between the difference in genuine attempts in being better then the other.” Baxandall, “Conditions of Trade,” 26. in relation, the painting concerns the painter’s conscious response to picture trade, and the non-isolation in pictorial interests.
Rubens was a diplomat by both profession and character. Polished in manner and eloquent in his words, he moved easily within many realms of Baroque society in his native Flanders as well as in Italy, England, France and Spain. Botero is similarly peripatetic and likewise gifted in his comprehension of the wide variety of human values and emotions. He is, in both his personality and his art, as comfortable with bullfighters as with presidents, with nuns as with socialites. His images of this range of types presents his...
It reflected the Counter Reformation by the Catholic church against the Protestants. Much of Baroque art were stylized from Mannerism and what was going on at the time. “To counter the inroads made by the Reformation, the Roman Catholic Church after the Council of Trent adopted a propagandistic stance in which art was to serve as a means of extending and stimulating the public’s faith in the church. To this end the church adopted a conscious artistic program whose art products would make an overtly emotional and sensory appeal to the faithful” (Britannica). This led to a new interest in nature and the need for learning, encouraging the developments of science and exploring the world, where art was becoming more engaging and
The Baroque era was the age of magic. Flat surfaces became three-dimensional and paint on plaster became alive. It was the age of masterful illusion. Nothing exhibits this mastery better than Baroque ceiling paintings.
Art is a constantly evolving process. The previous style of work serves as a roadmap for what will follow. As often is the case with any form of growth, there exists a transitional period. Because of this evolution, there are traces of a style’s illustrious history embedded in the adaptive art’s metaphorical DNA. The transition from early to late Renaissance established two styles of art known as Baroque and Rococo. While, on the surface, the Rococo style can appear to be very similar to the work produced by Baroque artists, the two also demonstrate distinct differences in their use of subject and theme, the manner in which they created the art, and how that art was perceived in their time. These factors establish both styles from one another, making them unique.