Encompasses painting, sculpture, and architecture.
Reflected the religious tensions of the age, specifically the Reformation and Counter-Reformation.
Reformation
Protestants like Martin Luther and John Calvin.
Belief in faith alone led to new churches.
New denominations emerged:
Anglicans (England)
Lutherans (Germany and Scandinavia)
Reformed Church (Germany, Switzerland, The Netherlands, and Scotland)
Counter-Reformation
The Catholic Church's response to the Reformation.
Led to wars across Europe.
Emperors and monarchs had a significant stake in the Catholic Church’s success and glorified their own divine splendor.
Holland
Experienced less conflict, with aspirations and financial strength among the merchant and middle class.
Rembrandt sold works to civilians and their institutions.
Discovery of Africa and Asia
Brought new ideas and produce.
Influenced playwrights like Shakespeare and the development of opera.
Characteristics of Baroque Art
Developed in Rome.
Aimed to counter the threat of Protestantism.
Emphasized emotion and human drama.
Large scale monumental wall paintings and frescos.
Reflected key elements of Catholic dogma.
Was not a monolithic style, differences between Catholic and Protestant countries:
Melodramatic style of religious art.
Life-like naturalism.
Easel art for the prosperous in Protestant Holland.
Influences
High Renaissance.
Sense of movement from Mannerism.
Composition
Asymmetrical and spiral compositions.
Shape
Foreground and background blended.
Chiaroscuro
Balance of light and dark.
Marked difference between light and dark areas, with light often falling on the focal point.
Style
Painterly style with movement.
High degree of technical ability.
Glowing rich color.
Distortions and contortions were common.
Subjective style emphasizing opinions and emotions.
Deep space.
Theatrical, dramatic, and full of movement.
Fleeting moment used as subject.
Naturalistic.
Themes often religious but increasingly secular.
Italy and the Transformation to Baroque
Took place in Rome towards the end of the 16th century.
Caravaggio’s paintings had a formative influence on Baroque school of painting.
Caravaggio (1571 – 1610)
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio.
Italian artist with a hot temper.
Imprisoned and had a death warrant issued by the pope.
1606 killed a young man in a brawl and fled from Rome with a price on his head.
1608 another brawl in Malta.
1609 another in Naples.
Subject to a deliberate attempt on his life by unidentified enemies.
Relatively brief career.
Forgotten almost immediately after his death only rediscovered in the 20th century.
Italian artists were required to endorse the authority of the church.
Make the scriptures a palpable reality to its people.
Caravaggio had an enormous influence.
Awareness of the importance of the light and dark.
Artemisia Gentileschi (1593 – 1652)
Italian early Baroque painter.
One of the most accomplished painters of her generation.
First female painter to become a member of the Academia di Arte del Disegno.
Passion and intensity unique among female artists.
Raped by her father’s friend, giving her a unique insight into violence and betrayal.
Battled against the unexpressed absolutes of her culture regarding the inferiority of women.
Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598 – 1680)
Italian artist in Rome.
Leading sculptor of his age.
Prominent architect, wrote plays and did metalwork.
Sculptures were typically larger than life.
Showed dynamic movement and active use of space.
Flanders: Sir Peter Paul Rubens (1577 – 1640)
Flemish Baroque painter.
Emphasized movement, colour, and sensuality.
Created Counter-Reformation altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects.
Popular with nobility and collectors.
Diplomat knighted by Phillip IV of Spain and Charles I of England.
Handsome, well-educated, sensible, wealthy, and recognized by crowned heads of Europe.
Activity 1
Paste photocopies of Caravaggio, Conversion on the Way to Damascus (1600) and Peter Paul Rubens, The Descent from the Cross (c. 1612-1614) in your Visual Studies workbook.
Write down the subject matter of each.
Indicate the basic composition outlay (shapes) on top of paintings, and indicate the focal points with a coloured pen.
Annotate the paintings with the following words:
Chiaroscuro
Painterly
Colour
Movement
Restless
Emotion
Dramatic
Explain why these works are ‘a more life-like naturalism’.
Holland: Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606 – 1669)
Dutch painter and etcher.
One of the greatest painters and printmakers.
Dutch Golden Age.
Fascinated by the self-portrait, making us able to ‘read’ him and his emotional life.
Form a unique and intimate biography.
Without vanity and with the utmost sincerity.
Mid-life: quietly confident gaze.
Nine years before death: face stripped of all pretension, looking earnestly not at us but at himself.
Rembrandt, The Night Watch, 1642
Oil on canvas.
Colours are rich and contrasting, with dark areas in deep browns, purples, black-browns, and dark reds.
Two central figures: Cocq in black, white, and red, and Ruytenburch in white and yellow.
Two "accidental" figures: a barking dog and the girl in yellow.
The girl plays an important role in the painting and balances the colors.
Symbolic: dead chicken hanging from her waist referring to Cocq.
The painting was cut down in size during the 18th century.
The original title was The company of Captain Banning Cocq and Lieutenant Willem van Ruytenburch.
Formerly darkened condition and now known as Night Watch.
Civilian platoons were formed for civil defence but lost their original function and became social clubs.
Commissioned to paint their group portrait but had two problems: personal characteristics of each person and a meaningful relationship between them.
The focus is on the moment the drum is played, and the group is preparing for the march.
Intense play of light and shade unites the scene.
Dutch Genre Painting
Genre painting collected by rich Dutch citizens.
Consists of a table against a blank background with objects placed in a general upward and diagonal direction.
Commonly glasses, silver plates and the remains of a sumptuous meal.
Vanitas: a type of still-life depicting a collection of objects including hour glasses with the sand running out, butterflies, skulls, mirrors, flowers, candles, a watch etc.
Jan Vermeer
Dutch painter who specialized in exquisite domestic interior scenes of middle-class life.
Never particularly wealthy.
Known as Vermeer of Delft to distinguish him from two similarly named painters.
Not much known about Vermeer.
35 of his works survived.
Activity 2
Jan Vermeer in The Artist’s Studio shows a painter in his studio painting a girl, who is usually viewed as symbolizing Clio, the muse of history. This painting is also known as the Allegory of Painting.
The South African painter, Helmut Starcke, made a pastiche of this painting and changed the meaning of this work to comment on South African history.
Answer the following questions in your workbook:
Describe the scene in Vermeer’s painting. Name some of the objects that you see in this painting.
Discuss the composition, perspective and light in Vermeer’s painting.
Why do you think Starcke used Vermeer’s painting to comment on South African history?
What figure replaced Cleo in Starcke’s version? How was a figure like this viewed by the Europeans of the time?
What would you see as the meaning of Starcke’s painting relating to the colonial period in South Africa? What is the message for our time?
Spain: Diego Rodriguez de Silva y Velazquez (1599 – 1660)
Leading artist in the court of King Phillip IV.
Individualistic artist and an important portrait artist.
Painted the Spanish royal family.
Said that he could paint anything he saw.
Activity 3
Velazquez is often called the “painter’s painter”, meaning that other painters can learn a lot about the art of painting by studying his work.
Between August and December 1957, Picasso produced an astonishing 54 original oil paintings analyzing and exploring Las Meninas by Diego Velazquez.
Picasso first saw the masterpiece by Velazquez at the Prado in Madrid when he was only fourteen years old, but it clearly captivated him.
Look at Picasso’s versions and do the following:
Write down the description of the figures you can identify from Velazquez’s work.
Write down what Picasso changed from Velazquez’s version in Figure 1? Consider the style, colour, composition and atmosphere.
Write down the similarities and differences between Velazquez’s and Picasso’s versions of the little princess (the Infanta Margarita)?