Transcript baroque_italian1_1

ART HISTORY 132
Baroque: Italian
Baroque: Italian
• context: ecclesiastical
– Council of Trent (c. 1565)
• part of the larger [Catholic] Counter Reformation
• defined role assigned to arts in Catholic Church
• headings:
– 1) clarity, simplicity & intelligibility
– 2) realistic interpretation
» in contrast to Renaissance idealization
» appropriateness of age, gender, type, expression,
gesture & dress
– 3) emotional stimulus to piety
Baroque: Italian
“Realist” tendency
• Caravaggio (1573-1610)
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biography: in permanent revolt against
authority
• fled Rome because charged w/
manslaughter
• died of malaria
style: “realist” tendency
• rejection of Mannerism
• interest in surface textures &
appearances
• human figure not prettified
narrative: heightened emotion
• moment of recognition
• powerful foreshortening
light/shadow: dramatic chiaroscuro
spatial order: systematically destroys
space between event in
painting and viewer
Caravaggio
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Calling of St. Matthew (c. 1600)
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narrative: NT
• moment of recognition
genre scene: anachronistic
• mundane environment
• contemporary clothes
composition: dynamic
narrow range of browns & flesh tones
• punctuated by primaries that circulate
vision through composition
light: chiaroscuro & “tenebrism”
• dark setting envelopes occupants
• sharply lit figures
– e.g., Christ’s gesture
highlighted by sharply
descending diagonal
Caravaggio
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Conversion of St. Paul (c. 1600)
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narrative: NT
• moment of recognition
• emotional stimulus to piety
figures: realistic
setting: ambiguous & distilled
composition: clarity, simplicity &
intelligibility
color: narrow range
• punctuated by compliments
lighting: tenebrism & chiaroscuro
spatial order: shallow
• dramatic foreshortening
• overlapping
Caravaggio
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Entombment (c. 1600)
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narrative: emotional stimulus to piety
spatial order: shallow depth; distilled
• foreshortening
• overlapping
figures: realistic
• agedness
• corpse of Christ
– discolored
– dangling arm
composition: dynamic
• compact, distilled arrangement
• visually coherent
color: narrow range
• punctuated by primaries
light: “tenebrism” & chiaroscuro
• dark background
• selective illumination
• establishes volume & mass
Caravaggio
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Entombment (con’t.)
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figures: realistic
(con’t.)
• Virgin Mary
– realistic interpretation
» in contrast to High
Ren idealization
» appropriate age,
expression & dress
» elderly
» forehead
wrinkled
» sunken cheeks
Caravaggio’s Italian Baroque Entombment (c. 1600)
vs.
Raphael’s High Renaissance Deposition (c. 1500)
CARAVAGGIO’s Italian Baroque Entombment (c. 1600)
vs.
MICHELANGELO’s High Renaissance Pieta (c. 1500)
Caravaggio’s Supper at Emmaus
(c. 1600)
Baroque: Italian
“classicizing” tendency
• Carracci (1560-1609)
– aesthetic: “classicizing”
• movement against Mannerist
artificiality
– training: private teaching academy
• drawing from life & Roman
sculptures, coins, medallions
• clear draftsmanship
– medium: fresco (“Grand Manner”)
– figures: heroic
– characteristics:
• illusionistic surfaces
• High Renaissance decoration
– draws inspiration from
» Michelangelo’s
Sistine Chapel
» Raphael’s frescos
in Vatican
CARRACCI’s
“classicizing” tendency Italian Baroque
Flight into Egypt
(c. 1600)
Carracci
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Farnese Gallery
– style: “Classicizing”
– patron: Farnese
– program: mythological themes
• see Ovid's Metamorphosis
• also alludes poem written by
Lorenzo de Medici (c. 1475)
– format: illusionistic enhancement
of architectural space
(“quadri riportati”)
– themes: mythological
• moralizing messages
• hidden religious content
Carracci’s Triumph of Bacchus & Ariadne
Farnese Gallery (c. 1600)
Carracci
• Farnese Gallery (con’t.)
– Polyphemus & Galatea
• subject: mythological
– P  cyclops
– G sea nymph
• figure: free adaptation of
ancient Greek sculpture
– Classical Discobolus
– Hellenistic Laocoön
» reverses legs
» one arm extended
down, other up
» head tilted
Carracci’s Italian Baroque Polyphemus and Galatea (c. 1600 CE)
vs.
Myron’s Classical Greek Discus Thrower (c. 450 BCE)
Carracci’s Italian Baroque Polyphemus and Galatea (c. 1600 CE)
vs.
Hellenistic Greek Laocoön (c. 150 BCE)
RENI’s “classicizing” tendency
Italian Baroque
Aurora
(1613-14)
Bernini
(1598-1680)
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significance: successor to Michelangelo
– unique ability to capture essence of
narrative moment
aim: to synthesize/unify sculpture, painting
and architecture into coherent
conceptual and visual whole
patrons: many associated w/ papacy
– early age, came to attention of papal
nephew, Scipione Borghese
– knighted at age 23, by Gregory XV
– Urban VII, Alexander VII, Clement IX
quality of naturalism: realism
light: used as metaphorical device in religious
settings
– often, hidden light source intensifies
focus of religious worship
Bernini
Bust of Scipione Borghese (1632)
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subject: portraiture
patron: Cardinal Scipione Borghese
– maternal uncle elected to papacy as
Pope Paul V (1605)
• placed SB in charge of internal
and external political affairs
• entrusted w/ finances of papacy
and Borghese family
– B’s first patron (c. 1618-24); also patron
of Caravaggio
composition: dynamic
narrative moment: mid-speech
quality of naturalism: realistic
Bernini
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Apollo and Daphne (1622-25)
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patron: Cardinal Scipione Borghese
subject matter: early 17C Italian poetry
• see Ovid’s Metamorphoses
intellectual context: frustrated desire
and enduring despair and pain,
provoked by love
meaning: personal, special resonance
for SB, who was widely ridiculed for
his attraction to other men
narrative moment: transformative
• A reaching out toward river
nymph D, just as she is
transformed into laurel tree by her
father
• prevent D from being burned by
touch of god of sun
figural type: androgynous male (see
Hellenistic Greek)
Bernini
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David (c. 1625)
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patron: Cardinal Scipione Borgheses
• commissioned to decorate Galleria
Borghese at private villa
style: “dynamic” tendencies
influences: Hellenistic Greek
Baroque qualities:
• spatial order: active vs. selfcontained
• realism of detail & differentiation
of texture
• drapery: abstract play of folds &
crevasses
• attempting pictorial effects
traditionally outside sculpture’s
domain
Classical Greek Discus Thrower (c. 450 BCE)
vs.
BERNINI’s Italian Baroque David (c. 1625 CE)
(Left) DONATELLO’s Italian Early Ren. David (c. 1450)
vs.
(right) BERNINI’s Italian Baroque David (c. 1625)
(Left) BERNINI’s Italian Baroque David (c. 1625)
vs.
(right) MICHELANGELO’s Italian High Ren David (c. 1500)
Bernini
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Cornaro Chapel (c. 1650)
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function: funerary
dedicated: Saint Teresa
• mystic of Spanish CounterReformation
• 1st Carmelite nun to be canonized
aesthetic influence: Humanism
materials: multimedia
• marble panels
• painted ceiling
• gilded bronze
• sculpture portraits
lighting: windows, both hidden &
apparent
Detail (“transverberation”) of Bernini’s
Ecstacy of St. Teresa
(c. 1650)
(Left) Detail of BERNINI’s Italian Baroque Ecstasy of St. Teresa (c. 1650)
vs.
(right) MICHELANGELO’s High Renaissance Pietá (c. 1500)
IMAGE INDEX
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CARAVAGGIO. Detail of self-portrait from David (160607), Oil on wood, 90.5 x 116 cm, Kunsthistorisches Museum,
Vienna.
CARAVAGGIO. The Calling of Saint Matthew (1600), Oil
on canvas, 10' 7 1/2" X 11' 2”, Contarelli Chapel, San Luigi
dei Francesi, Rome.
Detail of Christ and St. Peter from CARAVAGGIO’s Calling
of St. Matthew.
CARAVAGGIO. Conversion of St. Paul (1600-01), Oil on
canvas, 90 1/2 x 70 in., Cerasi Chapel, Santa Maria del
Popolo, Rome.
CARAVAGGIO. Entombment (c. 1600), Oil on canvas, 300x
203 cm., Pinacoteca Vaticana, Rome.
Detail of Mary from CARAVAGGIO’s Entombment.
Comparison between CARAVAGGIO’s Entombment (c.
1600) vs. RAPHAEL’s High Renaissance Descent from the
Cross (c. 1500).
IMAGE INDEX
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CARRAVAGIO. Supper at Emmaus (1601), Oil on canvas,
77 by 55 in., National Gallery, London.
Portrait of Annibale CARRACCI.
CARACCI. Flight into Egypt (c. 1603-04), Oil on canvas, 4’
x 7’6”, Galleria Doria Pamphili, Rome.
CARACCI. Loves of the Gods (c. 1600), Ceiling frescoes in
the gallery, Palazzo Farnese, Rome.
CARRACCI. Bacchus and Ariadne, central ceiling panel
Farnese Gallery (c. 1600).
CARRACCI. Polyphemus and Galatea, from Farnese Gallery
(c. 1600).
Comparison between (Left) CARRACCI’s Polyphemus and
Galatea vs. (right) Classical Greek Discuss Thrower (c. 450
BCE).
Comparison between (left) CARRACCI’s Polyphemus and
Galatea vs. (right) Hellenistic Greek Laocoön (c. 200 BCE).
IMAGE INDEX
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RENI. Aurora (1613-14), ceiling fresco in the Casino
Rospigliosi,Rome.
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BERNINI. Bust of Scipione Borghese (1632), marble, 31in.
high, Galleria Borghese, Rome.
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BERNINI. Apollo and Daphne (1622-25), marble, 96 in.
high, Galleria Borghese, Rome.
BERNINI. David (c. 1625), Marble, , lifesize, Galleria
Borghese, Rome.
Slide 20:
Portrait of Bernini by BACICCIO (c. 1665)
Slide 21:
Comparison between Classical Greek Discuss Thrower (c. 450
BCE) vs. BERNINI’s Baroque David (c. 1625).
Slide 22:
(Left) DONATELLO’s Early Renaissance David (c. 1425);
and (right) BERNINI’s David (c. 1625)
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(Left) MICHELANGELO’s HIGH Renaissance David (c.
1500); and (right) BERNINI’s David (c. 1625)
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BERNINI. Cornaro Chapel (c. 1650), Church of Santa Maria
della Vittoria, Rome.
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BERNINI. The Ecstasy of Saint Therese (c. 1650), Marble,
Cappella Cornaro, Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome.