Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Two Italian Painters Of Renown

By Darren Hartley


Early Caravaggio paintings were paintings of flowers and fruits, including Boy Peeling a Fruit, also known to be the earliest of Caravaggio paintings, Boy with a Basket of Fruit and Young Sick Bacchus. They demonstrated physical particularity, an aspect of Caravaggio realism, for which he became famous for.

The Fortune Teller was the first of Caravaggio paintings to feature more than one figure. It was painted by an Italian artist active in Rome, Naples, Malta and Sicily whose full name was Michelangelo Merisi o Amerighi da Caravaggio. It carried a theme that was relatively new in Rome, that of a 16 year old Sicilian artist, who went by the name Mario Minniti, being cheated by a Gypsy girl. This theme became immensely influential in the coming century as well as the next.

The Cardsharps, an example of the more psychologically complex Caravaggio paintings was considered the first true Caravaggio masterpiece. It featured a boy falling prey to card cheats. Other Caravaggio paintings followed suit, namely, The Musicians, The Lute Player, a tipsy Bacchus and Boy Bitten by a Lizard. These paintings became a center of dispute among scholars and biographers due to the homoerotic ambiance they carried with them.

Returning to realism, Caravaggio paintings centered on religious themes that showed an emergence of remarkable spirituality. Penitent Magdalene, Saint Catherine, Martha and Mary Magdalene, Judith Beheading Holofernes, Sacrifice of Isaac, Saint Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy and Rest on the Flight into Egypt are among these religious paintings.

Raphael Sanzio celebrated perfection and grace with the serene and harmonious qualities of the Raphael paintings. This Italian High Renaissance painter and architect, together with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, formed the traditional trinity of great masters of the period.

The 3 phases and 3 styles to which Raphael paintings fall naturally are Raphael's early years in Umbria, a 4 year period of absorption of the artistic traditions of Florence and his last triumphant but hectic 12 years in Rome.

A brilliant self portrait drawing showing Raphael's precocious talent was one of the early Raphael paintings. With the use of an oil varnish medium, thick paint was applied in shadows and darker garments while thin paint was applied on the flesh areas. This was the underlying technique used in this self-portrait drawing.

Among Raphael paintings, the Baronci altarpiece for the church of Saint Nicholas of Tolentino has the distinction of being the first documented work. Large works, some in fresco, comprised the Raphael paintings of the following years. They were actually painted works for other churches, among which are the Mond Crucifixion, the Brera Wedding of the Virgin and Oddi Altarpiece.

The Three Graces and St. Michael are examples of small and exquisite cabinet Raphael paintings during the period. In the same period are Raphael paintings showcasing the beginning of his Madonna and portrait paintings.




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