Renaissance artists were interested in reproducing the world they saw around them. But an equally important discovery during this period was the benefit of oil paint. Before the Renaissance, the most popular medium was tempera paint, a quick-drying medium created from egg yolk.
The medium is difficult to blend due to its quick-drying time and it is not suited to layering because of its opacity. Oil paint, which uses pigments ground in an oil medium such as linseed oil, dry more slowly.
This slow drying time, combined with its translucence, make it possible to build up thin layers of paint known as glazing. This made it much easier for Renaissance artists to blend and build up gradual tones of color - helping chiaroscuro become a viable technique to model realistic forms.
The 17th-century Italian painter Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio took chiaroscuro to the extreme, often blacking out large portions of the background and brightly illuminating large foreground subjects. This combination of using high contrast with a single focused light source had an incredibly dramatic effect. In the painting below, the subjects are illuminated from a single light source coming from the right of the painting.
The drama in the scene is intensified by the stark contrast between the deep shadows and the warm highlights and midtones. The light focuses your attention on the subjects seated at the table. Another term for this style of chiaroscuro is tenebrism , which comes from the Italian term tenebroso , meaning dark, gloomy or mysterious.
In the painting above, David takes on a luminous appearance as light falls on him from the left of the painting. He was painted with soft tones and edges. Also, notice how the parts of David which are in shadow gently blend in with the black background. The light falls more directly on Goliath, harshly illuminating the shadows of his hair, his creased brow and his sunken eyes. With the painting placed just above eye level, a viewer standing in front of it will be looking almost directly into the face of Goliath's green-tinged, oversized face.
Below is an example of Carvaggisti work. The subject, Judith, holds her hand out to block the light that streams in from the left. The result is a stark curve of shadow cast against her own face. Other artists took a more delicate approach to chiaroscuro - using it to create a calm and reflective mood. The Dutch master Rembrandt van Rijn is renowned for his subtle handling of the chiaroscuro technique.
In the self-portrait below, Rembrandt used painterly brushwork to explore the relationship between light and shadow. Unlike many other portraits, most of Rembrandt's face is in shadow, with only one side of his face slightly exposed to light. Also, the background is painted with midtones, rather than deep black like many of the other paintings in this post. Gerard van Honthorst is another Dutch master who explored the use of chiaroscuro.
In the painting below, the subjects are brought forward from the darkness and your attention is focused on the child, who appears to be glowing with light. The other subjects are basked in a more subtle light, with the man in the background only just emerging from the darkness. French artist Georges de La Tour often used candles as the main light source for his paintings. In the painting below, he used candlelight bouncing off a mirror to illuminate a seated Mary Magdalene.
In this painting, you can feel the warmth of the candlelight. The paper in the subject's hand glows like burnished gold. Words form: chiaroscuros. See word origin. The technique of using light and shade in pictorial representation. Light and shade in a painting, drawing, etc. The arrangement of light and dark elements in a pictorial work of art. A style of painting, drawing, etc. Raphael used light coming from a single source using the chiaroscuro technique to illuminate and lead the eye to the subject, usually portraits or groups of people in small rooms.
With light coming from the left or right, artists could use the chiaroscuro technique to give volume to the body of the model. They would also create a strong contrast between the well-lit model and the very dark surrounding area of the canvas.
In this painting you can see the light appears from the left hand side and illuminates Mary and Jesus to make them the focal point. The secondary characters of Saint Elizabeth and John the Baptist on the far left are in partial light, and everything else is dark. Caravaggio excelled at close physical observation, along with a dramatic use of chiaroscuro that came to be known as tenebrism.
He darkened shadows and bathed subjects in bright shafts of light. Caravaggio liked to paint crucial moments and scenes in history, mostly involving violent struggles, torture, and death. He worked with live models, painted directly onto the canvas. Leonardo da Vinci is among the old master artists who developed the chiaroscuro technique. The world famous painting The Mona Lisa is an excellent example of this. He also used the chiaroscuro technique in his preliminary sketches for large paintings.
Gerrit Dou was a student of Rembrandt and produced all kinds of artwork from niche illustrations to sumptuous night-scenes.
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