No.33438[Reply]
Can we have an art thread?
I'm particularly interested in the renaissance art, and personally wish I knew more about the artists and the works from this period.
To start off, The Calumny Of Apelles:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calumny_of_Apelles_(Botticelli)More about Botticelli:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandro_Botticelli No.33564
'Sacred And Profane Love', by Titian.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacred_and_Profane_LoveThe wikipedia lists the contestations made about the 'meaning' of the painting, but gives an accurate description of what and who the painting is about.
No.33565
'Flaying of Marsyas', Titian.
It's notable that in his age the later works of Titian move into these dream-like depictions. You can see the same with
>>33459https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flaying_of_Marsyas_(Titian)From the wikipedia
<The philosopher-turned-novelist Iris Murdoch was especially fascinated by the painting, which she described in an interview as "the greatest in the Western canon". It is mentioned in three of her novels, and sometimes discussed by the characters. In her portrait for the National Portrait Gallery by Tom Phillips, a reproduction occupies most of the wall behind her head. She said it was "something to do with human life and all its ambiguities and all its horrors and terrors and misery, and at the same time there’s something beautiful, the picture is beautiful, and something also to do with the entry of the spiritual into the human situation and the closeness of the gods …" No.33566
The other Starry Night is more famous but I like this one better. It captures an important period of change in Europe. We can see here a sort of liminal space between the comfy old world, lit by the stars, and the looming new world lit by industrially produced artificial lights. Here, the gas lamps across the river are just beginning to dominate, but have not yet drowned out the stars above. The exaggerated reflection of the gas lamps in the river foreshadows their eventual dominance, and creates a feeling as if the lights of industry are reaching across this natural barrier.
The composition also creates an alienating effect. The human figures are rendered tiny here, shoved into a corner in the foreground. The river, bridged by the artificial lights creates a barrier between them and the sky. The material, earthly realm to be dominated by these burning lights of industry, cutting us off from the heavenly world, both in the stars and the natural beauty.
I don't know how much foresight Van Gogh had, but it feels like a sense of that separation informed much of his work, given the focus on contrasts. For this painting, there is a notable difference in the color of the starlight and the lamplight, the latter being a more vivid yellow. The paler stars therefore already acquire a sense of being overshadowed, largely separated from the rest of the image in a sky unbothered by the vivid yellow gas lights below, unlike the beach in the foreground. Yet even as those yellow lights reach out to us to change our colors, the pale starlight waits above, unmoved and unchanging, perhaps to be seen again if we should dim our lights of industry on nights to come.
No.33603
>>33562some of these are tempera paintings, not oil paintings or frescos