Directions in painting. What are the main genres of painting do you know? Painting definition briefly

Painting is one of the types of fine art. Painting is subdivided into the following types:

monumental;
easel;
theatrical and decorative;
decorative;
miniature.

Unlike other types, in painting, color has the main expressive value, thanks to which it performs an aesthetic, cognitive, ideological and documentary role.

Painting is the transfer of images with liquid paints, as opposed to graphics. Oil paint, tempera, gouache, enamel, watercolor, etc. are used as paints.

Painting style is a direction with general ideas, technique of execution, characteristic techniques of the image. The formation of styles was influenced by politics and economics, ideology and religion. Therefore, each style can be considered as a representative of its time.

Directions and styles of painting are no less diverse than the means of its depiction. Sometimes there is no clear division of styles. When you mix several styles, you get a new one. But with all the diversity, there are several main directions:

Gothic

This European style was prevalent in the 9th and 14th centuries. Biblical stories, lack of perspective, emotionality and pretentiousness are the main features of this style. Representatives: Giotto, Traini.

Renaissance

The 14-16th century marks a return to antiquity, the glorification of the beauty of the human body, humanism. The main representatives are Michelangelo Buonarotti, Leonardo da Vinci.

Mannerism

Direction in painting of the 16th century. The style is opposite to the Renaissance. The name comes from the word "manner". Representatives of this trend Vasari, Duve.

Baroque

Pompous, luxurious painting style of 16-18 centuries in Europe. It is distinguished by the brightness of colors, attention to detail and decoration.

Rococo

16th century. A more sophisticated, refined and intimate continuation of the Baroque style. Representatives: Boucher, Watteau.

Classicism

The style inherent in European culture of the 17-19 centuries. From the point of view of classicism, the picture should be built on strict canons. The classicism style is the heir of antiquity and the Renaissance. The main representatives of this style are Raphael, Poussin.

Empire style

19th century style. The name of the style comes from the word "empire". It is a continuation of the development of classicism in its majesty, luxury and sophistication. The main representative is J.L. David.

Romanticism

19th century style preceded by classicism. Emotionality, individuality, expressiveness of images. Notable for depicting emotions such as horror, awe. Promotes folk traditions, legends, national history. Representatives: Goya, Bryullov, Delacroix, Aivazovsky.

Primitivism

Painting style of the 19th century. A stylized, simplified image resulting in primitive shapes reminiscent of primitive drawings. A prominent representative is Pirosmani.

Realism

Style of the 19-20 centuries. Basically, it reflects objective reality truthfully, without excessive emotionality. They often depicted people at work. Artists: Repin, Shishkin, Savrasov, Manet.

Abstractionism

Style of the 19-20 centuries. A harmonious color combination of geometric shapes aimed at achieving a variety of associations. Representatives: Picasso, Kandinsky.

Impressionism

Style of the 19-20 centuries. Painting style outdoors, in the open air. The play of light performed in a characteristic manner, the technique of a small stroke, the movement conveyed by the master. The name of the style was given by Monet's painting "Impression". The main representatives of this style are Renoir, Monet, Degas.

Expressionism

20th century style. Exaggerated portrayal of emotions for greater impact on the viewer. Among the representatives of this style are Modigliani, Munch.

Cubism

20th century avant-garde style. It is characterized by broken (cubic) lines, a certain combination of objects, simultaneously viewed from several points of view. The founder of this style is considered to be Picasso.

Modernism

Style of the 19-20 centuries. It is the antipode of conservative depictions of realism. The shocking, plastic style of painting presents original paintings that reflect the inner world of the artist. Representatives: Picasso, Matisse.

Pop Art

20th century style. An ironic depiction of banal, often vulgar, objects. Typically used in marketing and advertising. A prominent representative of this trend is Andy Warhol.

Symbolism

Direction of the 19th -20th centuries. Spirituality, dreams, myths and legends. Symbols, often ambiguous, characterize this style. It is the forerunner of Expressionism and Surrealism. Representatives: Vrubel, Vasnetsov, Nesterov.

Surrealism

20th century style. Allusions, mixing of spaces of reality and dream, unusual collages. It makes an impression on the subconscious. Dali and Magritte made a great contribution to this style.

Underground

An experimental trend in contemporary art that reflects asocial behavior in violation of generally accepted moral and ethical principles. The representative of the style is Shemyakin.

What is style?

What exactly is meant by style in art? This is a kind of ideological and artistic unity, thanks to which artists give preference to certain topics and special visual means. They remain individual, but looking at this or that canvas, one can already almost unmistakably determine the era and style.

Europe took shape in the Middle Ages. And painting developed from icon painting. On Russian soil, there was even a transitional genre - parsuna. This is no longer an icon, but not yet a portrait. And only when art is gradually freed from the authority of the church, becomes more secular and secular, painting as an art form acquires all rights.

Style by style

The first common European style in painting can be considered not the Romanesque style and the Gothic (there is mainly architecture), but the Baroque.

This is the style of hints, omissions, allegories, the style of allegories and metaphors. Rembrandt and Rubens are typical representatives. Rococo is a kind of degenerated baroque. The style is not so much in painting as in applied art. F. Boucher and A. Watteau left the most striking examples of Rococo painting. This painting itself is refined, with a touch of eroticism, sustained in pastel colors, full of mythological motives. The eighteenth century becomes the century of the dominance of classicism. This is already a heroic painting in which rulers and commanders are glorified. The artists are also fond of mythological and historical subjects. Strict proportions, the unity of content and form, the division of characters into positive and negative, into main and secondary - these are just some of the features of classicism. Then comes the short but vibrant age of sentimentalism. In addition to painting, poetry is also in his sphere of influence. Sentimentalists deepen the content of art, fill it with psychological tension. They turn painting to the needs and demands of ordinary people. Art is being democratized. On the canvases now there are not gods and heroes, but cooks, laundresses, workers. For the most unsightly work. Romanticism is replacing sentimentalism. With his stormy passions, unusual, extraordinary characters, a cult of inspiration. It is enough to compare the portraits of Pushkin by Kiprensky and Tropinin to feel the fundamental difference between them. The romantic Kiprensky - and Pushkin the romantic, against the background of the lyre. The realist Tropinin portrays the poet as a man with a casually open shirt collar, albeit with a feather in his hands.

Realism - seriously and for a long time Realistic art from the thirties of the nineteenth century began to make its way. And very soon it begins to define and shape the artistic tastes of a significant number of the public. At the heart of realism is the desire for a truthful and comprehensive reflection of the surrounding reality, a critical attitude to bourgeois values, a powerful social orientation. In Russia, realistic painting is, first of all, the Itinerant artists. At the turn of the century, realism is experiencing a certain temporary crisis. But it turns out to be enough for modernism to appear. This term is customary to designate a motley collection of those artistic trends and schools that sought to shake off the shackles of traditional art, to break with realism and its subject depiction.

Alternative or false gloss?

Modernism is impressionism, fauvism, symbolism and futurism. The public sees less and less people, nature, animals on the canvases. Instead - distorted proportions, unclear tones. Everything is colored by emotions and momentary moods of this or that author. As they say, further - more. After modernism - abstractionism. These are already color spots, curved lines, a bizarre combination of geometric bodies. Cubism, rayonism, surrealism. Only talent saved me. It's about Picasso or Dali. The mediocrity swallowed Lethe. Their lot is oblivion in history. Finally, there is postmodernism, whose age has dragged on for an unreasonably long time. There are already no rules and canons. No confession or preaching. Anything is permissible. Complete eclecticism, that is, a mixture of styles and dissimilar elements. A bet on commercial success.

What have you come to? The development of painting styles, unfortunately, confirms the hypothesis of the Spanish philosopher J. Ortega y Gasset about the onset of the century of “dehumanization of art”. No one denies the need for self-expression and no one limits the artist in choosing the means for him. The only sad thing is that many are inclined to think, like the old woman Shapoklyak from the cartoon - "you can't become famous for good deeds." The more scandalous, the louder the predicted success. And it is unaware to such "artists" that time will still weed out all the slag and husk, but true art will remain. No dirt will stick to him.

LECTURE. OKSANA RYMARENKO: "LUCHISM among the" isms "of abstract art"

Students, graduate students, young scientists who use the knowledge base in their studies and work will be very grateful to you.

INTRODUCTION

1. TYPES OF PAINTING

2. PAINTING AND ITS GENRE

CONCLUSION

BIBLIOGRAPHY

INTRODUCTION

The word "painting" is derived from the words "lively" and "write". “To paint,” Dahl explains, “to depict correctly and vividly with a brush or with words, with a pen.” For a person who paints, depicting correctly means accurately conveying the external appearance of what he saw, its most important features. It was possible to correctly convey them by graphic means - line and tone. But it is impossible to convey vividly with these limited means the multicolor of the surrounding world, the pulsation of life in every centimeter of the colored surface of an object, the charm of this life and constant movement and change is impossible. Painting, one of the types of fine art, helps to truthfully reflect the color of the real world.

Color - the main pictorial and expressive means in painting - has tone, saturation and lightness; he kind of fuses into a whole everything that is characteristic of an object: both that which can be depicted with a line and that which is inaccessible to it.

Painting, like graphics, uses light and dark lines, strokes and spots, but unlike her, these lines, strokes and spots are colored. They convey the color of the light source through glare and brightly lit surfaces, mold the volumetric form with the object (local) color and the color reflected by the environment, establish spatial relationships and depth, depict the texture and materiality of objects.

The task of painting is not only to show something, but also to reveal the inner essence of what is depicted, to reproduce "typical characters in typical circumstances." Therefore, a true artistic generalization of the phenomena of life is the basis of the foundations of realistic painting.

1. TYPES OF PAINTING

Monumental painting is a special kind of large-scale paintings that adorn the walls and ceilings of architectural structures. It reveals the content of major social phenomena that have had a positive impact on the development of society, glorifies and perpetuates them, helping to educate people in the spirit of patriotism, progress and humanity. The sublimity of the content of monumental painting, the significant size of its works, the connection with architecture require large color masses, strict simplicity and laconic composition, clarity of contours and generalization of plastic form.

Decorative painting It is used to decorate buildings, interiors in the form of colorful panels, which with a realistic image create the illusion of a wall breakthrough, a visual increase in the size of a room, or, on the contrary, with deliberately flattened forms confirm the flatness of the wall and the enclosure of space. Patterns, wreaths, garlands and other types of decor, decorating works of monumental painting and sculpture, tie together all the elements of the interior, emphasizing their beauty, consistency with architecture.

Theatrical and decorative painting(scenery, costumes, make-up, props, made according to the artist's sketches) helps to deeper reveal the content of the performance. The special theatrical conditions for the perception of the scenery require taking into account the many points of view of the audience, their great remoteness, the effect of artificial lighting and colored lights. The scenery gives an idea of the place and time of the action, activates the viewer's perception of what is happening on the stage. The theatrical artist strives to sharply express the individual character of the characters, their social status, the style of the era, and much more in sketches of costumes and make-up.

Miniature painting received great development in the Middle Ages, before the invention of printing. Handwritten books were decorated with the finest headpieces, endings, detailed miniature illustrations. The painting technique of miniature was skillfully used by Russian artists of the first half of the 19th century to create small (mostly watercolor) portraits. Pure deep colors of watercolors, their exquisite combinations, jewelry subtlety of writing distinguish these portraits, full of grace and nobility.

Easel painting, performed on a machine - easel, uses wood, cardboard, paper as a material basis, but most often canvas stretched on a stretcher. An easel painting, being an independent work, can depict absolutely everything: actual and fictional by the artist, inanimate objects and people, modernity and history - in a word, life in all its manifestations. In contrast to graphics, easel painting has a richness of color, which helps to emotionally, psychologically multifaceted and subtly convey the beauty of the surrounding world.

By technique and means of execution, painting is divided into oil, tempera, fresco, wax, mosaic, stained glass, watercolor, gouache, pastel. These names came from a binder or from the method of using material and technical means.

Oil painting it is performed with paint wiped off with vegetable oils. Thick paint liquefies when oil or special thinners and varnishes are added to it. Oil paint can be used on canvas, wood, cardboard, paper, metal.

Temperanaya painting is done with paint cooked on egg yolk or casein. Tempera paint is water-soluble and applied pasty or liquid on a wall, canvas, paper, wood. Tempera in Russia created wall paintings, icons and patterns on household items. Nowadays, tempera is used in painting and graphics, in arts and crafts, and in design and decoration.

Fresco painting decorates interiors in the form of monumental and decorative compositions applied on wet plaster with water paints. The fresco has a pleasant matte surface and is durable in indoor conditions.

Wax painting(encaustic) was used by the artists of Ancient Egypt, as evidenced by the famous "Fayum portraits" (1st century AD). The binder in encaustic is bleached wax. Wax paints are applied in a molten state to a heated base, after which they are cauterized.

Mosaic painting, or mosaic, is assembled from individual pieces of smalt or colored stones and fixed on a special cement ground. Transparent smalt, inserted into the ground at different angles, reflects or refracts light, causing the color to flash and flicker. Mosaic panels can be found in the metro, in theater and museum interiors, etc. Stained glass painting is a work of decorative art designed to decorate window openings in any architectural structure. The stained-glass window is made up of pieces of colored glass, held together by a strong metal frame. The luminous flux, piercing the colored surface of the stained-glass window, draws decoratively spectacular, multi-colored patterns on the floor and walls of the interior.

2. PAINTING AND ITS GENRE

Painting genres (fr. Genre - genus, species) is a historically established division of works of painting in accordance with the themes and objects of the image. In modern painting, there are the following genres: portrait, historical, mythological, battle, everyday life, landscape, still life, animalistic genre.

Although the concept of "genre" appeared in painting relatively recently, certain genre differences have existed since ancient times: images of animals in caves of the Paleolithic era, portraits of Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia from 3000 BC, landscapes and still lifes in Hellenistic and Roman mosaics and frescoes. The formation of the genre as a system in easel painting began in Europe in the 15th-15th centuries. and ended mainly in the 17th century, when, in addition to the division of fine art into genres, the concept of "high" and "low" genres appeared, depending on the subject of the image, theme, plot.

Historical and mythological genres were attributed to the "high" genre, portrait, landscape, and still life - to the "low" genre. This gradation of genres lasted until the 19th century. So, in the 17th century in Holland, it was the "low" genres (landscape, genre, still life) that became the leading ones in painting, and the ceremonial portrait, which formally belonged to the "low" genre of portrait, did not belong to such.

Having become a form of displaying life, genres of painting, with all the stability of common features, are not unchanged, they develop along with life, changing as art develops. Some genres die off or acquire a new meaning (for example, a mythological genre), new ones appear, usually within pre-existing ones (for example, an architectural landscape and a seascape appeared within the landscape genre). There are works that combine various genres (for example, a combination of a genre of genre with a landscape, a group portrait with a historical genre).

The genre of fine art, reflecting the external and internal appearance of a person or a group of people, is called a portrait... This genre is widespread not only in painting, but also in sculpture, graphics, etc. The main requirements for a portrait are the transfer of external similarities and the disclosure of the inner world, the essence of a person's character. By the nature of the image, two main groups are distinguished: ceremonial and chamber portraits. A ceremonial portrait shows a person in full growth (on a horse, standing or sitting), against an architectural or landscape background. In a chamber portrait, a half-length or bust image is used against a neutral background. The self-portrait - the artist's image of himself - stands out in a special group.

The portrait is one of the oldest genres of fine art, initially it had a cult purpose, it was identified with the soul of the deceased. In the ancient world, portraiture developed more in sculpture, as well as in pictorial portraits - Fayum portraits of the 1st - 3rd centuries. In the Middle Ages, the concept of a portrait was replaced by generalized images, although on frescoes, mosaics, icons, miniatures, there are some individual features in the depiction of historical figures. Late Gothic and Renaissance is a stormy period in the development of portraiture, when the formation of the portrait genre takes place, reaching the heights of humanistic faith in a person and understanding of his spiritual life.

A genre of fine art dedicated to historical events and characters is called historical genre... The historical genre, which is characterized by monumentality, developed for a long time in wall painting. From the Renaissance to the 19th century. artists used plots of ancient mythology, Christian legends. Often, real historical events depicted in the picture were saturated with mythological or biblical allegorical characters.

The historical genre intertwines with others - the genre of everyday life (historical scenes), portrait (depiction of historical figures of the past, portrait-historical compositions), landscape ("historical landscape"), merges with the battle genre.

The historical genre is embodied in easel and monumental forms, in miniatures, illustrations. Originating in antiquity, the historical genre combined real historical events with myths. In the countries of the Ancient East, there were even types of symbolic compositions (the apotheosis of the military victories of the monarch, the transfer of power to him by a deity) and narrative cycles of paintings and reliefs. In Ancient Greece, there were sculptural images of historical heroes, in Ancient Rome, reliefs were created with scenes of military campaigns and triumphs.

In the Middle Ages in Europe, historical events were reflected in miniatures of chronicles, in icons. The historical genre in easel painting began to take shape in Europe during the Renaissance, in the 17th - 18th centuries. it was viewed as a "high" genre, bringing to the fore (religious, mythological, allegorical, actually historical subjects).

Pictures of the historical genre were filled with dramatic content, lofty aesthetic ideals, and the depth of human relations.

The genre of fine art dedicated to the heroes and events that the myths of the ancient peoples tell about is called mythological genre(from the Greek mythos - legend). The mythological genre comes into contact with the historical and takes shape in the Renaissance, when ancient legends provided the richest opportunities for the embodiment of stories and characters with complex ethical, often allegorical overtones. In the XVII century. - early. XIX century, in the works of the mythological genre, the circle of moral, aesthetic problems is expanding, which are embodied in high artistic ideals and either come closer to life, or create a festive spectacle. From the XIX-XX centuries. themes of Germanic, Celtic, Indian, Slavic myths became popular.

Battle genre(from the French bataille - battle) is a genre of painting that is part of the historical, mythological genre and specializes in depicting battles, military exploits, military actions, glorifying military valor, the fury of battle, the triumph of victory. The battle genre can include elements of other genres - everyday life, portrait, landscape, animalistic, still life.

The genre of fine arts, showing scenes of everyday, personal life of a person, everyday life from peasant and urban life, is called everyday genre... The appeal to the life and morals of people is already found in the paintings and reliefs of the Ancient East, in antique vase painting and sculpture, in medieval icons and books of hours. But the everyday genre stood out and acquired its characteristic forms only as a phenomenon of secular easel art. Its main features began to take shape in the XIV-XV centuries. in altar paintings, reliefs, tapestries, miniatures in the Netherlands, Germany, France. In the 16th century in the Netherlands, the genre of everyday life began to develop rapidly and became isolated. One of its founders was Hieronymus Bosch.

The development of the genre of genre in Europe was greatly influenced by the work of Pieter Bruegel: he moves to a pure genre, shows that everyday life can be an object of study and a source of beauty. The 17th century can be called the century of the genre of genre in all painting schools in Europe.

In the XVIII century. in France, genre painting is associated with the depiction of gallant scenes, "pastorals", becomes refined and graceful, ironic. The works of the everyday genre are diverse: they showed the warmth of home life and the exoticism of distant countries, sentimental experiences and romantic passions. The genre of everyday life, focused on showing peasant life and the life of a city dweller, developed vividly in Russian painting of the 19th century: for example, in the works of A.G. Venetsianov, P.A.Fedotov, V.G. Perov, I.E. Repin.

The genre of fine arts, where the main thing is the image of nature, the environment, views of the countryside, cities, historical monuments, is called landscape(fr.paysage). Distinguish between rural, urban, architectural, industrial, marine (marina) and river landscape.

In ancient times and in the Middle Ages, the landscape appears in the paintings of temples, palaces, icons and miniatures. In European art, the first to turn to the depiction of nature were the Venetian painters of the Renaissance. Since the XVI century. landscape becomes an independent genre, its varieties and directions are formed: lyrical, heroic, documentary landscape. In the XIX century. creative discoveries of landscape masters, saturation of it with social issues, the development of plein air (the image of the natural environment) ended with the achievements of impressionism, which gave new opportunities in the pictorial transfer of spatial depth, variability of the light-air environment, the complexity of the color range.

A genre of fine art that shows household items, labor, creativity, flowers, fruits, crushed game, caught fish, placed in a real household environment, is called still life(fr. nature morte - dead nature). A still life can be endowed with a complex symbolic meaning, play the role of a decorative panel, be the so-called. "trick", which gives an illusory reproduction of real objects or figures, causing the effect of the presence of true nature.

The depiction of objects is known even in the art of antiquity and the Middle Ages. But the first still life in easel painting is considered a painting by the artist from Venice Jacopo de Barbari "Partridge with an arrow and gloves". Already in the 16th century, still life is divided into many types: kitchen interior with or without people, a laid table in a rural setting, "vanitas" with symbolic objects (a vase of flowers, an extinguished candle, musical instruments). Especially rich was the Dutch still life, modest in color and in the things depicted, but refined in the expressive texture of objects, in the play of color and light.

A fine art genre featuring animals is called animalistic genre(from lat.animal - animal). The animal painter pays attention to the artistic and figurative characteristics of the animal, its habits, decorative expressiveness of the figure, silhouette. Animals are often endowed with human traits, actions and experiences. Images of animals are often found in antique sculpture and vase painting.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, let's summarize the above:

Painting is subdivided into monumental, decorative, theatrical and decorative, miniature and easel painting.

By technique and means of execution, painting is divided into oil, tempera, fresco, wax, mosaic, stained glass, watercolor, gouache, pastel.

In modern painting, there are the following genres: portrait, historical, mythological, battle, everyday life, landscape, still life, animalistic genre.

Historical painting is an image of certain historical moments, as well as figures of public life of the past.

Battle painting aims to capture battles, battles and wars. Mythological painting depicts events described in myths, epics and legends.

Household (genre) painting is an image of scenes of real life, its realities and attributes.

Landscape (landscape) painting is an image of natural nature or any area.

Portrait painting is an artistic depiction of a person. A specific type of portrait is the self-portrait.

Still life is an image of various inanimate objects, for example, fruits, flowers, household items, utensils, placed in a real household environment and compositionally organized into a single group.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Batrakova SP Artist of the XX century. and the language of painting. M., 1996.

2. Wipper B.R. An introduction to the historical study of art. M., Fine Arts, 1985

3. Western art of the XX century. Classic heritage and modernity. M, 1992.

4. History of foreign art. M., Fine Arts, 1984

5. History of world art. 3rd edition, Publishing House "Academy", M., 1998.

6. From constructivism to surrealism. M., 1996.

7. Polyakov V.V. History of world art. Fine arts and architecture of the XX century. M., 1993.

8. Sadokhin A.P. Culturology: theory and history of culture: Textbook. - M .: Eksmo, 2007.

9. Contemporary Western Art. XX century: problems and trends. M., 1982.

10. Suzdalev P. On the genres of painting. // Creativity, 2004, No. 2, 3. S. 45-49.

History of Fine Arts

The history of painting is an endless chain that began with the very first paintings made. Each style grows out of the styles that came before it. Every great artist adds something to the accomplishments of earlier artists and influences later artists.

We can enjoy painting for its beauty. Its lines, shapes, colors and composition (arrangement of parts) can please our senses and linger in our memories. But the enjoyment of art increases when we learn when and why and how it was created.

Many factors have influenced the history of painting. Geography, religion, national characteristics, historical events, the development of new materials - all this helps to shape the artist's vision. Throughout history, painting has reflected a changing world and our ideas about it. In turn, the artists have provided some of the best records of the development of civilization, sometimes revealing more than the written word.

Prehistoric painting

The cave dwellers were the earliest painters. Colored drawings of animals, dating from 30,000 to 10,000 BC, have been found on the walls of caves in southern France and Spain. Many of these drawings are remarkably well preserved because the caves have been sealed for centuries. Early humans painted the wild animals they saw around them. Very crude human figures made in life positions have been found in Africa and eastern Spain.

Cave artists filled the cave walls with drawings in rich, vibrant colors. Some of the most beautiful paintings are in the Altamira Cave, Spain. One detail shows a wounded bison no longer able to stand - probably a hunter's victim. It is colored reddish brown and outlined simply, but skillfully, in black. The pigments used by cave artists are ocher (iron oxides ranging in color from light yellow to dark orange) and manganese (dark metal). They were crushed into a fine powder, mixed with a lubricant (possibly with fatty oil), and applied to the surface with some kind of brush. Sometimes the pigments took the form of crayon-like sticks. The fat mixed with the powdered pigments made the paint liquid and the pigment particles stuck together. The inhabitants of the cave made brushes from animal hairs or plants, and sharp instruments from silicon (for drawing and scratching).

As early as 30,000 years ago, humans invented the basic tools and materials for painting. Methods and materials have been refined and improved over the following centuries. But the discoveries of the cave dweller remain the main ones for painting.

Egyptian and Mesopotamian Painting (3400-332 BC)

One of the first civilizations appeared in Egypt. Much is known about their lives from the written records and art left behind by the Egyptians. They believed that the body must be preserved so that the soul can live after death. The Great Pyramids were complex tombs for the wealthy and powerful Egyptian rulers. Much Egyptian art was created for the pyramids and tombs of kings and other important people. To be absolutely sure that the soul will continue to exist, artists created images of a dead person in stone. They also reproduced scenes from human life in wall paintings in burial chambers.

Egyptian visual art techniques have remained unchanged for centuries. In one method, watercolor paint was applied to clay or limestone surfaces. In another process, outlines were carved into stone walls and painted with watercolors. A material called gum arabic was probably used to adhere paint to a surface. Fortunately, the dry climate and sealed tombs made it difficult for some of these watercolor paintings to deteriorate from the dampness. Many hunting scenes from the walls of the tombs at Thebes, dating from around 1450 BC, are well preserved. They show how hunters chase birds or fish. These plots can still be identified today because they were carefully and carefully painted.

The Mesopotamian civilization, which lasted from 3200 to 332 BC, was located in a valley between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in the Middle East. Houses in Mesopotamia were built mainly of clay. As the clay was softened by the rain, their buildings collapsed into dust, destroying any wall paintings that might have been very interesting. What has survived are decorated pottery (dyed and fired) and colorful mosaics. Although mosaics cannot be regarded as painting, they often have an impact on it.

Aegean civilization (3000-1100 BC)

The third great early culture was the Aegean civilization. The Aegeans lived on islands off the coast of Greece and on the peninsula of Asia Minor at about the same time as the ancient Egyptians and Mesopotamians.

In 1900, archaeologists began excavating the palace of King Minos at Knossos in Crete. Excavations have uncovered works of art painted around 1500 BC. in the unusually free and graceful style of the time. Obviously, the Cretans were light-hearted, nature-loving people. Among their favorite themes in art were marine life, animals, flowers, sports games, and mass processions. In Knossos and other Aegean palaces, paintings were painted on wet plaster walls with paints of minerals, sand and earthy ocher. The paint soaked into the wet plaster and became a permanent part of the wall. These paintings were later called frescoes (from the Italian word for "fresh" or "new"). The Cretans liked the bright yellows, reds, blues and greens.

Greek and Roman Classical Painting (1100 BC - 400 AD)

The ancient Greeks decorated the walls of temples and palaces with frescoes. From ancient literary sources and from Roman copies of Greek art, it can be said that the Greeks painted small pictures and made mosaics. The names of Greek masters and few of their lives and works are known, although very little Greek painting survived the centuries and the consequences of wars. The Greeks did not write much in the tombs, so their work was not protected.

Painted vases are all that remain from Greek painting today. Pottery making was a large industry in Greece, especially in Athens. The containers were in great demand, were exported, as well as butter and honey, and for domestic purposes. The earliest vase painting was done in geometric shapes and ornaments (1100-700 BC). The vases were also decorated with human figures in brown glaze on light clay. By the 6th century, vase artists often painted black human figures on natural red clay. The details were carved into the clay with a sharp tool. This allowed the red to appear in the depths of the relief.

The red-figured style eventually replaced the black one. That is, on the contrary: the figures are red, and the background has become black. The advantage of this style was that the artist could use a brush to create paths. The brush gives a looser line than the metal tool used in black curly vases.

Roman wall paintings have been found mainly on villas (country houses) in Pompeii and Herculaneum. In 79 AD, these two cities were completely buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. The archaeologists who excavated the area were able to learn a lot about ancient Roman life from these cities. Almost every house and villa in Pompeii had paintings on its walls. Roman painters carefully prepared the surface of the wall, applying a mixture of marble dust and plaster. They polished the surfaces to a marble finish. Many of the paintings are copies of Greek paintings from the 4th century BC. The graceful poses of the figures painted on the walls of the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii inspired artists from the 18th century when the city was excavated.

The Greeks and Romans also painted portraits. A small number of these, mostly Greek-style portraits of mummies by Egyptian artists, have survived around Alexandria, in northern Egypt. Founded in the 4th century BC by Alexander the Great of Greece, Alexandria became a leading center of Greek and Roman culture. The portraits were painted using the encaustic technique on wood and were installed in the form of a mummy after the death of the person depicted. Encaustic paintings made in paint mixed with melted beeswax have a very long shelf life. Indeed, these portraits still look fresh, although they were taken as far back as the second century BC.

Early Christian and Byzantine Painting (300-1300)

The Roman Empire began to decline in the 4th century AD. At the same time, Christianity was gaining strength. In 313, the Roman emperor Constantine officially recognized the religion and converted to Christianity himself.

The rise of Christianity greatly influenced art. The artists were commissioned to decorate the walls of the churches with frescoes and mosaics. They made panels in church chapels, illustrated and decorated church books. Under the influence of the Church, artists had to communicate the teachings of Christianity as clearly as possible.

The early Christians and Byzantine painters continued the mosaic technique they learned about from the Greeks. Small flat pieces of colored glass or stone were placed on wet cement or plaster. Sometimes other hard materials were used, such as pieces of baked clay or shells. In Italian mosaic, the colors are especially deep and full. Italian artists made the background with pieces of gilded glass. They depicted human figures in rich colors against a glittering gold backdrop. The overall effect was flat, decorative and unrealistic.

Mosaics by Byzantine artists were often even less realistic and even more decorative than those of the early Christians. Byzantine is the name given to a style of art that developed around the ancient city of Byzantium (now Istanbul, Turkey). The mosaic technique matched perfectly the Byzantine taste for the magnificently decorated churches. The famous mosaics of Theodora and Justinian, made around 547 AD, show a taste for wealth. The jewelry on the figures glistens, and the colored court dresses sparkle against the glittering gold backdrop. Byzantine artists also used gold in frescoes and panels. Gold and other precious materials were used during the Middle Ages to separate spiritual items from the everyday world.

Medieval painting (500-1400)

The first part of the Middle Ages, from about the 6th to the 11th century AD, is commonly referred to as the Dark. During this time of unrest, art was kept mainly in monasteries. In the 5th century A.D. Warran tribes from Northern and Central Europe roamed the continent. For hundreds of years, they have dominated Western Europe. These people produced art in which the main element is the pattern. They were especially fond of the structures of intertwining dragons and birds.

The best of Celtic and Saxon art can be found in manuscripts from the 7th and 8th centuries. Book illustrations, lighting, and miniature painting, practiced since late Roman times, spread throughout the Middle Ages. Lighting is the decoration of text, caps, and margins. The colors used were gold, silver and bright. A miniature is a small picture, often a portrait. The term was originally used to describe the decorative block around the initial letters in a manuscript.

Charlemagne, who was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in the early 9th century, tried to revive the classical art of the late Roman and early Christian periods. During his reign, miniature painters imitated classical art, but they also conveyed personal feelings through their objects.

Very little wall painting has survived from the Middle Ages. Churches built during the Romanesque period (11-13th centuries) had several great frescoes, but most of them have disappeared. In the churches of the Gothic period (XII-XVI centuries) there was not enough space for wall paintings. Book illustration was the main work of the Gothic painter.

Among the best illustrated manuscripts were the books of hours - collections of calendars, prayers, and psalms. A page from an Italian manuscript shows elaborate initials and a finely detailed marginal scene of Saint George slaying a dragon. The colors are shiny and gem-like, as in stained glass, and gold shimmers above the page. Delicately thin leafy and floral designs border on text. Artists probably used magnifying glasses to accomplish such intricate, detailed work.

Italy: Cimabue and Giotto

Italian painters at the end of the 13th century were still working in the Byzantine style. Human figures were made flat and decorative. The faces rarely showed expression. The bodies were weightless and seemed to float rather than stand firmly on the ground. In Florence, the painter Cimabue (1240-1302) tried to modernize some of the old Byzantine methods. The angels in Madonna Enthroned are more active than usual in the paintings of the time. Their gestures and faces show a little more human feelings. Cimabue added a new sense of monumentality or grandeur to his paintings. However, he continued to follow many Byzantine traditions, such as the gold background and the patterned arrangement of objects and figures.

It was the great Florentine painter Giotto (1267-1337) who actually broke with the Byzantine tradition. His fresco series in the Arena Chapel in Padua leaves Byzantine art far behind. These scenes from the lives of Mary and Christ have real emotions, tension and naturalism. All the qualities of human warmth and sympathy are present. People don't seem completely unreal or heavenly. Giotto shaded the outlines of the figures, and he placed deep shadows in the folds of the clothes to give a sense of roundness and strength.

For his small panels, Giotto used pure egg tempera, a medium that was perfected by the Florentines in the 14th century. The clarity and vibrancy of its colors should have greatly influenced people accustomed to the dark colors of Byzantine panels. Tempera paintings give the impression of soft daylight falling on the stage. They have an almost flat appearance, in contrast to the gloss of oil painting. Egg tempera remained the main paint until oil almost completely replaced it in the 16th century.

Late medieval painting north of the Alps

At the beginning of the 15th century, artists in Northern Europe worked in a style completely different from Italian painting. Nordic artists achieved realism by adding countless details to their paintings. All hair was gracefully contoured and every detail of drapery or flooring was precisely set. The invention of oil painting made detailing easier.

The Flemish painter Jan van Eyck (1370-1414) made a great contribution to the development of oil painting. When tempera is used, colors must be applied separately. They cannot shade each other well because the paint dries quickly. With oil that dries slowly, the artist can achieve more complex effects. His portraits from 1466-1530 were executed in Flemish oil technique. All details and even mirroring are crisp and precise. The color is durable and has a hard, enamel-like surface. The primed wood panel was prepared in the same way that Giotto prepared his panels for tempera. Van Eyck created the painting in layers of a subtle color called glaze. Tempera was probably used in the original undergrowth and for highlights.

Italian Renaissance

While van Eyck was working in the North, Italians were entering the golden age of art and literature. This period is called the Renaissance, which means rebirth. Italian painters were inspired by the sculpture of the ancient Greeks and Romans. The Italians wanted to revive the spirit of classical art, which celebrates human independence and nobility. Renaissance artists continued to paint religious scenes. But they also emphasized earthly life and the achievements of people.

Florence

Giotto's achievements in the early 14th century marked the beginning of the Renaissance. Italian artists of the 17th century continued it. Masaccio (1401-1428) was one of the leaders of the first generation of Renaissance painters. He lived in Florence, a wealthy trading city where Renaissance art began. By the time of his death in the late twenties, he had revolutionized painting. In his famous fresco, The Tribute Money, he sets solid sculptural figures in a landscape that seems to stretch far into the distance. Masaccio may have studied perspective with the Florentine architect and sculptor Brunelleschi (1377-1414).

The fresco technique was very popular during the Renaissance. It was especially suitable for large paintings because the colors in the fresco are dry and perfectly flat. The image can be viewed from any angle without glare or reflections. Also, frescoes are affordable. Usually, the artists had several assistants. The work was done in parts because it had to be completed while the plaster was still damp.

Masaccio's full "three-dimensional" style was typical of the new progressive movement of the 15th century. Fra Angelico's style (1400-1455) represents a more traditional approach used by many early Renaissance painters. He was less concerned with perspective and more interested in decorative design. His "Coronation of the Virgin" is an example of tempera in the most beautiful performance. Cheerful, intense colors set against gold and accented with gold. The picture looks like an enlarged miniature. Long, narrow shapes have little in common with Masaccio. The composition is organized in broad lines of movement circling around the central figures of Christ and Mary.

Another Florentine who worked in the traditional style was Sandro Botticelli (1444-1515). Flowing rhythmic lines connect sections of "Spring" by Botticelli. The figure of Spring, carried by the westerly wind, sweeps from the right. The three graces dance in a circle, the fluttering folds of their dresses and the graceful movements of their hands express the rhythms of the dance.

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) studied painting in Florence. He is known for his scientific research and inventions as well as his paintings. Very few of his paintings have survived, in part because he often experimented with different ways of creating and applying paint, rather than using tried and true methods. The Last Supper (painted between 1495 and 1498) was done in oil, but unfortunately Leonardo painted it on a damp wall that cracked the paint. But even in poor condition (before restoration), the painting had the ability to arouse emotions in everyone who sees it.

One of the hallmarks of Leonardo's style was his method of depicting lights and darkness. The Italians called it semi-dark lighting "sfumato", which means smoky or hazy. The figures in Madonna of the Rocks are veiled in a sfumato atmosphere. Their shapes and features are softly shaded. Leonardo achieved these effects using very subtle gradations of light and dark tones.

Rome

The culmination of Renaissance painting took place in the 16th century. At the same time, the center of art and culture moved from Florence to Rome. Under Pope Sixtus IV and his successor, Julius II, the city of Rome was gloriously and richly decorated by Renaissance artists. Some of the most ambitious projects of this period began during the papacy of Julius II. Julius commissioned the great sculptor and painter Michelangelo (1475-1564) to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and carve a sculpture for the tomb of the Pope. Julius also invited the painter Raphael (1483-1520) to help decorate the Vatican. With assistants, Raphael painted four rooms of the Pope's apartments in the Vatican Palace.

Michelangelo, a Florentine by birth, developed a monumental painting style. The figures in his painting are so solid and voluminous that they look like sculptures. The Sistine ceiling, which took Michelangelo 4 years, consists of hundreds of human figures from the Old Testament. To complete this grandiose fresco, Michelangelo had to lie on his back in the scaffolding. The pensive face of Jeremiah among the prophets that surround the ceiling is considered by some experts to be a self-portrait of Michelangelo.

Raphael came to Florence from Urbino as a very young man. In Florence, he absorbed the ideas of Leonardo and Michelangelo. By the time Raphael went to Rome to work at the Vatican, his style had become one of the greatest in beauty of execution. He especially loved his beautiful portraits of the Madonna and Child. They have been reproduced in thousands and can be seen everywhere. His Madonna del Granduca is successful due to its simplicity. Timeless in its peacefulness and purity, it is as attractive to us as it is to the Italians of the era of Raphael.

Venice

Venice was the main northern Italian city of the Renaissance. It was visited by artists from Flanders and other regions who knew about Flemish experiments with oil paint. This stimulated the early use of oil technology in the Italian city. The Venetians learned to paint on tightly stretched canvas rather than on the wood paneling commonly used in Florence.

Giovanni Bellini (1430-1515) was the greatest Venetian painter of the 15th century. He was also one of the first Italian painters to use oil on canvas. Giorgione (1478-1151) and Titian (1488-1515), who is the most famous of all Venetian painters, were apprentices at Bellini's workshop.

Oil master Titian painted huge canvases in warm, rich colors. In his mature paintings, he sacrificed detail for stunning effects such as Madonna Pesaro. He used large brushes to make large strokes. His colors are especially rich because he patiently created glazes of contrasting colors. Typically, glazes were applied to a brown tempered surface to give the painting a uniform tone.

Another great Venetian painter of the 16th century was Tintoretto (1518-1594). Unlike Titian, he usually worked directly on canvas without preliminary sketches or outlines. He often distorted his forms (twisted them) for the sake of composition and plot drama. His technique, which includes wide strokes and dramatic contrasts of light and dark, seems very modern.

The painter Kyriakos Theotokopoulos (1541-1614) was known as El Greco (Greek). Born on the island of Crete, which was occupied by the Venetian army, El Greco was trained by Italian artists. As a young man, he went to study in Venice. The combined influence of Byzantine art that he saw around him in Crete and Italian Renaissance art made El Greco's work outstanding.

In his paintings, he distorted natural forms and used even stranger, more unearthly colors than Tintoretto, whom he admired. Later, El Greco moved to Spain, where the gloominess of Spanish art influenced his work. In his dramatic vision of Toledo, a storm rages over the deathly silence of the city. Cold blues, greens, and blues and whites carry the chill over the landscape.

Renaissance in Flanders and Germany

The golden age of painting in Flanders (now part of Belgium and northern France) was the 15th century, the time of van Eyck. In the 16th century, many Flemish painters imitated Italian Renaissance painters. However, some Flemings continued the Flemish tradition of realism. Then genre painting spread - scenes from everyday life that were sometimes charming and sometimes fantastic. Hieronymus Bosch (1450-1515), who preceded genre painters, had an unusually vivid imagination. He invented all kinds of strange, grotesque creatures for The Temptation of St. Anthony ". Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1525-1569) also worked in the Flemish tradition, but added perspective and other Renaissance characteristics to his genre scenes.

Albrecht Durer (1471-1528), Hans Holbein the Younger (1497-1543) and Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553) were the three most important German painters of the 16th century. They did much to soften the grim realism of early German painting. Dürer visited Italy at least once, where he was impressed by paintings by Giovanni Bellini and other northern Italians. Through this experience, he instilled in German painting a knowledge of perspective, a sense of color and light, and a new understanding of composition. Holbein absorbed even more Italian achievements. His sensitive drawing and ability to select only the most important details made him a master portraitist.

Baroque painting

The 17th century is known in art as the Baroque period. In Italy, the painters Caravaggio (1571-1610) and Annibale Carracci (1560-1609) presented two contrasting points of view. Caravaggio (real name Michelangelo Merisi) has always drawn inspiration directly from the realities of life. One of his main problems was to copy nature as accurately as possible without glorifying it in any way. Carracci, on the other hand, followed the ideal of Renaissance beauty. He studied ancient sculpture and works by Michelangelo, Raphael and Titian. Caravaggio's style admired many artists, especially the Spaniard Ribera and the young Velazquez. Carracci inspired Nicolas Poussin (1594-1665), a famous French painter of the 17th century.

Spain

Diego Velazquez (1599-1660), court painter to King Philip IV of Spain, was one of the greatest of all Spanish painters. An aficionado of Titian's work, he was a master at using rich, harmonious colors. No artist could better create the illusion of rich tissue or human skin. The portrait of the little prince Philippe Prosper shows this skill.

Flanders

Paintings by the Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) are the embodiment of the full-color baroque style. They are bursting with energy, color and light. Rubens broke with the Flemish tradition of painting small pictures. His canvases are huge, filled with human figures. He received more orders for large paintings than he could handle. Therefore, he often only drew a small color sketch. Then his assistants transferred the sketch to a large canvas and finished the painting under the direction of Rubens.

Holland

The achievements of the Dutch painter Rembrandt (1606-1669) are among the most outstanding in history. He had a wonderful gift - to accurately capture and convey human emotions. Like Titian, he worked for a long time on the creation of multi-layered paintings. Earthy colors - ocher yellow, brown and brownish-red - were his favorites. His paintings are mostly made in dark colors. The importance of the dark layered parts makes his technique unusual. The emphasis is conveyed by bright lighting in relation to bright areas.

Jan Vermeer (1632-1675) was part of a group of Dutch artists who painted humble scenes of everyday life. He was a master in drawing any texture - satin, Persian carpets, bread crusts, metal. The overall impression of Vermeer's interior is that of a sunny, cheerful room filled with iconic household items.

18th century painting

In the 18th century, Venice produced several excellent artists. The most famous was Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696-1770). He decorated the interiors of palaces and other buildings with grandiose colorful frescoes representing scenes of wealth. Francesco Guardi (1712-1793) was very skillful with the brush, with just a few spots of color he could conjure up the idea of a tiny figure in a boat. The spectacular views of Antonio Canaletto (1697-1768) celebrated Venice's past glories.

France: Rococo style

In France, a taste for pastel colors and intricate finishes in the early 18th century led to the development of the Rococo style. Jean Antoine Watteau (1684-1721), court painter to King Louis XV, and later François Boucher (1703-1770) and Jean Honore Fragonard (1732-1806) were associated with Rococo trends. Watteau wrote dreamy visions, a life in which everything is fun. The style is based on picnics in parks, forest parties, where cheerful gentlemen and elegant ladies have fun in nature.

Other 18th-century painters depicted scenes of ordinary middle-class life. Like the Dutch Vermeer, Jean Baptiste Simeon Chardin (1699-1779) appreciated simple home scenes and still lifes. His colors are sober and calm compared to Watteau.

England

In the 18th century, the British first developed a separate school of painting. The core consisted mainly of portrait painters who were influenced by Venetian Renaissance painters. Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792) and Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788) are the most famous. Reynolds, who traveled to Italy, followed the ideals of Renaissance painting. His portraits, charming and touching, are not particularly interesting in color or texture. Gainsborough, on the other hand, had a talent for brilliance. The surfaces of his paintings glow with a radiant color.

19th century painting

The 19th century is sometimes seen as the period during which contemporary art began to take shape. One of the important reasons for the so-called revolution in art during this time was the invention of the camera, which forced artists to reconsider the purpose of painting.

A more significant development was the widespread use of prefabricated paints. Until the 19th century, most artists or their assistants made their own paints by grinding pigment. Early commercial paints were inferior to hand paints. Artists in the late 19th century discovered that the dark blues and browns of earlier paintings turned black or gray over the years. They started using solid colors again to preserve their work, and sometimes because they tried to more accurately reflect sunlight in street scenes.

Spain: Goya

Francisco Goya (1746-1828) was the first great Spanish painter to emerge from the 17th century. As a favorite painter of the Spanish court, he made many portraits of the royal family. The royal characters are equipped with elegant clothes and beautiful jewelry, but on some of their faces all that is reflected is vanity and greed. In addition to portraits, Goya painted dramatic scenes such as the Third of May 1808. This painting depicts the execution by a group of Spanish rebels by French soldiers. The bold contrasts of light and dark and gloomy colors, laced with red splashes, evoke the grim horror of the spectacle.

Although France was a great center for art in the 1800s, English landscape painters John Constable (1776-1837) and Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) made valuable contributions to 19th century painting. Both were interested in painting light and air, two aspects of nature that 19th century artists explored in their entirety. The constable used a technique known as division, or broken color. He used contrasting colors over the main background color. He often used a palette knife to apply color tightly. The painting "Hay Wain" made him famous after being shown in Paris in 1824. This is a simple village haymaking scene. Clouds drift over meadows covered with patches of sunlight. Turner's paintings are more dramatic than those of Constable, who painted the majestic sights of nature - storms, seascapes, blazing sunsets, high mountains. Often, a golden haze partially obscures objects in his paintings, making them appear to be floating in endless space.

France

The period of Napoleon's reign and the French Revolution marked the emergence of two opposing trends in French art - classicism and romanticism. Jacques Louis David (1748-1825) and Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres (1780-1867) were inspired by ancient Greek and Roman art and the Renaissance. They accentuated details and used color to create solid shapes. As a favorite artist of the revolutionary government, David often wrote the historical events of that period. In his portraits, such as Madame Recamier, he strove to achieve classical simplicity.

Theodore Guericault (1791-1824) and the romantic Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) rebelled against David's style. For Delacroix, color was the most important element in painting and he did not have the patience to imitate classical statues. Instead, he admired Ruben and the Venetians. He chose colorful, exotic themes for his paintings that sparkle with light and full of movement.

The Barbizon painters were also part of a general romantic movement that lasted from about 1820 to 1850. They worked near the village of Barbizon at the edge of the Fontainebleau forest. They took inspiration from nature and completed paintings in their studios.

Other artists experimented with everyday common objects. The landscapes of Jean Baptiste Camille Corot (1796-1875) reflect his love of nature, and his studies of the human body show a kind of balanced serenity. Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) called himself a realist because he portrayed the world as he saw it - even its harsh, unpleasant side. He limited his palette to just a few gloomy colors. Edouard Manet (1832-1883) also took the basis for his stories from the world around him. People were shocked by his colorful contrasts and unusual techniques. The surfaces of his paintings often have a flat, patterned texture of brush strokes. Manet's techniques for applying light effects to form influenced young artists, especially the Impressionists.

Working in the 1870s and 1880s, a group of artists known as the Impressionists wanted to depict nature exactly as it was. They went much further than Constable, Turner and Manet in the study of the effects of light in color. Some of them have developed scientific theories of color. Claude Monet (1840-1926) often painted the same species at different times of the day to show how it changes under different lighting conditions. Whatever the subject, his paintings are composed of hundreds of tiny strokes placed next to each other, often in contrasting colors. In the distance, strokes blend to create the impression of solid shapes. Pierre Auguste Renoir (1841-1919) used Impressionist techniques to capture the celebration of Parisian life. In his Dance at the Moulin de la Galette, people in brightly colored clothes crowded and danced merrily. Renoir painted the whole picture with small strokes. Dots and strokes of paint create texture on the surface of the painting that gives it a special look. The crowds seem to melt into sunlight and shimmering color.

20th century painting

A number of artists soon became dissatisfied with Impressionism. Artists such as Paul Cezanne (1839-1906) felt that Impressionism did not describe the strength of forms in nature. Cezanne loved to paint still lifes because they allowed him to focus on the shape of the fruit or other objects and their location. The objects in his still lifes look solid because he reduced them to simple geometric shapes. His technique of placing stains of paint and short strokes of rich color side by side shows that he learned a lot from the Impressionists.

Vincent Van Gogh (1853-90) and Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) reacted to the realism of the Impressionists. Unlike the Impressionists, who said they viewed nature objectively, Van Gogh cared little for accuracy. He often distorted objects to express his thoughts more creatively. He used impressionist principles to place contrasting colors next to each other. Sometimes he squeezed the paint from the tubes directly onto the canvas, like in The Field of Yellow Corn.

Gauguin did not care about the spotty color of the Impressionists. He applied color fluidly in large flat areas that he separated from each other with lines or dark edges. Colorful tropical peoples provided much of his plots.

Cezanne's method of creating space using simple geometric shapes was developed by Pablo Picasso (1881-1973), Georges Braque (1882-1963) and others. Their style became known as Cubism. Cubists painted objects as if they could be seen from multiple angles at once, or as if they were taken apart and assembled on a flat canvas. Often the objects turned out to be dissimilar to anything that exists in nature. Occasionally, Cubists cut figures out of fabric, cardboard, wallpaper, or other materials and pasted them onto canvas to make a collage. The textures were also varied by adding sand or other substances to the paint.

More recent trends have been to place less emphasis on the topic. Composition and image technique began to receive more emphasis.

Acrylic painting: history, technique, advantages of acrylic

The number of styles and trends is enormous, if not infinite. The key feature by which works can be grouped by style is the unified principles of artistic thinking. The replacement of some methods of artistic thinking by others (alternation of types of compositions, methods of spatial constructions, peculiarities of color) is not accidental. Our perception of art is also historically changeable.
While building the style system in a hierarchical order, we will adhere to the Eurocentric tradition. The largest concept in the history of art is the concept of an era. Each era is characterized by a certain "picture of the world", which consists of philosophical, religious, political ideas, scientific ideas, psychological characteristics of the worldview, ethical and moral norms, aesthetic criteria of life, by which they distinguish one era from another. These are the Primitive Era, the Era of the Ancient World, Antiquity, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, the New Time.
Styles in art do not have clear boundaries, they smoothly merge into one another and are in continuous development, mixing and opposition. Within the framework of one historical art style, a new one is always born, and that, in turn, passes into the next. Many styles coexist at the same time and therefore there are no “pure styles” at all.
Several styles can coexist in the same historical era. For example, Classicism, Academism and Baroque in the 17th century, Rococo and Neoclassicism in the 18th century, Romanticism and Academicism in the 19th. Styles such as, for example, classicism and baroque are called great styles, since they apply to all types of art: architecture, painting, arts and crafts, literature, music.
A distinction should be made between artistic styles, trends, trends, schools and the peculiarities of the individual styles of individual masters. Several artistic directions can exist within one style. The artistic direction is formed both from the characteristics typical for a given era, and from the peculiar ways of artistic thinking. The Art Nouveau style, for example, includes a number of trends at the turn of the century: post-impressionism, symbolism, fauvism, etc. On the other hand, the concept of symbolism as an artistic direction is well developed in literature, while in painting it is very vague and unites artists, so different stylistically that it is often interpreted only as a unifying worldview.

Below will be given the definitions of eras, styles and trends that are somehow reflected in modern fine and decorative arts.

	- an artistic style that developed in the countries of Western and Central Europe in the XII-XV centuries. It was the result of the centuries-old evolution of medieval art, its highest stage and, at the same time, the first ever European, international artistic style in history. It covered all types of art - architecture, sculpture, painting, stained glass, book decoration, arts and crafts. The basis of the Gothic style was architecture, which is characterized by pointed arches directed upwards, multicolored stained-glass windows, and visual dematerialization of form. Elements of Gothic art can often be found in modern interior design, in particular, in murals, less often in easel painting. Since the end of the last century, there has been a Gothic subculture that has clearly manifested itself in music, poetry, and clothing design.
	(Renaissance) - (French Renaissance, Italian Rinascimento) An era in the cultural and ideological development of a number of countries of Western and Central Europe, as well as some countries of Eastern Europe. The main distinguishing features of the Renaissance culture: secular character, humanistic worldview, appeal to the ancient cultural heritage, a kind of "revival" of it (hence the name). The culture of the Renaissance has specific features of the transitional era from the Middle Ages to the new time, in which the old and the new, intertwining, form a peculiar, qualitatively new alloy. The question of the chronological boundaries of the Renaissance (in Italy - 14-16 centuries, in other countries - 15-16 centuries), its territorial distribution and national characteristics is a complex one. Elements of this style in contemporary art are often used in wall paintings, less often in easel painting.
	- (from Italian maniera - technique, manner) current in European art of the 16th century. Representatives of mannerism moved away from the Renaissance harmonious perception of the world, the humanistic concept of man as a perfect creation of nature. A keen perception of life was combined with a programmatic desire not to follow nature, but to express the subjective "inner idea" of the artistic image that was born in the artist's soul. Most clearly manifested in Italy. For the Italian mannerism of the 1520s. (Pontormo, Parmigianino, Giulio Romano) are characterized by dramatic acuteness of images, tragedy of world perception, complexity and exaggerated expression of poses and motives of movement, elongation of proportions of figures, coloristic and cut-and-light dissonances. Recently, it has been used by art critics to denote phenomena in contemporary art associated with the transformation of historical styles.
	- historical art style, which was spread initially in Italy in the middle. XVI-XVII centuries, and then in France, Spain, Flanders and Germany in the XVII-XVIII centuries. More broadly, this term is used to define the ever-renewing tendencies of a restless, romantic outlook, thinking in expressive, dynamic forms. Finally, in every time, in almost every historical artistic style, you can find your own "Baroque period" as a stage of the highest creative upsurge, tension of emotions, explosiveness of forms.
	- artistic style in Western European art of the 17th - early 20th century XIX century and in the Russian XVIII - early. XIX, referring to the ancient heritage as an ideal to follow. It manifested itself in architecture, sculpture, painting, arts and crafts. Artists-classicists considered antiquity the highest achievement and made it their standard in art, which they strove to imitate. Over time, it degenerated into academicism.
	- a trend in European and Russian art of the 1820-1830s, which replaced classicism. The romantics highlighted individuality, opposing the "imperfect" reality to the ideal beauty of the classicists. Artists were attracted by bright, rare, extraordinary phenomena, as well as images of a fantastic nature. In the art of romanticism, acute individual perception and experience plays an important role. Romanticism freed art from abstract classicistic dogmas and turned it towards national history and images of folklore.
	- (from Latin sentiment - feeling) - the direction of Western art of the second half of the XVIII., expressing disappointment in “civilization” based on the ideals of “reason” (the ideology of the Enlightenment). S. proclaims the feeling, solitary reflection, the simplicity of the rural life of the “little man”. J.J. Rousseau is considered the ideologist of S.
	- a trend in art that seeks to display both the external form and the essence of phenomena and things with the greatest truth and reliability. As a creative method, it combines individual and typical traits when creating an image. The longest in time of existence direction, developing from the primitive era to the present day.
	- a trend in European artistic culture of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Arising as a reaction to the dominance in the humanitarian sphere of the norms of bourgeois "common sense" (in philosophy, aesthetics - positivism, in art - naturalism), symbolism first of all took shape in French literature of the late 1860s-70s, later spread in Belgium, Germany , Austria, Norway, Russia. The aesthetic principles of symbolism in many ways went back to the ideas of romanticism, as well as to some of the doctrines of the idealistic philosophy of A. Schopenhauer, E. Hartmann, partly F. Nietzsche, to the work and theorizing of the German composer R. Wagner. Symbolism opposed living reality to the world of visions and dreams. The symbol generated by poetic insight and expressing the otherworldly meaning of phenomena hidden from ordinary consciousness was considered a universal tool for comprehending the secrets of being and individual consciousness. The artist-creator was seen as a mediator between the real and the supersensible, finding everywhere "signs" of world harmony, prophetically guessing the signs of the future both in modern phenomena and in the events of the past.
	- (from the French impression - impression) a trend in art in the last third of the 19th - early 20th centuries, which arose in France. The name was introduced by the art critic L. Leroy, who disparaged the exhibition of artists in 1874, where, among others, the painting by C. Monet “Sunrise. Impression". Impressionism asserted the beauty of the real world, emphasizing the freshness of the first impression, the variability of the environment. The predominant attention to the solution of purely pictorial problems diminished the traditional idea of drawing as the main component of a work of art. Impressionism had a powerful impact on the art of European countries and the United States, aroused interest in subjects from real life. (E. Manet, E. Degas, O. Renoir, C. Monet, A. Sisley, etc.)
	- current in painting (synonym - divisionism), which developed within the framework of neo-impressionism. Neo-Impressionism originated in France in 1885 and spread also in Belgium and Italy. The neo-impressionists tried to apply the latest achievements in the field of optics in art, according to which painting performed with separate points of the primary colors in visual perception gives a fusion of colors and the entire gamut of painting. (J. Seurat, P. Signac, C. Pissarro).
	Post-impressionism- the conditional collective name of the main directions of French painting towards. XIX - 1st quarter. XX century The art of post-impressionism arose as a reaction to impressionism, which fixed attention on the transmission of the moment, on the feeling of picturesqueness and lost interest in the shape of objects. Among the post-impressionists are P. Cezanne, P. Gauguin, V. Gogh and others.
	- style in European and American art at the end of the XIX-XX centuries. Modern reinterpreted and stylized the lines of the art of various epoxes, and developed his own artistic practices, based on the principles of practice. The object of modernization is also stanovyatsya and natural forms. This obyacnyaetcya ne tolko intepec to pactitelnym opnamentam in ppoizvedeniyax modepna, Nr and cama THEIR kompozitsionnaya and placticheckaya ctpyktypa - obilie kpivolineynyx ocheptany, oplyvayuschix, nepovnyx kontypov, napominayuschix pactitelnye fopmy. It is closely related to modernity - a symbolism that served as an aesthetic-philo-philosophical basis for a fashion, relying on modernity as a plausible implementation of its ideas. Modern had different names in different countries, which are essentially synonymous: Art Nouveau - in France, Secession - in Austria, Jugendstil - in Germany, Liberty - in Italy.
	- (from French modern - modern) the general name of a number of art trends of the first half of the 20th century, which are characterized by the denial of traditional forms and aesthetics of the past. Modernism is close to avant-garde and opposite to academism.
	- a name that unites a range of artistic trends common in the 1905-1930s. (fauvism, cubism, futurism, expressionism, dadaism, surrealism). All these directions are united by the desire to renew the language of art, to rethink its tasks, to gain freedom of artistic expression.
	- direction in art late XIX - n. XX century, based on the creative lessons of the French artist Paul Cezanne, who reduced all forms in the image to the simplest geometric shapes, and the color to contrasting constructions of warm and cold tones. Cezanneism served as one of the starting points for Cubism. To a large extent, Cezanneism also influenced the Russian realistic school of painting.
	- (from fauve - wild) avant-garde trend in French art n. XX century The name "wild" was given by contemporary critics to a group of artists who appeared in 1905 at the Paris Salon of the Independents, and was ironic in nature. The group included A. Matisse, A. Marquet, J. Rouault, M. de Vlaminck, A. Derain, R. Dufy, J. Braque, C. van Dongen and others. , search for impulses in primitive creativity, art of the Middle Ages and the East.
	- deliberate simplification of pictorial means, imitation of the primitive stages of the development of art. This term refers to the so-called. naive art of artists who have not received a special education, but are involved in the general artistic process of the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th century. XX century. The works of these artists - N. Pirosmani, A. Russo, V. Selivanov and others are characterized by a peculiar childishness in the interpretation of nature, a combination of generalized form and small literality in details. The primitivism of the form by no means predetermines the primitiveness of the content. It often serves as a source for professionals who borrowed forms, images, methods from folk, in fact, primitive art. N. Goncharov, M. Larionov, P. Picasso, A. Matisse drew inspiration from primitivism.
	- a trend in art, formed on the basis of following the canons of antiquity and the Renaissance. It was used in many European art schools from the 16th to the 19th century. Academism turned classical traditions into a system of “eternal” rules and regulations that constrained creative searches, tried to oppose “high” improved, non-national and timeless forms of beauty to imperfect living nature. Academism is characterized by a preference for subjects from ancient mythology, biblical or historical subjects from contemporary artist's life.
	- (French cubisme, from cube - cube) direction in the art of the first quarter of the XX century. The Plactic language of Cubism was based on the deformation and arrangement of the parameters on the geometrical planes, the plactic displacement of the form. The birth of Cubism falls on 1907-1908 - the eve of the First World War. The undisputed leader of this trend was the poet and publicist G. Apollinaire. This movement was one of the first to embody the leading trends in the further development of art of the twentieth century. One of these tendencies was the dominance of the concept over the artistic intrinsic value of the painting. J. Braque and P. Picasso are considered the fathers of Cubism. Fernand Léger, Robert Delaunay, Juan Gris and others joined the emerging current.
	- current in literature, painting and cinema, which arose in 1924 in France. It greatly contributed to the formation of the consciousness of modern man. The main figures of the movement are André Breton, Louis Aragon, Salvador Dali, Luis Buñuel, Juan Miro and many other artists around the world. Surrealism expressed the idea of existence outside the real, the absurdity, the unconscious, dreams, dreams take on a particularly important role here. One of the characteristic methods of the surrealist artist is detachment from conscious creativity, which makes him a tool that in various ways extracts bizarre images of the subconscious, akin to hallucinations. Surrealism survived several crises, survived the Second World War and gradually, merging with mass culture, intersecting with trans-avant-garde, entered postmodernism as an integral part.
	- (from lat.futurum - future) literary and artistic current in the art of the 1910s. Otvodya cebe pol ppoobpaza ickycctva bydyschego, fytypizm in kachectve ocnovnoy ppogpammy vydvigal ideyu pazpysheniya kyltypnyx ctepeotipov and ppedlagal vzamen apologiyu texniki and ypbanizma HOW glavnyx ppiznakov nactoyaschego and gpyadyschego. The important artistic idea of fyturism became a search for a physical expression of the rate of movement as the fundamental life of the tempo of modern life. The Russian version of futurism bore the name kybofytyrism and was based on the connection of the plastic principles of the fantastical kybism and the eupopeyticity of the general

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Features of painting as a type of fine art

Painting belongs a special place among other arts : Perhaps no other type of art is capable of conveying the seen phenomena of the world, human images with such completeness, especially when you consider that most of the information we get from the outside world with the help of sight, those. visually. art painting portrait landscape still life

It was the art of painting that managed to create the impossible - to stop a moment long before photography: works of this kind andart through one depicted moment conveys previous subsequent, past and future, conjectured by the viewer.

Painting - this is a show organized by the artist:

Despite the fact that the painter embodies real images in visible forms, they are not a direct copy of life;

Creating a picture, the artist relies on nature, but at the same time recreates it on the material obtained as a result of his social and professional experience, skill, skill, imaginative thinking.

Can be found several main types of experience caused by paintings:

· Recognition of familiar objects comprehended by sight - on the basis of this, certain associations are born about the depicted;

· Getting an aesthetic feeling.

Thus, painting performs pictorial, narrative and decorative functions.

Types of painting and its expressive means

Painting is divided into the following types:

· Monumental - decorative - serves to complement and design architectural structures (wall paintings, shades, panels, mosaics);

· Scenery - used in other types of arts (cinema or theater);

· Easel;

· Iconography;

· Miniature.

The most independent variety is an easel painting.

Painting possesses special expressive means:

· Drawing;

· Color;

· Composition.

Drawing - one of the most important means of expression: it is with the help of it and the components of the drawing lines are created plastic images. Sometimes these lines are schematic, only outline the structures of the volumes.

Colour -the leading expressive means of the art of painting. It is in color that a person perceives the world around him. Colour:

· Builds shape depicted objects;

· Simulates space items;

· Creates mood;

Forms a certain rhythm.

Color organization system, color tone ratio, with the help of which the tasks of the artistic image are solved is called color:

In a narrow sense, it is the only correct organization of color schemes for a given picture;

In wide - common to most the laws of color perception, since you can say "warm color", "cold color", etc.

In different periods of the history of painting, there were color systems.

In the early stages, local flavor, excluding the play of colors and shades: the color here is, as it were, uniform and unchanged.

During the Renaissance, tonal coloring, where colorsdue toposition in space and their illumination. The ability to designate the shape of the depicted object with light is called plastic color.

There are two types of tonal coloration:

· Dramatic - contrast of light and shadow;

· Color - contrast of color tones.

It is very important for an artist to be able to use the technique. chiaroscuro, those. maintain the correct gradation of light and dark in the picture, because this is how the volume of the depicted object, surrounded by a light-air environment.

Composition in painting in the most general sense - placement of figures, their relationship in the space of the picture. The composition combines a huge variety of details and elements into a single whole. Their cause-and-effect relationship forms a closed system in which nothing can be changed or added to it. This system reflects a part of the real world, which is perceived and felt by the artist, he singled out from a variety of phenomena.

At the same time, in the composition area there is concentration of ideological and creative ideas, because it is through her that the attitude of the creator to his model. The image becomes an artistic phenomenon only when it is subordinated to the ideological plan, because otherwise we can only talk about simple copying.

N.N. Volkov draws attention to the difference between the concepts of "structure", "construction", and "composition":

· Structure determined a unified nature of connections between elements, a unified law of shaping. The concept of structure in relation to a work of art is associated with the multi-layered nature of a work of art, that is, in the process of perceiving a picture, we can penetrate into deeper layers of its structure;

· Construction - it is a type of structure in which elements are functionally linked, because its integrity depends on the unity of function. With regard to a picture, we can say that the function of constructive connections in a picture is the creation and strengthening of semantic ties, since usually the constructive center is most often the semantic node;

· Composition of artwork there is a closed structure with fixed elements linked by the unity of meaning.

One of the main laws of compositionis the limitation Images, which provides opportunities for the most important in the expression of the idea of the picture.

Form of restriction also plays a significant role - in artistic practice such basic forms:

· Rectangle.

The limitation also applies to what can be depicted, i.e. find external similarity in paints, lines on a plane objects, persons, visible space, etc.

In the practice of fine arts, the following types of compositions are known:

· Stable (static) - the main compositional axes intersect at right angles in the center of the piece;

· Dynamic - with dominant diagonals, circles and ovals;

Open - composition lines seem to diverge from the center4

· Closed - the lines are drawn to the center.

Stable and closed compositional schemes typical for artistic practice Renaissance,dynamic and open - for the baroque era.

Techniques and main genres of painting

The expressiveness of the painting and the embodiment of the artistic intention depend on what painting technique is used by the artist.

The main types of painting techniques:

· Oil painting;

· Watercolor;

· Tempera;

· Pastel;

· Fresco.

Oil painting characterized by the fact that with their help it is possible to obtain complex color solutions - the viscosity and long drying time of oil paints allow using mixing paints and obtaining their various combinations.

The usual basis for oil painting is a linen canvas covered semi-oil soil.

Other surfaces are also possible.

Watercolor differs from other techniques in special transparency and freshness of color. It does not use white and is used on unprimed white paper that serves as their role.

Interesting watercolor, made on raw paper.

Tempera, prepared with casein oil, egg or synthetic binder, it is one of the oldest painting techniques.

Tempera complicates the artist's work by the fact that it dries quickly enough and does not lend itself to mixing, and also changes color when dry, but on the other hand color in tempera especially beautiful - calm, velvety, even.

Pastel - painting with crayons.

Gives soft, delicate tones. Performed on raw paper or suede.

Unfortunately, pastel works are difficult to preserve due to their flowability.

Watercolor, pastel and gouache sometimes referred to graphics, since these paints are applied to unprimed paper, however, they have more of the main specific property of painting - color.

Fresco painting is carried out as follows: the powder of the paint pigment is diluted with water and applied to the wet plaster, which firmly holds the paint layer.

It has a long history.

This technique is especially often used when decorating the walls of buildings.

Despite the fact that painting is capable of reflecting almost all the phenomena of real life, most often it represents images of people, living and inanimate nature.

That's why the main genres of painting can be considered:

· Portrait;

· Landscape;

· Still life.

Portrait

Portrait in the most general sense is defined as an image of a person or a group of people existing or existing in reality.

Usually such portrait signs in the visual arts:

· Similarity with the model;

· Reflection of social and ethical traits through it.

But, undoubtedly, the portrait reflects not only this, but also the special attitude of the artist to the person being portrayed.

Never confuse the portraits of Rembrandt with the works of Velazquez, Repin with Serov or Tropinin, since the portrait represents two characters - the artist and his model.

Inexhaustible the main theme of the portrait ishuman. However, depending on the characteristics of the artist's perception of the person being portrayed, an idea arises that the artist seeks to convey.

Depending on the idea of the portrait, the following are determined:

· Compositional solution;

· Technique of painting;

· Coloring, etc.

The idea of the work gives rise to the image of the portrait:

· Documentary and narrative;

· Emotional and sensual;

· Psychological;

· Philosophical.

For narrative solution the image is characterized by a gravitation towards reliable specification of the portrait.

The desire for documentary similarity prevails here over the author's vision.

Emotional imaginative decision achieved decorative painting means and documentary authenticity is not required here.

It is not so important how similar the Rubens women are to their prototypes. The main thing is admiration for their beauty, health, sensuality, transmitted from artist to viewer.

To variety philosophical portrait include the "Portrait of an Old Man in Red" by Rembrandt (c. 1654). During the period of his creative maturity, such portraits-biographies of the elderly were very common, which are philosophical reflections of the artist about that period of human life, when the original results of a long and difficult life are summed up.

Artists quite often choose as a model of yourself, that's why it's so common self-portrait.

In it, the artist seeks to evaluate himself from the outside as a person, to determine his place in society, simply to capture himself for posterity.

Durer, Rembrandt, Velasquez, Van Gogh have an internal conversation with themselves and at the same time with the viewer.

It takes a special place in painting group portrait.

It is interesting for what it is exactly general portrait, and not portraits of several specific personalities depicted on one canvas.

In such a portrait, of course, there is a separate characteristic of each character, but at the same time, the impression of community, unity of the artistic image is created ("Regenshi of a shelter for the elderly in Haarlem" by F. Hals).

Sometimes it is very difficult to draw a line between group portrait and other genres, since the old masters depicted groups of people often in action.

Landscape

The main subject of the landscape genre is nature -either natural or transformed by man.

This genre much younger than others. If the sculptural portraits were created as early as 3 thousand BC, and the pictorial ones have a history of about 2 thousand years, then the beginning of the biography of the landscape dates back to the 6th century. AD, and they were widespread in the East, especially in China.

The birth of the European landscape happened in the 16th century, and it acquired the independence of the genre only from the beginning of the 17th century.

The landscape genre was formed, going from a decorative and auxiliary element in the composition of other works to an independent artistic phenomenon, portraying the natural environment.

It can be real or imagined types of nature. Some of them have stuck their names:

The city's architectural landscape is called redoubt ("Opera Passage" by C. Pissarro;

· Marine species - Marina ( landscapes by I. Aivazovsky).

Landscape genre becomes not just a reflection of nature, but also a means of expressing a special artistic idea.

Moreover, by the nature of his favorite subjects, to a certain extent, one can judge the emotional structure of the artist and the stylistic features of his work.

The figurative meaning of the work depends on the choice of a natural species:

· Epic start contained in the image of forest distances, mountain panoramas, endless plains ("Kama" by A. Vasnetsov).

Stormy sea or impenetrable wilderness embodies something mysterious sometimes harsh (J. Michel "The Thunderstorm");

· Lyrical types of snow-covered paths, forest edges, small bodies of water;

Sunny morning or noon can transmit feeling of joy and calmness ("White Water Lilies" by K. Monet, "Moscow Courtyard" by V. Polenov).

Since the pristine nature is gradually being actively intervened by humans, the landscape takes on the features of a serious historical document.

The landscape is capable of embodying even some social sensations of the era, the course of social thought: so in the middle of the 19th century, the aesthetics of the romantic and classical landscape is gradually giving way to the national landscape, which often acquires a social meaning; recorded in the landscape and the onset of a new technical era ("New Moscow by Y. Pimenov," Berlin-Potsdam Railway "by A. Menzel).

Landscape is not only an object of cognition of nature, a monument of art, but also a reflection of the state of culture of a particular era.

Still life

Still life depicts the world of things around a person, which are placed and organized in a solid composition in a real everyday environment.

Exactly such organization of things is a component of the figurative system of the genre.

Still life can have independent meaning, maybe become part of a composition of another genre, in order to more fully reveal the semantic content of the work, as, for example, in the paintings "The Merchant's Wife" by B. Kustodiev, "The Sick" by V. Polenov, "Girl with Peaches" by V. Serov.

In plot-thematic paintings, still life has, although important, but subordinate, however, as an independent genre of art it has great expressive possibilities. It presents not only the external, material essence of objects, but in a figurative form the essential aspects of life are transmitted, the era and even important historical events are reflected.

Still life serves good creative laboratory, where the artist improves his skills, individual handwriting,

The still life experienced periods of decline and development.

Of great importance for its formation was played by Dutch painters of the 16th - 17th centuries

They have worked out main, artistic principles:

· Realism;

· Subtle observations of life;

· A special gift of conveying the aesthetic value of familiar things.

In the favorite "breakfasts" and "shops", the material of the objects was conveyed with great skill; texture of surfaces of fruits, vegetables, game, fish.

It is especially important that in a still life, the inextricable connection of a person with the world of things is emphasized.

Impressionist painters they solved the creative problem of still life painting somewhat differently.

The main thing here was not a reflection of the properties of objects, their tangibility. A play of light, color, freshness of color (still lifes by K. Monet, masters of the Russian branch of French impressionism K. Korovin and I. Grabar).

Not every capture of the world of things on paper or canvas will be considered a still life. Since each object has its own natural habitat and purpose, placing it in different conditions can cause dissonance in the sound of the picture.

The main thing is that things combined into a still life composition create harmonious emotionally - rich artistic image.

Other genres of painting

Genres occupy a significant place in the art of painting:

· Household;

· Historical;

· Battle;

· Animalistic.

Household genre portrays everyday private and public life, usually, contemporary artist.

The pictures of this genre represent the labor activity of people ("Spinners" by D. Velazquez, "At the Harvest" by A. Venetsianov), holidays ("Peasant Dance" by P. Bruegel), minutes of rest, leisure ("Young Couple in the Park" by T. Geisborough , "Chess Players" by O. Domier), national flavor ("Algerian women in their chambers" by E. Delacroix).

Historical genre - capturing important historical events. This genre includes legendary and religious stories.

Among the paintings historical genre can be called "Death of Caesar" by K.T. von Piloti, "Delirium Surrender" by D. Velazquez, "Hector's Farewell to Andromache" by A. Losenko, "Sbinyanka" by J.L. David, "Liberty Leading the People" by E Delacroix and others.

The subject of the imagebattle genre are military campaigns, glorious battles, feats of arms, hostilities ("Battle of Angyari" by Leonardo da Vinci, "Tachanka" by M. Grekov, "Defense of Sevastopol" by A. Deineka). Sometimes it is included in the composition of historical painting.

In picturesanimalistic genre displayed animal world (" Poultry "by M. de Hondecuter," Yellow Horses "by F. Mark).

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