color in art

COLOR IN ART HISTORY JosĂŠ Luis CAIVANO caivano@fadu.uba.ar

University of Buenos Aires and National Council for Research Argentine Color Group

circa 20 000 BC - Bison, Altamira cave, Spain

2660 BC - Ur, Mesopotamian memorial plate

Egypt - glazed brick lion from the wall of Nebuchadnezzar’s palace

Egypt one of the first major civilizations to codify design elements in art. The wall paintings followed a rigid code of visual rules and meanings.

circa 2500 BC - Egypt hippopotamus hunt, Tomb of Ti, Saqqarah

Egypt circa 1300 BC bust of Nephertiti polychrome sculpture

Greece red and black pottery 500 BC

chryselephantine sculptures Greece, 5th century BC polychromy with the use of different materials

chryselephantine sculptures Greece Athena Parthenos Phidias, circa 440 BC polychromy with the use of different materials

circa 500 BC Greece, polychrome painted sculpture (reconstruction)

circa 80 BC Pompeii, wall painting in a villa

1st century Rome, polychrome painted sculpture

1st century Rome, polychrome sculpture

medieval polychrome sculpture

12th century Byzantin mosaic

circa 1100 medieval stained glass windows

circa 1140 Cathedral of St. Denis medieval stained glass windows

Medieval painting

circa 1285 Cimabue Madonna and child image and color codified representation

Medieval painting

1340 Pietro Lorenzetti Madonna and child codified blue on the Virgin

circa 1300 miniature painting, manuscript

circa 1400 illuminated manuscripts

1325 Giotto Last supper errors in perspective (parallel lines do not met in a vanishing point)

Renaissance

codified blue on the Virgin correct perspective with central vanishing point for parallel lines

before 1470 - Botticelli, Madonna and child

Renaissance

circa 1439 Jan van Eyck Madonna and child early stages of aerial perspective

Renaissance

circa 1474 Piero della Francesca Federico da Montefeltro aerial perspective

Renaissance

circa 1490 Jean Hay Margaret of Austria aerial perspective

Renaissance

circa 1495 Lorenzo di Credi Annunciation aerial perspective

High Renaissance

circa 1510 Raphael Madonna

High Renaissance

1510 Leonardo Virgin and child with St. Anne developed stage of aerial perspective

Manierism

circa 1530 Parmigianino Madonna and child developed stage of aerial perspective; starting of chiaroscuro

1598 - Federico Barocci, Aeneas flees burning Troy

Baroque

1606 - Caravaggio, St. Jerome - chiaroscuro

Baroque

circa 1609 Rubens, Samson and Delilah - chiaroscuro

Baroque

1640 Georges de la Tour St. Joseph, the carpenter chiaroscuro

Baroque

17th century trompe l’oeil in mural painting perspective and illussions of 3D space

1767 Tiepolo ceiling in Villa Pisani

1648 - Nicolas Poussin, Holy family - 3 primary colors

Neoclassicism

1784 - Jacques-L. David, Oath of the Horatii

Romanticism

1822 - Delacroix, The barque of Dante

1835 - William Turner, The burning of the Houses of Lords‌

circa 1835 - William Turner, Surge of sea in a storm

circa 1845 - William Turner, Europe and the bull

Chevreul The principles of harmony and contrast of colors “Two adjacent colours, when seen by the eye, will appear as dissimilar as possible.� influence on impressionist painters

1886 - Georges Seurat, La grande jatte - pointillism

1887 - Georges Seurat, Sitting model - pointillism

1888 - Georges Seurat, The dock of Port-en-Bessin with hight tide – pointillism, divisionism, partitive color mixture

1887 Vincent Van Gogh, Interior of a restaurant - pointillism

1887 Vincent Van Gogh Self portrait

Impressionism

1892-1894 Monet, Cathedral of Rouen

1904 Henri Matisse, Light, calm and voluptuous

Fauvism

1905 Henri Matisse, Portrait of Madame Matisse arbitrary use of color

Fauvism

1906 AndrĂŠ Derian pure colors without mixing, painting withouth shades or nuances, subjective representation

Abstraction

1913 - Kandisnky, Composition Nr. 4

Abstraction suprematism

1915 Malevich Black square

Abstraction suprematism

Malevitch White on white

Ostwald, Harmonie der Farben (Harmony of colors) influences on Paul Klee and the neoplasticist painters (De Stijl), including Mondrian

Abstraction

1929 Paul Klee Fire in the evening

Abstraction neoplasticism De Stijl

1921 Piet Mondrian Composition

Abstraction neoplasticism De Stijl

1942 Piet Mondrian Brodway boogie boogie

Abstraction

1926 Josef Albers Structure in blue sandblasted glass

1950 Henri Matisse, Zulma gouache on paper cut-out use of plane color

1950-1960 - Yves Klein – monochrome paintings

conceptual art

1950-1960 Yves Klein monochrome paintings IKB

(International Klein Blue)

reminiscent of the lapis lazuli used to paint the Madonna's robes in medieval paintings

Yves Klein – anthropometries – using the human body to paint

color field painting abstract expressionism Keneth Noland 1958

Clyfford Still 1957

1960 Mark Rothko Red over black on red

abstract expressionism 1960’s - Jackson Pollock

Pop art reminiscent of comics

1965 Roy Lichtenstein Head with black shadow

cinetic art

1960-1990 Jesus Soto light, color, space, moires, interferences

cinetic art

1960-2000 Carlos Cruz Diez light, color, space, moires, interferences

Association Internationale de la Couleur International Color Association Internationale Vereinigung f端r die Farbe

www.aic-color.org