The Fresco painting

Fresco is a way of painting pictures. A fresco is a painting that is ended on a wall. All wall paintings are sometimes called frescoes by mistake. A true fresco is painted onto plaster that is fresh.

The plaster has been laid on the wall that day and is still damp. The word fresco comes from the Italian for "fresh “Advantages and disadvantages of fresco painting.

The good things about fresco painting:

Fresco is a very good way of painting pictures on walls. It is much easier than painting on dry plaster because when paint is put onto dry plaster, it sinks straight in. Painting on fresh plaster means that the artist can spread the paint much easier.

Another reason why it is a good way to paint pictures on plastered walls is that the paint joins with the plaster so that the colors will not rub off. Frescoes last for hundreds of years. If they are reserved clean and dry, the colors will stay bright for a very long time.

Fresco is the "green" method of painting because it doesn't use dangerous chemicals. The water, the calcite and the colors do not cause pollution.

The bad things about fresco painting:

The problems with painting frescos come from the plaster. It must be mixed up and put on the wall freshly every day and left to partly dry before it can be used.

As the plaster begins to dry or "set", the artist can start the picture. The plaster becomes very hot while it is drying, giving off steam, and a psaltery smell.

The artist must work very quickly and carefully. If he/she makes a mistake, the plaster must be scraped off. Unlike most other types of painting, frescos can't be moved from place to place, or rearranged.

Paolo Veronese Paintings

Oil painting is a way of painting pictures with pigments (colors) that are held together by the medium of oil. The most usual type of oil that is used in paint is linseed oil. A picture that is painted using oil paint is called an "oil painting". Oil paint takes a long time to dry.

Artists find this useful because they can keep working on the painting for a long time. People say that Leonardo da Vinci worked on his painting of the Mona Lisa for four years, even although it is not a very big picture. Oils paints and oil paintings are often just called "oils" for short. If someone talks about "painting in oils" they mean that the painting is done in oil paints.

No-one knows when oil paint was first used. Caves in Afghanistan are decorated with ancient paintings in paint mixed with oils. It is believed that this type of paint was used in other countries of Asia as well.

It is believed that oil paint was used in Europe in the middle Ages at first for decorating shields, because oil paint lasted better than the traditional paint of tempera when it was in the weather, or if it was roughly treated. In 1125 a writer called Theophilus gives information for how to make oil paint in his book called On Diverse Arts.

The Renaissance art historian, Giorgio Vasari, said that the art of oil painting came from Northern Europe and the person who invented it was the famous Flemish painter Jan van Eyck.

Artists from the areas of modern Belgium and the Netherlands were the first artists to make oil painting their usual method of painting. This trend spread to other parts of Northern Europe.

A famous painting called the Portinari Altarpiece by Hugo van der goes arrived in Florence in the 1470s at a time when Leonardo da Vinci was young. Oil paintings at this date were usually done on wooden panels, in the way that tempera pictures were.

Leonid aftermov oil paintings

Leonid Afremov is a Belarus born, Israeli modern painter who creates unique landscapes, cityscape and figures using a palette knife rather than a brush to paint. Here is what he himself says about his work and the technique he uses:

I tried different techniques during my career, but I especially fell in love with painting with oil and palette-knife.

Every artwork is the result of long painting process; every canvas is born during the creative search; every painting is full of my inner world.

Each of my paintings brings different mood, colors and emotions. I love to express the beauty, harmony and spirit of this world in my paintings.

My heart is completely open to art. Thus, I enjoy creating inspired and beautiful paintings from the bottom of my soul.

Each of my artworks reflects my feelings, sensitivity, passion, and the music from my soul. True art is alive and inspired by humanity. I believe that art helps us to be free from violence and depression.

The Office at Night

In Office at Night (1940), another “couple” painting, Hopper creates a psychological puzzle. The painting shows a man focusing on his work papers, while nearby his attractive female secretary pulls a file.

Several studies for the painting show how Hopper experimented with the positioning of the two facts, perhaps to amplify the eroticism and the tension. Hopper presents the viewer with the possibilities that the man is either truly unconcerned in the woman's appeal or that he is working hard to ignore her.

Another interesting aspect of the painting is how Hopper employs three light sources, from a desk lamp, through a window and indirect light from above. Hopper went on to make several “office” pictures, but none with a physical undercurrent.

The style is suggestive of many of Hopper's works in that it depicts loneliness in a stark and distinctive fashion.It depicts a man sitting at a desk reading a document in a corner office at night. He is joined by a woman in a blue dress, possibly a secretary, standing at an open file cabinet.

A sheet of paper has fallen on the floor between the two individuals. There is a sexual interpretation of the relationship between the two individuals.

Josephine Hopper served as the model for the woman. Several titles were proposed for the painting, such as Room 1005 and Confidentially Yours, before Edward Hopper chose "Office at Night."

In a letter to the Walker Art Center, Hopper said the work was "probably first suggested by many rides on the 'L' train in New York City after dark glimpses of office interiors that were so fleeting as to leave fresh and vivid impressions on my mind."

About Western_oilpaintings

The history of Western painting represents a continuous, though disrupted, tradition from antiquity. Until the mid-19th century it was primarily concerned with representational and Classical modes of production, after which time more modern, abstract and conceptual forms gained favor.

Developments in Western painting historically parallel those in Eastern painting, in general a few centuries later. African art, Islamic art, Indian art, Chinese art, and Japanese art each had significant influence on Western art, and, eventually, vice-versa.

Initially serving imperial, private, civic, and religious support, Western painting later found audiences in the aristocracy and the middle class.

From the Middle Ages through the rebirth painters worked for the church and a wealthy aristocracy. Beginning with the Baroque era artists received private commissions from a more educated and prosperous middle class.

The idea of "art for art's sake" began to find expression in the work of the Romantic painters like Francisco de Goya, John Constable, and J.M.W. Turner. During the 19th century the rise of the commercial art gallery provided support in the 20th Century.

Western painting reached its zenith in Europe during the Renaissance, in conjunction with the refinement of drawing, use of perspective, ambitious architecture, tapestry, stained glass, sculpture, and the period before and after the advent of the printing press.

Following the depth of discovery and the complexity of innovations of the Renaissance the rich heritage of Western painting continues into the 21st century.