"Baco" by Michel Ángel Caravaggio
Oil paint on canvas called "Baco";which deals with a mythological theme, the scene is observed to the god Baco or Dionisio represented at a time when he is drinking with a fruitful in front, which is called Bodegón. The author is showing technique, mainly with the transparent glass of the cup and with the target (one of the most difficult colors in paint) of the sheet that surrounds the god. This picture incorporates particularities that had never been made until the fifteenth or sixteenth century;For example, the light, which is not diaphanous or homogeneous, but is a theatrical light with areas of the painted painting and others very dark. It is a drawing of great realism, for sensuality and for the still life or, for example, the glass of wine
Another characteristic of the painting and that is also typical of the Baroque is the reflection of reality as it is;That is, beauty is no longer sought, so that they look at the most pictures and morbid aspects (old age, diseases, torture). This is mainly due to two reasons: first, to impress the viewer and second, because the seventeenth century is a depressive century, with many wars and pests;In addition, the theme of the brevity of life is always very present and hence the still lifes are represented with rotten food, thus representing an earthly life that has little value (this is called "naturalism"). In the painting, theatricality will also highlight, specifically in the gaze of the God, who looks at us and directly implies. Finally, the picture does not have much movement.
The Baroque in Italy and painting during the seventeenth century
Italy became the seventeenth century again an artistic focus of first importance that influenced the rest of Europe (although something less than in the Renaissance).
In the first half of the seventeenth century, the Urban Popes VIII and Alejandro VII transform to Rome in the epicenter of the counterreforma. Baroque art will become the political and spiritual weapon that the institution will use as a means of propaganda of its claims. Hence, Rome has the need to be the baroque capital per antonomasia. Other outstanding Italian cities of this stage will be Bologna, Naples or Turin. In that 17th -century Italy, three currents will highlight with different styles as far as painting is concerned: classicist, naturalist and decorative. However, they will all have some common characteristic that will be appreciated in the different works of each current.
Materials and techniques
The technique of oil and fresco will predominate and, mainly due to the influence of the Venetian school, pastes of thick material will be used, which will facilitate that the colors are very saturated. Baroque painters knew very complex techniques such as the dark box which affects the feeling of realism of their paintings. Sometimes the baroque paintings give an equivocal sensation, because it seems that they have painted themselves from the natural and, nevertheless, most of them are workshop work.
Support
The large canvas will be used, in addition the paintings of a decorative nature and the frescoes will be captured in vaults of churches or palaces, and although less frequently, they will be placed in other places such as altarpieces or decorating a sculpture. In this sense, the influence of the Venetian school will be noticed again.
Theme
fundamentally religious issues, especially with a tendency to exalt the Catholic religion. The classic style and decorative tendency make the religious issue as something idealized where reasons such as triumphalism, apotheosis;with a very dramatic end. Naturalism, on the contrary, seeks to awaken religious piety through feeling and to achieve it showreality, that is, in their daily life, even if it is very humble. The staging, lighting, models, which are often vulgar;They achieve that artistic purpose. On the other hand, naturalism highlights how humble, vulgar, giving it an expression of beauty that will penetrate the viewer’s eyes (against what Renaissance idealism expresses). It is important to emphasize that not only religious issues are favorites during the Baroque, since mythological issues, political or religious allegories, etc.
Since from the rebirth issues such as landscape or lifes were already a constant, during the baroque it will not be less;However, other genres of painting such as landscape, still life or scenes related to genders (male or female) will be included. As for artists, there is a first-order figure within baroque painting in Italy, it is Miguel Ángel Caravaggio (1571-1610). Of somewhat quarrelsome and unstable life, dies before they turn forty years old.
Caravaggio places the problem of light in the foreground of interest, but abandons what is achieved by Leonardo in the gradation of nuances between light and shadow. He is not interested in the vanished. In Caravaggio Light is projected on the form with violence and its contrast is abrupt and intense. This is due to the name of a tenebrismo with which their style and that of its imitators are known. Naturalism excited him. He was little friend of the arrogance with which the Renaissance liked to imagine his characters and he recreated them in such a natural and real way that he received angry protests for some of his religious paintings. However, it was sometimes unnatural, such as when he used violent runoff in many of his compositions. Among his most important works are: Baco (1595);Vocation of San Mateo (1599);Burial of Christ (1604);Dormition of the Virgin (1605);The vocation of St. Paul (1601);The disciples of Emaus, Judith and Holofernes, Crucifixion of San Pedro, etc.
Tenebrismo will influence very importantly in the most prominent baroque painters in Spain (for example, in Ribera, Zurbarán, and in Velázquez, primarily in their young man);in France (brothers Le Nain, Georges la Tour), and in the Netherlands (in Rembrandt);It is also considered one of the main contributions of the Baroque.
Caravaggio’s dark painting
Tenebrismo is an artistic resource introduced by Caravaggio that will make fortune in the first half of the seventeenth. It consists of placing the characters and objects that together form a picture that has a dark background where the light is the main element that will highlight the other components;It is an intense and elegant light that will illuminate to certain parts of the scenes of the painting, leaving others in the dark. In addition, objects and gestures, which are located in the foreground in the eyes of the spectator. Tenebrismo ignores the landscape, but values dead nature, the still life. It is an interior painting, Caravaggio himself painted in the basement of his house with artificial light and mannequins (Caravaggio imitators are known in Italy as the ‘Bambochants’, of ‘Bamboccio’ = Monigote).
The Tenebrista Method will call the attention of the great European painters of the time, who will have a stage in their professional career dedicated to this style (it is the case of artists such as Ribera, Murillo, Van Laert or Velázquez in his Sevillian time).
Relationship with other works
Drunkenness and ecstasy are associated with wine at this time, this will be shown in other works of the same period as:
- "The triumph of Baco" by Velázquez (1628, Madrid, Prado Museum). The great Spanish painter turns with the same mythological theme that refers to Baco. In this picture, the god surrounded by normal and current people is observed, who are reddened by the wine they have drunk, while God presents a more pale and glowing color.
- ‘Sick Bacchus” by Caravaggio: God can be seen in a pale state, with a very greenish skin tone, with dark circles, very white lips that apparently indicate the hangover caused by the excesses of the enjoyment of wine.
- Baco ”by Rubens (1638): In this painting the flamenco painter personifies the God in a very fleshy way, in addition among his companions highlights the silence, which was his adoptive father and one of the most drunk of his followers. Finally, he has his right foot supported on a lion, which is apparently chewing a wine sheet.
About literary work
According to Greek mythology, Dionisio is the son of Zeus and Semele and is part of one of the Olympic gods, especially wine and fertility;Hence he is described as a God who carries a fox skin, which symbolizes vineyard and fauna. In ancient Greece, great parties and rituals were celebrated in their honor where orgies abounded (which had the meaning of vitality, nature, joy and rich harvests) and, above all, women. Some historians like Herodoto pointed out that the cult of Dionisio came to other parts of the world as Egypt.
In Roman mythology, it was called Baco, which derives from the bachanales, which were parties celebrated secret by women in the adventine mountain in the second and III centuries.C. The parties were prohibited throughout Rome when their celebration was discovered from the Senate and it was suspected that different plots were forged against the Republic.
Dionysus or Bacchus, art and wine
We have seen that the wine is very present in the mythological representations of the Baroque, especially through the god Baco and its parties;However, whether in one way or another throughout history the relationship between wine and art has been closely linked, appearing in various periods of history. In this way, allusions to wine appear in the frescoes of the funeral cameras of Luxor;Also during the period of ancient Greece, reference was already made to the God Dionysus and wine, in works such as "Hermes and the Child Dionysus";Also during the Roman period, Baco became also the god of wine and he was dedicated to cult through the bacanales. In the Middle Ages, wine was also consumed as an offering in the liturgies that were celebrated;In the Renaissance, the author Miguel Ángel would sculpt "Bacchus Ebrio", as a sign of the interest of the artists of that time for classical antiquity.
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