El Greco - Catholic Schoolhousedirectors.catholicschoolhouse.com/wp-content/... · El Greco Spanish...
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©2016 Kathy Rabideau, all rights reserved. Excerpted from Year 3 Art. This digital form solely for Catholic Schoolhouse members’ home use. El Greco Spanish Renaissance—Mannerism El Greco was born on the island of Crete, which is part of Greece, so the Spaniards nicknamed him El Greco, which means “The Greek” in Spanish. He painted in a style know as Mannerism during the Spanish Renaissance. Mannerist painters focused less on realism, and more on expression and emotion. Whereas artists such as da Vinci and Dürer studied the human figure, seeking proper, exact proportions, El Greco purposely distorted them, drawing strange, elongated figures. A normal human figure is seven heads high; El Greco’s figures were as tall as nine heads giving them their strange, stretched look. Even the horse in St. Martin and the Beggar shows unusually long legs. His departure from the realistic gives his paintings a terrifying quality. El Greco saw light in a new way. He often painted in his studio with his shades drawn. It is reported that when a friend suggested letting in more light, El Greco replied, “No, the sun will interfere with the light inside of me.” The great contrast made his subjects pop from their dark backgrounds. He used excessive shading, giving the figures an antiqued, almost dirty look. Color was of utmost importance to El Greco; he said even more important than form. He once declared, "I hold the imitation of color to be the greatest difficulty of art." Repeated retouching and repainting helped him achieve the look he desired. His expressiveness and colors would later influence the impressionists. The new technique of foreshortening came about during El Greco’s time. Notice how, in our featured painting, the book in St. Matthew’s hands appears to poke out at you from the paper. The cross in Christ Carrying the Cross shows another exceptional example of foreshortening. This technique allows objects to be drawn so they appear three dimensional. Have you been to a 3-D movie? If so, you have seen foreshortening used in a dramatic way. Portrait of a Man, El Greco self-portrait, 1604 Christ Carrying the Cross, c. 1580
Transcript of El Greco - Catholic Schoolhousedirectors.catholicschoolhouse.com/wp-content/... · El Greco Spanish...
©2016 Kathy Rabideau, all rights reserved. Excerpted from Year 3 Art. This digital form solely for Catholic Schoolhouse members’ home use.
El Greco
Spanish Renaissance—Mannerism
El Greco was born on the island of Crete, which is part of Greece, so the Spaniards nicknamed him El Greco, which means “The Greek” in Spanish. He painted in a style know as Mannerism during the Spanish Renaissance. Mannerist painters focused less on realism, and more on expression and emotion. Whereas artists such as da Vinci and Dürer studied the human figure, seeking proper, exact proportions, El Greco purposely distorted them, drawing strange, elongated figures. A normal human figure is seven heads high; El Greco’s figures were as tall as nine heads giving them their strange, stretched look. Even the horse in St. Martin and the Beggar shows unusually long legs. His departure from the realistic gives his paintings a terrifying quality. El Greco saw light in a new way. He often painted in his studio with his shades drawn. It is reported that when a friend suggested letting in more light, El Greco replied, “No, the sun will interfere with the light inside of me.” The great contrast made his subjects pop from their dark backgrounds. He used excessive shading, giving the
figures an antiqued, almost dirty look. Color was of utmost importance to El Greco; he said even more important than form. He once declared, "I hold the imitation of color to be the greatest difficulty of art." Repeated retouching and repainting helped him achieve the look he desired. His expressiveness and colors would later influence the impressionists.
The new technique of foreshortening came about during El Greco’s time. Notice how, in our featured painting, the book in St. Matthew’s hands appears to poke out at you from the paper. The cross in Christ Carrying the Cross shows another exceptional example of foreshortening. This technique allows objects to be drawn so they appear three dimensional. Have you been to a 3-D movie? If so, you have seen foreshortening used in a dramatic way.
Portrait of a Man, El Greco self-portrait, 1604
Christ Carrying the Cross, c. 1580
©2016 Kathy Rabideau, all rights reserved. Excerpted from Year 3 Art. This digital form solely for Catholic Schoolhouse members’ home use.
St. Matthew, El Greco, 1610
©2016 Kathy Rabideau, all rights reserved. Excerpted from Year 3 Art. This digital form solely for Catholic Schoolhouse members’ home use.
Saint Martin and the Beggar,
El Greco, 1597-1599
©2016 Kathy Rabideau, all rights reserved. Excerpted from Year 3 Art. This digital form solely for Catholic Schoolhouse members’ home use.
Adoration of the Shepherds,
El Greco, 1612-1614
