- [Steven] We're in the
National Gallery in London, standing in front of Giovanni Bellini's the Madonna of the Meadow. This is a Renaissance
painting from Venice. But we wanted to talk about it, as a vehicle to highlight
the tools of visual analysis. - [Beth] So here's what
we're not gonna talk about. We're not gonna talk about iconography, how this painting fits in
with the history of paintings of the Madonna and Child. We're not gonna talk about the
symbolism that we might see in some of the animals in the background. We're not gonna talk about the commission or who the patron was. - [Steven] We're not gonna
talk about the political, social, or economic context in
which this painting was made. Instead, we're gonna focus
on the things we can see. So we're gonna talk
about scale, composition, pictorial space, form, line, color, light, tone, texture, and pattern. - [Beth] Let's start
with the issue of scale. So here we can talk about
the scale of the painting, and the scale of the figures, and what we see in the painting. - [Steven] Well, we're in
a gallery with paintings of all different sizes, there
are very large altar pieces, and there are some very
small paintings as well. This is a moderately sized painting, and that changes where we stand in relationship to the painting. When you stand in front
of a very large painting, you tend to stand back,
we want to take it all in. Whereas when you walk up
to a very small painting, we tend to come in very close,
to see as much as we can. - [Beth] We see a female figure who's smaller than life size. - [Steven] But she fills
a third of the frame. - [Beth] And that brings
us to the composition. Not only does she fill
a third of the frame, but the clothing that she's
wearing, the drapery spreads out across the bottom length of the painting. - [Steven] Creating,
in essence, a pyramid. The base of a pyramid is broad. - [Beth] And pyramids
are a very stable form. We also notice that the
child in her lap is contained within the pyramidal shape of her body. So there is an intimacy that is created between the female figure and the child. - [Steven] The artist
has placed her very close to the foreground, so that she
towers over the horizon line, and is clearly the primary subject. But there is also a
significant amount of landscape that surrounds her, that,
in a sense, frames her. Bellini has created this
pyramidal foreground, in front of a series of what
are really horizontal bands, that move back into space. You see a band in the
foreground of greenery, then there's a band of pebbles, then there's a band of tilled farmland, and even the clouds create
horizontal bands in the sky. - [Beth] She's framed
on one side by trees, and on the other side
by the vertical forms of the architecture. - [Steven] Another way we
can talk about composition, is to think about the
way in which the artist has composed the bodies of the figures. Look at the lovely, gentle
tilt to the Virgin Mary's head, which corresponds to the angle
of the Christ Child's head. But I'm also struck by the
volume in between the hands of the Virgin Mary, who holds
her fingertips together, defining an internal space,
that has the same kind of volume as her own head and that of the child. - [Beth] The diagonal
line that forms the slope of her right shoulder
corresponds to the diagonal line of her forearm, and the diagonal
line of the child's body. So we have this echoing of forms, that helps to unify the composition. - [Steven] Let's turn
next to pictorial space. - [Beth] We should acknowledge that we're looking at a flat surface. And that what the artist is doing is creating an illusion
of three-dimensional form and an illusion of space
on this flat surface. Let's start with the figure, she's seated on the ground
with the child on her lap. So we have, immediately,
a sense of one thing in front of another
because of overlapping. - [Steven] But in addition,
the pictorial space is defined by what we would call atmospheric and linear perspective. If we look at the sky at
the top of the painting, the sky that is closest to
us, it has deep, rich blues. And as the sky moves back in space, towards the horizon, it becomes paler. Look at the mountains in the distance, how they've become paler and bluer. This is a technique
that's meant to replicate the natural phenomena of
looking at a great distance, looking through more atmosphere. Details become less vivid,
color becomes paler, things become bluer. - [Beth] We also notice a
little bit of linear perspective if we look at the plowed field. Where we see diagonal
lines that appear to recede into the distance, that lead
our eye back into space. - [Steven] Those lines
are called orthogonals. They meet at a vanishing point, which in the context of this painting, is obscured by the Virgin Mary
and Child in the foreground. But which nevertheless
creates a sense of logic, and places us, the viewer, in
a particular point in space, in relationship to the
image that we're seeing. - [Beth] Let's turn next
to the question of form. - [Steven] Generally,
when we speak about form, we're thinking about the
representation of solids in space, and it's instructive to think about the variety of types of form that the artist is representing. - [Beth] Well we have the
natural forms, we have trees, and grass, and fields,
and mountains, and clouds. We also have figurative forms, the Madonna and Child in the foreground, but we also have built forms, we have the architecture
in the background. Some of these forms are
rounded and curvilinear, like the Virgin Mary and
the Christ Child, or even the clouds. And some of them are rectilinear
like the architecture in the background. - [Steven] Some of them feel very solid, like the figures in the foreground. And some of the form is far more delicate, look at the handling, for example, of the leaves on the trees. - [Beth] Those forms are established just by touches of color
from the artist's brush. - [Steven] Now form is
often defined by line. - [Beth] And, in fact,
there are contour lines used to demarcate and separate forms. So, for example, separating
the Virgin Mary's drapery from the grass that she sits on. And we also have places where
we have line on its own, for example, in the branches of the tree. Line is also sometimes
the corners of forms, I'm looking at the line
that forms the edge of the squared turret. - [Steven] Next we wanted
to talk about color. - [Beth] One is immediately
struck by the rich blue of the Virgin's mantle. But also the deep blue of the sky. And that contrast with the earth colors, the browns and the greens
that we see in the fields around and behind her. - [Steven] There are essentially
three main color groups. There's the brilliant blue
of the Virgin's mantle, of the sky, of the mountains. There's the red of her undergarment. And then there's the yellows of the flesh, of the fields, and of the architecture. These are the three primary colors. - [Beth] We see white in
the shawl that she wears around her head, and also in the clouds. So Mary is connected with the heavens. - [Steven] Color is in
someways a function of light, and here the artist has created a sense of the broad light of a clear day. - [Beth] The light from the sun seems to be coming from the left,
maybe a little bit forward from the figures. - [Steven] And high in the sky. - [Beth] And we see the
clouds illuminated from above, there in shadow below,
similarly with the Virgin Mary, if we look at her right forearm, it's illuminated from
above, but in shadow below. - [Steven] And so the artist
has taken pains to create a consistent of use of light and shadow. That is, shadow is always in accordance with the source of that light. - [Beth] Look at Virgin Mary's face, her right cheek is illuminated, but the left side of
her cheek is in shadow, and we have the sense of moving tones from light into darkness, what art historians
often call chiaroscuro. And this helps to create a form that looks three-dimensional, that appears to exist in space. - [Steven] But light and color are both closely related to tone as well. - [Beth] And tone refers to the amount of light and darkness in a color. - [Steven] And we can
see that in many parts of this painting, we
can see it in the cloak of the Virgin Mary, but it's
probably most subtly handled in the representation of flesh. Looking at the beautiful rendering of the Virgin Mary's face,
and the smooth brushwork, makes me aware of the variety of textures within this painting. And the contrast that
the artist is creating between the smooth textures of the flesh, or of the cloth that the figures wear, in comparison to the rough, pebbly surface that we see in the middle ground. - [Beth] Or we could
look at the featheriness of the leaves on the trees
which are yet another texture. - [Steven] Texture's a
tool that artists can use to create a sense of veracity, as they define different kinds of form. - [Beth] And texture is intimately
related to the materials that the artist is using. Here, we know it's oil
paint, which is well suited to the depiction of different textures. - [Steven] Let's talk next about pattern. You might not expect to
see pattern in a landscape, which is filled with natural forms because pattern is the repetition of a form over and over again. Often to create a decorative field. - [Beth] Here, we see ornamentation in the Virgin Mary's blue robe,
we see some gold embroidery. - [Steven] But if you look closely, there is a soft, organic pattern, especially in the
foreground, in the foliage. - [Beth] We do see the
repetition of leaf forms, and grass forms, that
look almost like a carpet, like a decorative field, than
the unruliness of nature. - [Steven] And one of
the results of pattern, is that it is often in
conflict with pictorial space, with the illusionistic depth
that the artist renders. And even here, it seems as
if that green field stands up a little bit, in a way that remind us that this is in fact a
two-dimensional surface. So by looking at scale, at
composition, at pictorial space, at form, line, color, light, tone, at the textures and the patterns, we have an opportunity to
look closely at the painting. But these are only a few of the tools that art historians use to
discuss and explore works of art.
My professor, Dr. Bryan Zygmont, wrote some articles for this site! Wonderful articles for the art-curious as they are easy to read and meant for young students.
Thanks for posting this! I have used it in two of my lectures now.