ART APPRECIATION LESSON 3: European Artist and History
In the art appreciation lesson, you see how an artist uses lines and integrate the idea into your own work of art.
Perhaps, like many others, you’ve picked up the idea that a good artist draws perfect lines in the perfect place and the whole drawing just magically fits together. This idea is a myth. If you sat in the studio of the great European master, Leonardo da Vinci, you’d observe how lines are used in the process of making a drawing. (1) You’d notice that the artist initially uses lines to map out the outline of the face, shoulder, and head piece. The placements of these lines were changed as he continually looked at the relationships of the parts. He did not erase the first lines because they were drawn lightly. We can see these first lines in the finished drawing. (2) Look at the woman’s back and hair. He filled these areas with lines to identify light and shadow. Leonardo worked carefully around the facial features. (3) He uses dark lines around the upper eye lid to show dynamic changes in values. He used lighter lines on the lower portion where skin meets eye. (4) He does not outline the lips, but makes the darkest line at the opening of the mouth. Drawing is a process of moving lines around so that they get closer and closer to what we see. You can learn a lot about drawing with lines by studying this drawing further.
THE ARTIST Leonardo da Vinci (1442-1519) Renaissance painter from Vinci, Italy
Within his city’s churches and public buildings, Leonardo, born in the city of Vinci, had access to the best art in Europe. When he was about fifteen, his father apprenticed him to the renowned workshop of Andrea del Verrocchio. Artworks at this timewere often a collaboration ofmaster and student.Themaster painted the main figures, while apprentices filled in backgrounds. It is recorded that Leonardo’s talent surpassed Verrocchio’s quickly. Competition between artists was fierce during the Renaissance period. Patrons, who financed works of art, gave assignments to only the best painters. Experimentation was common and boundarieswere pushed as patronswanted bigger andmore impressive art and architecture. Leonardo made line drawings of his ideas and his observations of the world. Artists’ sketches were often casualties of wars, fires, or floods. Leonardo’s meticulously illustrated notebooks survive, allowing us to see his accomplishments in science, painting, architecture, mathematics, and design.
THE TIMES
If you think that the true test of good art is measured by how realistic it looks, you are dealing with a longstanding European expectation that began in the Renaissance Period during the 15th to 17th centuries. Human figures in medieval times had been stiff and lifeless. During the Renaissance, artists broke from this tradition and began to study the human body by asking fellow artists to pose for them or by cutting into corpses to see for themselves how muscles were composed. In that day, dealing with the human body in such a manner was an immoral practice. However, artists were willing to risk the consequences for the knowledge it would provide. They felt that a closer likeness to reality would move the viewer to a greater connection with the meaning of a painting. Their aim in art was spiritual and moral, like the medieval artists that went before them, but the method had changed. Perspective lines, drawing to scale, and small details took on important roles when portraying the reality of the world seen by the Renaissance artist.
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