Jiang Xun, the author of A History of Western Art for All, takes time as the latitude, artists of various art schools and their representative works as the longitude, and returns to the historical scene, starting with a flint hand axe in prehistoric times, taking you all the way through mysterious Egypt, great Greece, brilliant Rome, brilliant impressionism ... and strange modern and contemporary art around the Mediterranean.
This book is divided into three stages and will be shared in two parts.
One: the art from prehistoric times to the early Renaissance.
1940, one of the earliest murals found in Lascaux Cave in southwest France. The theme of murals is animals, including bison, horses, deer and portraits.
Why do humans paint? What is the purpose of painting these bison and deer? Until today, many scholars have been unable to explore the creative motives of these Paleolithic cave murals. Maybe we can find the original starting point of human artistic creation from it.
Egypt is one of the earliest civilizations that formed "style" in human fine arts. Egyptians used lines in a very precise way, with mathematical rigor and a tendency to be highly geometric. The artistic style of Egypt tends to establish a high order. No matter how complicated the content is, how chaotic the scene is and how tortuous the plot is, the Egyptians always seem to want to summarize them into a geometric symbol, arrange them in an orderly way and place them in a regular space.
Egyptian art is closely related to their cognition of death. Egyptians believe that there is another world after death, where people can continue to live. Therefore, everything they had before their death must be copied through painting and sculpture and brought to another world. Most of the Egyptian art they see now comes from the excavation of tombs, which can reproduce the life beliefs of Egyptians four or five thousand years ago.
Around the middle of the 6th century BC, this typical portrait of youth appeared in the history of Greek art.. The Greeks called it Kouros, which means 18 to 20 years old and well developed. What kind of body is this? This sculpture is very calm and comfortable, with a gentle smile on the face, and the muscles in the chest seem to fluctuate with breathing. He was naked, as if there were no clothes more perfect than this body; He is confident, healthy and cheerful, and he came to us step by step from Greece 2500 years ago.
Why can the Greek human body become a unique chapter in the history of art?
When we stare at the Greek portrait sculpture, we find that the creator does not care about the political status, rights or social status of the human body, whether it is rich or poor, noble or humble, or even ethical or moral judgment, whether it is good or evil, which is no longer important in Greek human body sculpture. The Greeks' gaze on human statues is simply a kind of "beautiful" gaze, as if trying to purify us from the political, social and ethical chaos to a single level of beauty through this focused gaze.
In the golden age of Greek art, the expression of human body has greater freedom, which comes from the experience of physical competition and leads to the renewal of artistic creation and beauty. Around 450 BC, Miron's original bronze work The Discus Thrower represented the arrival of the golden age in the classical period.
The great epics and dramas of the Greeks touched the deepest inner world of mankind, including fear, anxiety, anxiety about death and resistance to disasters. Perhaps because of this, such a great sculpture masterpiece as laocoon was produced-the father and son were punished by God, and the human body was entangled by a giant snake. The tragedy of human nature is touching. At the same time, the goddess of victory and Venus have confirmed the most unforgettable glorious page in the history of Greek art. In many societies where pedantic morality is used to suppress the body and vulgar taboos are used to bind the body, the freedom and health of the human body provided by Greek art is an aesthetic enlightenment worthy of serious consideration.
Roman art, although Rome highly esteems Greek culture and studies the elegance and sublimity of Greek city-state civilization, still has its own unique personality characteristics of pragmatism, roughness and seeking truth from facts. When you think of Greece, you often think of myths, epics and philosophy. When you think of Rome, perhaps more soldiers and politicians emerge, which is the spirit of the rule of law to establish national order and discipline-Roman law is the basis of western law. This pragmatic personality is embodied in sculpture, forming a strong realistic style.
Rome has a large population and needs strict planning. In order to solve the problem of densely populated areas, the public baths and city squares in Rome set the earliest model for the formation of modern western metropolis. Of course, the most famous public building in Rome is the Colosseum. This huge circular space can accommodate 50 thousand people at the same time, which can be said to be the originator of the necessary dome building in modern cities. Solemn and majestic, with the blood of beasts fighting with people, the glory of Rome is immortal, as if it still reverberates in this huge circular space.
Christ in early Christian art is an abstract concept, which represents life, the pursuit of good things and the preaching of good voices. At first, the painter didn't know how to express jealousy, so he used Flo, the Greek god of music, to play the piano and music. In art, they regard each other as heresy and find a beautiful symbol of * * *.
Christianity does not attach importance to the existence of the body, emphasizes abstinence and abandons the senses. Over time, I naturally feel out of place for the Greek "icon" which mainly expresses the beauty of the body. After the rise of Byzantine art, icons found their own unique faces. Icons are the main body of Byzantine art, and the purpose of their existence is not to arouse people's visual beauty, but to arouse the memory of saints in the hearts of believers-to remember what they said and did. So the icons are gradually unified and summarized into fixed symbols.
The Middle Ages, which lasted for 1000 years, developed a unique art form in the history of western art with Christian belief as the center. The theme of medieval art is Christian belief, and art is not the ultimate goal. The ultimate goal is to cover up evil and promote good and preach doctrine. At that time, craftsmen themselves were believers, and they were able to embed piety and awe in their works, which made medieval art completely different from the external beauty of Greece and Rome, but constantly showed people the power of modesty and modesty.
Christian faith, constantly pursuing upward spiritual sublimation, has gradually formed more and more towering domes and towers from the church form in Rome, which is an upward spire. /kloc-after 0/2 century, Gothic architecture appeared, competing to form the characteristics of cathedrals in vast areas of Europe with upward development structure.
Gothic architecture is characterized by an upward vertical structure. At first, the Roman round arch was upgraded to a pointed arch. In order to consolidate the upward mechanical stability of the pointed arch, the pointed arch is crossed to form a "transverse rib arch" to increase the height. Famous Gothic buildings include chartres Cathedral, built at1134-1216, and St. Martin's Church, built at 1387, about 163-65438+.
Just shrouded by religious theocracy, personal realistic pursuit and personal physical desire have been suppressed for a long time, longing for new liberation. Around the 0/4th century in Italy/Kloc, the awakening of reason began to sprout, forming a great Renaissance movement.
Art in the early Renaissance paid attention to people's awakening and replaced the old theological form with scientific visual analysis. San Francesco began to think about the true meaning of life from an ordinary person, because he took part in the war and saw people's birth and death. He reformed people's way of life, the language they used, and their views on God and nature. God is no longer the supreme authority. God exists in trees in full bloom in spring, in the sound of birds singing, in running water and everywhere. God is people's own hearts that love life and good things.
Francis was named San Francesco when he preached ordinary things and called for people's inner awakening. Many painters painted murals with his stories, and most of these murals became the earliest works of art in the Renaissance.
The most famous is Giotto. Giotto was active in the first half of14th century. He is called "the father of painting", and many of them are about depicting San Francesco's stories. When Giotto painted The Story of San Francesco, he gave San Francesco a real human body. He is no longer just a god, but a human being. Giotto turned all the saints in his works into real flesh and blood. Giotto uses the method of light and shadow to contrast the human body from light and shade, and also produces a sense of volume and weight. Giotto also attaches importance to describing the background. The hills, trees and grasslands behind the characters are hierarchical and spatial. It can also be said that he was the first painter in the Renaissance who used the method of "perspective" to create the distance effect of the picture.
Renaissance art paid attention to people's awakening and replaced the old theological form with scientific visual analysis. Giotto is the first pioneer to deal with painting problems from the perspective of human anatomy and space, which is the main reason why he won the honor of "Father of Painting".
Two: from the heyday of the Renaissance to the end of Rococo art in the early period of the French Revolution.
The Italian word "1400" has been in the era of 1400, during which the humanities and arts flourished in an all-round way. This 100 year has produced great politicians and philosophers and great literary and artistic works; This 100 year has inspired people's amazing creativity, such as Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, etc. They have set a humanistic model for more than 400 years and laid an eternal foundation for western artistic creation.
This 100 year is called the Renaissance in history, which means "rebirth", as if the sleeping humanistic spirit woke up again after the long Middle Ages. It seems that after a long, cold and dark winter, spring is coming again; It seems that after a long pause and death, life is reborn, and joy and light return to the world.
For a long time, birth has always meant the birth of Jesus Christ, but is there a other meaning in birth? Everyone should have a special feeling of gratitude and blessing for the birth of his life. At that time, Greek mythology was retranslated and reread. The praise of the body and the love of the perfect body in Greek mythology touched many artists. Although the church still has many strict restrictions and regards the Greek gods as heresies, beautiful fairy tales call for people's love for beauty. Venus, the goddess of love and beauty, emerged from the waves of the sea, and the painter could not help but draw the legendary beautiful scene.
Botticelli ushered in the heyday of the Renaissance. His Birth of Venus, with the theme of Greek pagan mythology, broke the taboo of Christianity and boldly described female nudity. He wants to give meaning to the rebirth of the body.
Leonardo da vinci was a typical genius in the Renaissance. His talent goes beyond painting. He is proficient in architecture, anatomy, chemistry and fluid mechanics. He experimented with the earliest human planes and submarines, designed dams and bridges, and made unique observations on plants. Leonardo da Vinci used rational science to observe everything, breaking the authority of theology and exposing the specific power of knowledge hidden behind theology. He studied the proportion of human body in ancient Greece and tried to find the most perfect human body shape.
He escaped the ban of the church and hid in the cemetery. He dissected 30 human bodies in a very scientific way, and recorded the differences of venous arteries, the understanding of different atria and ventricles of the heart, the structure of female uterus, and the composition of digestive system, respiratory system and even brain with fine drawings and notes. He is a pioneer of modern anatomy, pathology and medicine.
If Leonardo da Vinci is the peak of the Renaissance, then Michelangelo is the most cutting-edge rock on this peak. Leonardo da Vinci is calm and mysterious, leading people into a deep and quiet world, while Michelangelo is full of passion. He is like a roaring wind and a raging sea, which makes people experience great life shock in his works. Michelangelo was first famous for his sculptures. At the age of 23, he mourned for Christ, which earned him the status of a master. At the age of twenty-six, he was entrusted by the town hall in his hometown of Florenka to carve a statue of David representing the spirit of the city-state. He showed a fascination with the masculine beauty of Greek men.
Michelangelo was about thirty years old and was ordered to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel for Pope Julius II of the Vatican. Rice uses carved three-dimensional light and shadow to deal with the human body in the painting, which makes people look up, like a whirlwind storm, shocking people. This work has developed the amazing creativity hidden in his heart and set an immortal example for human creation.
Michelangelo lived to be 89 years old, and his life was rich and magnificent, showing the courage and ambition of men. Rafael was older than Michelangelo small 8, but he died young at the age of 37.
He cares more about painting itself, and his works bring people a lot of pure visual pleasure. Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo both touched people's hearts. They are more like philosophers or thinkers, exposing the uneasiness of life. On the other hand, Raphael is pure and innocent. It seems that there is not much stimulation of life passion, and my personality is gentle and peaceful. His works are exquisite and perfect, which set a good example for the Renaissance.
Venetian school? If China's Renaissance is a humanistic tradition based on a stable industry, Venice is more of a fantasy, more of an emotional mystery and romance, more of a realistic desire and more of a colorful display.
Bei Lini should be the first important figure to lead the Venetian school of painting. He learned oil painting skills from the northern Germanic painter Diu Lei. The luster, color and delicate texture of oil paintings give the Venetian school a delicate aesthetic feeling, and the unique interest of Venetian painters in nature has also added landscape descriptions to some paintings with religious or mythical themes.
The Venetian School, initiated by Bei Lini, was formed together with giorgione and Titian, and gradually established the mainstream position of European painting.
Venus is the favorite theme of the Venetian school of painting, but usually Venus is treated in natural scenery, which shows that she is a god in the sky, not a woman on the earth. Titian's famous Venus of Urbino is the first painting in the history of European art to invite the goddess into the bedroom. Under the mythological sustenance of Venus, Titian praised the newly-married young woman from a wealthy family, instead of the goddess, and her life was full of sweetness and happiness. The woman in the painting is more "human" in enjoyment and satisfaction, and no longer dreams of God.
Northern Renaissance, the north generally refers to the European cultural center at that time, the area north of Italy, including Germanic areas, Belgium, the Netherlands, and other Dutch areas that were not yet founded at that time, including part of France.
The northern painting school, especially the Flemish painting school in the Netherlands, is particularly good at depicting the reality of life with delicate oil painting skills. Van Eyck is one of the most representative people. He is usually regarded as the earliest founder of western oil painting techniques.
Bos of the Northern Painting School is the originator of the surreal avant-garde movement in the 20th century. With compassion, he lamented the metamorphosis and depravity of human nature, examined the deception, cruelty, the sinking of desire and greed in people's hearts, and provided a completely different perspective to look at human nature.
Some of Bruegel's paintings are similar to Bos's, and also take Paradise Lost or the Fall of Angels as the theme, drawing surreal nightmares with changeable human nature. But his descriptions of ordinary people's lives in the world are more, such as "farmers' weddings", celebrations and cups and plates of rural people, and hot soup served from the kitchen, which is full of the simple and true side of folk life.
The tradition of western art, as far as the Italian Renaissance is concerned, focuses on eulogizing Greek gods and Christian sages, and ordinary people rarely become the theme of painting. Bruegel not only takes "people" as the theme, but also avoids the image of aristocratic businessmen and chooses ordinary people who live the least on the land as the theme. He set an example for the tradition of ordinary people, and also laid the foundation for the realism that rose after19th century.
/kloc-Around the 0/5th century, the center of European art was still in Italy, and the great achievements of the Renaissance filled northern artists with yearning. Diu Lei was the first painter to paint self-portraits, Diu Lei was the first painter to integrate the North and South painting schools, Diu Lei was the first painter to sketch directly on natural scenery, and Diu Lei was the first painter to make a collection of prints.
With the rigorous scientific spirit of the northern painting school, he combined the aesthetics of the Italian Renaissance with the lofty classical aesthetics, which made the original fragmented regional painting schools merge together, which also predicted the emergence of European international style art in the next stage.
Pretend that the representatives are greco and Caravaggio.
Many of greco's works are related to religion, dealing with the human body with elongated and inclined lines. Against the background of dark clouds and flowing clouds, religious saints seem to be infinitely disappointed and look at human suffering with compassion. Greco broke the classical balance and symmetry in the Renaissance, absorbed the diagonal composition of Venetian painting school, strengthened the contrast between light and shade, and made the picture emit mysterious light. The human body is no longer like a real body, but floating in the sky, more like a soul in the void.
Greco changed the movement from Renaissance to secularism and returned to the ancient medieval religion, trying to find the pure and pious power of faith from the deepest part of his heart.
Caravaggio lived only 39 years old. Throughout his life, he has seen gambling and greed, promiscuity and cruelty in life, and ordinary people fighting and quarreling over trivial matters. Kabaqiao pondered: What is a "person"?
He attached himself to beauties, beautiful and youthful teenagers, dressed them up as ancient Greek gods, embraced rich fruits, or wore crowns of flowers and leaves on his head, holding musical instruments and grapes in his hand. Caramacho is addicted to the youthful body of the beautiful teenagers in this world, and at the same time he sees the degeneration and decay of the body. He described the emptiness behind youth with extremely skillful brushwork, just like the spots on those rich fruits, which began to rot after being eaten by insects. (Note the rotten fruit in the picture below)
Caravaggio attached to youth, but saw corruption, attachment to material and attachment to beauty, but exposed ugliness, longed for rebirth, but saw death. He indulged in lust, crime, murder and escape, and with hidden loneliness, he saw the depravity, poverty and spiritual frustration of his life.
He saw that the masters of the Renaissance were all praising success and loftiness, and David in the tradition. David of Caravaggio is a handsome boy, and the other hand holds the bloody head of the loser who has just been cut off, and it is Caravaggio himself who seriously injured the lonely head. He subverted beauty, embarrassed himself and made himself ugly. He appeared in front of everyone in despair and made no secret of his failure and tragic injury.
Caravaggio betrayed the sublimity, solemnity and beauty. If everyone thinks he is a successful, handsome, intelligent and just David, Caravaggio smiles bitterly, then who is Goliath, the ugly, insulting and spurned troll?
Caravaggio painted himself as Goliath. This is the first self-portrait in the history of western art as a traitor. He found a new starting point for modern western art, moving towards self-dissection, self-exposure and self-redemption.
He stood at the peak of history with an arrogant attitude of losing morality and collided with the ethics that people are used to. It subverts the tradition and returns life to the state of being dismantled. He can only see his own fragility, desire, greed, degeneration and despair. He wrote down his irreparable crime, and he didn't go to the paradise that everyone yearned for. He went to the burning hell alone with tears in his eyes.
Baroque movement, in the16th century, churches all over Europe suspected that the poor and simple spirit of primitive Christianity had been distorted, and the Vatican-centered church took power and became an interest group vying for power and wealth. Different forms of religious reform took place everywhere, and at the same time, people's rational knowledge rose. Galileo, Copernicus and other scientists studied the celestial bodies in the universe, which made the theological system of the church loose and disintegrated in Genesis. The discovery of new routes enabled adventurers to prove that the earth is a sphere through navigation, which also led to great geographical discoveries.
Throughout the17th century, the old church forces tried to safeguard and consolidate their own interests and launched anti-religious reforms. On the other hand, people's rational thinking and questioning spirit began to establish a new aesthetic thinking direction. Multi-values coexist in the era of alternating conflicts between the old and the new, and have undergone comprehensive qualitative changes in architecture, sculpture, urban landscape planning, painting and so on. This European art movement, which ran through the17th century and even continued into the18th century, was called "Baroque".
The name baroque is used all over Europe, but it has produced different baroque forms in every region. Representative figures are Italian bernini, Rubens, Spanish velazquez, Rembrandt and Vermeer in the Netherlands.
Velazquez's most famous "Gong E", in his usual way, uses the space reflected by the mirror to record the scene of his portrait of the king and queen on the one hand, and describes the accidental incident that the young princess and her guards suddenly broke into the picture on the other hand.
Velazquez uses multi-level spatial vision to produce extremely rich effects. The painter is painting himself. He took the palette and pen, and the king, queen and princess all became his models. The painter realized that he was the real king in the creative world. He is no longer a royal painter who obeys secular power. He found an independent meaning for the creator. Gong E is an immortal masterpiece in the history of western art, which constantly inspires later creators, such as Picasso in the 20th century, to find all the advanced elements of modern avant-garde creation in this classic.
/kloc-In the 7th century, after a long period of Spanish colonial rule, the Netherlands finally succeeded in the 80-year war of independence and became an independent country. In this context, the Dutch Baroque does not lie in the theme of God and religion, but in their belief in man's own labor force. Painting is no longer attached to religion, nor to the court. It paints the hearts of people who have returned to other places and praises life. Painters paint natural scenery, portraits of citizens and materials owned by characters. The rise of landscape painting, portrait painting and still life painting has replaced traditional religious or historical paintings and become the greatest contribution of Dutch painting school to western art.
Rembrandt is the most typical Baroque painter of Dutch painting school in17th century, and also the most influential painting master of western art in recent 300 years. His most important work, Night Patrol, once described the militia parade in Amsterdam, with a huge picture and many people. However, Rembrandt broke the rigid method of Dutch collective portrait at that time, which made many characters scattered and rich in visual depth of field. Captain Kirk's left hand in the center of the picture stretches forward, retracts forward and draws backward, so that the plane can draw space and generate the power to move forward.
Rembrandt inherited the tradition of painting self-portraits by the northern painting school. He began to record his appearance at the age of 23, and through a calm and objective method, he seemed to be another self in the mirror, watching himself move from youth to maturity, from maturity to decline, and from youthful exuberance to old age. Rembrandt created nearly 100 self-portraits in his life, which became the strictest portrait anatomy of himself in western art.
Rembrandt's baroque is by no means the vanity of religion and court, but depicts the phenomenon of life in the most heavy way. It contains full enthusiasm in concise calmness, and develops from absolutely accurate realistic skills to rich and hearty. He made painting get innovation and subversion, and also made painting the final salvation of his tragic life.
Vermeer didn't have many works in his life. At present, more than 30 works handed down are not long, and most of them are women-they are either reading, sewing, preparing breakfast day after day, or reading letters. They have no strong emotions in ordinary life, but live an ordinary and real life.
Baroque is actually an era of diverse values. Rembrandt and Vermeer completed themselves in their own ways, providing aesthetic thinking in different directions. The baroque styles of Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands also have different aesthetic styles because of their special environment. Baroque is a big mainstream direction, but it does not affect the unique and self-formed style of local culture.
/kloc-in the baroque era of the 0/7th century, latour, an outstanding civilian painter, appeared in France. Latour described the lives of ordinary people with extremely realistic brushstrokes, describing their banter, gambling, fraud or theft. He looked at the small deception and bad deception of human nature with a slightly sarcastic eye, or began to steal other people's property, or cheated in card games, and handled it with a calm and realistic brushwork, but it highlighted the disguised expression of the characters and was full of drama.
Rococo art, the mainstream art of the court before the French Revolution, advocates rich, gorgeous and complicated decorative styles. The representative painter is Hua Tuo, who has many palace decorations, taking the body of the ancient Greek goddess as the theme, with bright colors and gaudiness, and both men and women love to indulge in pleasure.
The most typical expression of Rococo's beauty of lust and pleasure should be Boucher. He painted a lot of pictures with ladies as the theme, mainly the imaginary concubines in the Eastern Palace, who served men naked, prostrate, and some oriental silk jewelry, boasting about women's lust in the illusory exotic atmosphere. His painting skills are exquisite, his colors are bright and his emotions are stirring, which is a typical Rococo style.
At the same time of Rococo art, Xia Erdan developed a painting style completely different from Rococo fashion. With the theme of civilian life, he described the hard-working servants in the cellar workshop, and wrote their working life with calm brushstrokes, which reminded people of the Spanish realistic civilian tradition in the17th century. Those wooden barrels filled with water, those pots and pans waiting to be cleaned, all show a simple and true side of life. Xia Erdan turned his attention to the kitchen and drew the themes of some daily necessities, such as a piece of bacon, a bottle of olive oil and some sugar cans, which highlighted the authenticity of civilian life.
Let's stop here for the first part of this book. The contents of the book are just some representative fragments. If you want to know more, you can buy it online or in a bookstore. Jiang Xun's A Talk on the History of Western Art)-Chang Gung Studio