Painterly

Painterly

Painterly is a translation of the German term "malerisch", one of the opposed categories popularized by Swiss art historian Heinrich Wölfflin (1864 - 1945) in order to help focus, enrich and standardize the terms being used by art historians of his time to characterize works of art. The opposite character is linear, plastic or formal linear design. [For further clarification of the meaning of "malerisch" read "Francis Bacon: Logic of Sensation" by Gilles Deleuze.] The term painterly has been applied to styles such as Venetian painting (as opposed to the Florentine), Baroque (as opposed to Renaissance) and the Rubenistes (as opposed to the Poussinistes).

An oil painting is "painterly" when there are visible brush strokes, and/or a rough impasto surface. This appearance might occur in oils, acrylics, watercolors, gouache, or any medium where a brush is used. "Painterly" characterizes the work of Pierre Bonnard, Francis Bacon, Paul Gauguin, Vincent Van Gogh, Rembrandt or Renoir, John Singer Sargent and many others. In watercolor it might be represented by John Marin. "Linear" characterizes the work of Botticelli, Michelangelo or Ingres artists whose works conceal the brushstrokes and depend heavily on drawing, shading, contour and carefully measured proportions.

The Impressionists and the Abstract Expressionists tended strongly to be "painterly" movements. Pop Art and photo-realism emphasize flatness, illusion, and smooth, sublimated brushstrokes. The Pop artist Roy Lichtenstein attempted to make a comment on Abstract Expressionist painterliness when he created images of brush strokes, rendered with comic book style inks and colors, complete with Benday dots and other attempts at imitating commercial reproduction processes on the flat picture plane.

What Rembrandt is to light, Delacroix is to color. Colorists tend to substitute relations of tonality for relations of value and render the form, shadow, light and surface through pure relations of color. "Painterly" art makes strong coloristic use of the many visual effects produced by paint on canvas such as chromatic progression, warm and cool tones, chiaroscuro, complementary and contrasting colors, broken tones, broad brushstrokes, impressionism, and impasto. Jackson Pollock's action paintings of the 1940s and 1950s are more "painterly" than Frank Stella's Hard-edge paintings of the 1960s.

Finally, "painterly" refers to paint, though some forms of sculpture make such use of surface texture resembling brushstrokes that they could almost be called painterly (see Wood as a medium). The application of the term outside painting is a little self-conscious, and may not genuinely help the reader experience the character of Auguste Rodin's surfaces or Richard Strauss's flow of chromatic harmonies. Photography can also be described as painterly.

ee also

*Expressionism
*Abstract expressionism
*Tachisme
*Action painting
*Lyrical Abstraction
*Neo-expressionism
*Western painting
*History of painting
*Painting

Notes and references


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Look at other dictionaries:

  • Painterly — Paint er*ly (p[=a]nt [ e]r*l[y^]), a. Like a painter s work. [Obs.] A painterly glose of a visage. Sir P. Sidney. [1913 Webster] …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • painterly — ► ADJECTIVE 1) of or appropriate to a painter; artistic. 2) (of a painting) characterized by qualities of colour, stroke, and texture rather than of line …   English terms dictionary

  • painterly — [pānt′ər lē] adj. 1. Now Rare of or characteristic of a painter 2. characterized by those qualities related to a painter s techniques in applying colors in masses, esp. with a thick, rough surface texture, as distinguished from linear qualities… …   English World dictionary

  • painterly — adjective Date: circa 1586 1. of, relating to, or typical of a painter ; artistic < painterly attention to detail > 2. suggestive or characteristic of a painting or of the art of painting < painterly photography >; especially marked by an… …   New Collegiate Dictionary

  • painterly — [[t]pe͟ɪntə(r)li[/t]] ADJ: usu ADJ n Painterly means relating to or characteristic of painting or painters. ...his painterly talents... The film has a painterly eye …   English dictionary

  • painterly — paint|er|ly [ˈpeıntəli US tər ] adj written typical of painters or painting ▪ painterly images …   Dictionary of contemporary English

  • painterly — adjective typical of painters or painting: painterly images …   Longman dictionary of contemporary English

  • painterly — /payn teuhr lee/, adj. 1. of, pertaining to, or characteristic of a painter. 2. Fine Arts. characterized by qualities of color, stroke, or texture perceived as distinctive to the art of painting, esp. the rendering of forms and images in terms of …   Universalium

  • painterly — adjective a) Characteristic of a painter or paintings. b) Having clear brush strokes. Ant: plastic, linear …   Wiktionary

  • Painterly — Живописный, относящийся к живописи …   Краткий толковый словарь по полиграфии

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