'Creation of Adam'

[Click image for larger version.]

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni ('Michelangelo Buonarroti', or just 'Michelangelo')
Creation of Adam, c. 1511
Fresco, this section approx. h230.1 cm x w480.1 cm (90.6" x 189")
Sistine Chapel, Vatican City

On location: Interactive Sistine Chapel

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*Note: Technical Difficulties in which all my links broke in half. Apologies for the delay!*

And we come to the last week of genre garbage, after which I can release you back to more-or-less random rambles. To give a final recap of the genres (working from least important to most important this time):

  1. Still life
  2. Animal painting
  3. Landscape
  4. Genre painting
  5. Portrait
  6. History Painting

So it is now HISTORY PAINTING. In its original context, this genre usually involved (*ahem*):
A picture designed to convey a high-minded narrative by use of epic-scale figures acting as exemplars of moral behavior (or as warnings against tragic sins). Often in the form of illustrations1 of well-known episodes from religious texts2, mythology, classic literature, or history.
But that's fussy and doesn't quite cover a lot of the cool fringe work, so the looser definition:
Narrative painting3, usually with didactic (or at least 'meaningful') overtones.  
For several centuries, history painting is what a 'serious' artist trained to be able to do, and 'masterpieces' (demonstrations of mature skill that showed an artist was ready for an independent career and important commissions, the artistic equivalent of a debutante's coming out ball) were often history paintings. Two reasons the genre was put on a pedestal: First, it was an intellectual achievement, a way to show that the artist could coherently translate grand themes into complex compositions. And second, it was a practical achievement, because the creation of said complex compositions was no small thing; various figures, animals, objects, backgrounds all had to be arranged to be dynamic and pleasing to the eye when taken all together, while still being completely finished as individual pieces, and the large scale demanded that the artist thoroughly knew how to get the best performance and a lasting stability out of their tools.

The basic types of history painting we'll be looking at this week:
  • Religious
  • Mythological
  • Allegorical
  • Literary
  • Historical
  • Contemporary
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In the meantime, we have above a highlight from one of the best-known works by one of the world's all-time best artists. And honestly, who wouldn't want to paint like this? Thoughtful, dramatic, technically refined...and that's not even getting into how this piece fits into the full context of the entire fresco series in the Sistine chapel. There's a temptation to say that of course this is 'better', 'more important' art than even the best bowl-of-fruit painting.

But then, that was always the most glaring problem with the hierarchy; if you buy into it, it kills the imagination as to what can be done with fruit.

...Once more unto the breach and then we'll worry no more about it.


NOTES:

1. These days there can be great snobbery from some 'fine artists' (or perhaps more correctly, some lovers of fine art) towards illustrators and especially fan artists, the complaint being something like "they didn't come up with their own message" or "an artwork should stand on its own without needing a text" or just "that's not art". Historically the distinction is pretty bunk.

2. Since this genre hierarchy is a Western/European art tradition thing, 'religious texts' refers almost exclusively to Christian texts, the Bible, the Golden Legend, some apocryphal stuff, etc. But I love reading about other art paradigms, and will definitely be going into other lines of tradition in future.

3. The term 'history painting' actually comes from the Italian word 'istoria', which meant 'narrative' or 'story' more than it meant 'history' exactly. So if you refer back to the first set of posts, about narrative painting, a lot of the same points will apply.