Clodion's Poetry and Music

Claude Michel, also known as Clodion was a sculptor of the Rococo style. He had many works illustrated within this fanciful and newly refined methodology. One of his most well known pieces, Poetry and Music (1774-1778), expresses this intimate and more personal style. Meant to be viewed at close range, Rococo sculptures like Michel’s were often referred to as “miniature Baroque” (http://www.all-art.org). This piece was commissioned by Louis XV’s finance minister and crafted in expensive Carrara marble. Although Michel or Clodion had also prepared a terracotta model as well, a medium he often worked within. Rococo seemed to be a more playful and elegant approach to Baroque art. Artists were concerned with depicting a more graceful and soft approach to Baroque art and architecture. As art in the early eighteenth century shifted it’s production from individual patrons to more industrially rich and middle class people, this style began to develop.

Once the French court changed locations from Versailles to Paris, the movement began to spread across the entire country and Rococo salons emerged. In these salons were not only great pieces of art, but the walls and ceilings themselves were sculpted and decorated within the Rococo technique. Rococo artists used soft creamy pastel-like colors, emulated curves within forms, and often used gold (especially within decoration). Chandeliers, decorated furniture and tabletop sculptures were very common within these salons that exploded across Europe.

Designed for his residence in Paris, Poetry and Music, was commissioned by Abbe Terray, a minister of Louis XV (www.nga.gov). The piece represents an overall interest of the minister within the arts and sciences, and depicts two young boys immersed within music. Standing up and with longer hair, the boy to the left seems to be older then the smaller one to the right. The smaller boy seems to be concentrated on the other while he plays an instrument. The boy on the right has a scroll in his hand and with his stern glance at the older boy, seems to be trying to learn or study. There is also a trumpet below the younger boy, suggesting that perhaps they are learning multiple instruments.

This sculpture expresses the smooth and graceful curves that the Rococo style was known for, specifically within sculpture. A soft piece that expresses a common interest within arts and sciences, this piece would have functioned in a Rococo style salon. Playful and intimate, Claude Michel’s Poetry and Music is a great sculpture coming out of the Rococo style of the eighteenth century.

Elk up Lion Rock

This big ol guy was at least 14 points, biggest I've ever seen.

Albrecht Durer's Self Portrait

For this week’s analysis, I will be looking at Albrecht Durer’s Self Portrait, also known as Self-Portrait at Twenty-Eight Wearing a Coat with Fur Collar. German Renaissance artist Durer painted this iconic piece on wood panel early around 1500. It is most well known for resembling Jesus Christ using religious devices such as symmetry, dark tones and the body language of the subject. Durer was the first known artist to accomplish many different styles of self-portraiture. This half-length portrait is frontal and highly symmetrical, with the figures right hand raised to his chest as if praying. His self portrait idealizes Christ, using a symmetrical and frontal view, rather then a pose where the head is at an angle. There was a large influence of Christ and the portrayal of Christ in portraits that went into Durer’s self-portrait.

Although the painting is directed at the viewer, it is also directed inward toward “the self”. The dark and bare background seems to suggest that Durer did not intend for this figure to be in any sort of environment. His use of the brown tones create a somber appearance and compliment the dark background. The use of the lighting in this portrait is also very interesting. The highlights fall unevenly across Durer and influence this portrait with a mellow notion of realism. Durer has also seemed to have mimicked the facial expressions of earlier depictions of Christ, and does it exceptionally well. Albrecht, who had started drawing at a very young age, was viewed as very bold for painting this frontal portrait, which at the time was very rare. He viewed himself as a fairly innovative and well-rounded artist, and perhaps he is suggesting in this portrait that his gift is God-given.

One of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance, Durer was known for working within exact proportions. However it is debated that this piece is not of exact proportions, with art historians saying his hair is uneven. Durer put incredible detail into the hair of this figure, and it is one of the most highlighted aspects of this whole piece. Another stylistic choice Durer has made is the choice of clothing for his figure, a coat with a fur jacket. This is typical of the Northern Renaissance and similar fur jackets can be found depicted in the works of Jan Van Eyck. Durer not only excelled in painting, but also in making wood cuts and engravings. This piece is his third of his painted self-portraits and is considered his most personal. The way the viewer interacts with this frontal image is very effective and at the time was very innovative. When looking at Durer’s previous works, especially his self-portraits, this one is his absolute most successful.

Comparative Analysis

For the following comparative analysis I will be comparing two works; Pontormo’s “Entombment” and Bronzino’s “Allegory with Venus and Cupid”. Both these works were achieved during the High Italian Renaissance around 1520 and both incorporate the style of Mannerism. Jacopo Carcucci, or Pontormo as he was known, was an Italian artist during the onset and early years of Mannerism. His paintings depict a different perspective then High Renaissance artists, and his figures seem to elegantly float in the air, a characteristic of Mannerism. Pontormo uses bright colors to depict a group of people in a grieving manner, supporting Jesus and encompassing the space around him.

These figures seem to be almost struggling, perhaps implying that help is needed to sustain the weight of Jesus. The man holding him on the bottom seems to be peering back towards the viewer with an empathically look of fret. The rest of the figures seem to carry the same look about them, floating in this bleak space. Even the man on the bottom seems to be barely grounded, however holding an immense weight.

The landscape of this oil painting consists of a dark flattened space, with solid ground and a single cloud in the sky. It is very interesting that no cross is visible in this painting, and perhaps the only item relevant to the “natural world” in this piece consists of the clothing worn by these figures. The figure in the front right, facing completely backwards, seems to be suggesting to the viewer that she is following along with the rest of the figures and perhaps there are more people following that are not depicted in the painting. Pontormo leaves the viewer with a quite ambiguous composition in this sense, and rather implies a more “visionary” painting. The way he has expressed these figures as more elongated and stretched out, is typical of the Mannerism style. Rather then being influenced by nature, artists began looking more at past works and sculptures. It is for this reason that Mannerism has been called as “anti-classical”.

Agnolo Bronzino’s Allegory with Venus and Cupid (also called An Allegory of Venus and Cupid and A triumph of Venus, is another great piece characteristic of the Mannerism style. Displaying elongated and obscured figures, while expressing grace and ambivalence, it is similar to Pontormo’s Entombment. However this piece, which was done maybe twenty years or so after Entombment does seem to incorporate a variety of depictions within figures. It also expresses a much more crowded space, and a well-defined foreground. The different characters within Bronzino’s piece are still presented in a manneristic style of exaggerated graceful forms, but with each figure having different expressions; varying from Pontormo’s figures.
As Stokstad states, this composition does carry with it the complex allegoric ambiguity relevant from this time period, but could imply a rather disturbing difference then Pontormo’s work. The erotic imagery, which appealed to mid-sixteenth century courts, suggests emotions of lust and jealousy. Mannerism is made up of several approaches and ideals defining its style. Rather then the humanistic approach of life like figures, Mannerism, is more concerned with grace and elegance. It was very much influenced by the more naturalistic works of artists like da Vinci and Raphael.