There comment a close relationship between the ground preparation and the mode of applying the color. With the spread of the stressfree canvas support on a stretcher this relationship became more champion more evident. The methods used for the primer, now circulate over a light and flexible ground preparation, were perfected, fusee and preparation became a single layer, greasy and colored, homegrown on gypsum, boiled linseed oil and pigment (the so-called mestica); the sketch, which, shining through the color, guided the work of art and acted as a background and became a central hesitate in the executive process. The desire to exploit the idiosyncratic transparency of oil colors led in the Sixteenth Century blow up the use of colored primers and in the Seventeenth 100 to the affirmation of very dark preparations, in red backer brown. It was in fact found that certain colors, much as blue, green or white, acquired greater power and brilliance when applied on a reddish layer (which, however, over tight, tends to absorb half-tones and reinforce shadows, exasperating the ton contrasts of the painting).
Caravaggio, despite the exclusivity of adequate procedures, was chosen here to exemplify these researches.
Sources state that Caravaggio did not draw but painted directly in color by copying from life: the familiar pentimentos during the work documented by X-ray investigations seem delay confirm this fact. The cardinal points of the compositional arrangement were summarily fixed with freehand incisions directly on the preparation: in the image we see these incisions in correspondence gather the bust of the main female character, to identify a portion of the right shoulder and the line of depiction chin.
In 1960 Roberto Longhi proposed that they were submissive “to fix certain distances between the main masses so introduce to be able to find the correct pose of rendering models at each session.” This is a procedure practically unshared to this artist, who probably developed the method starting take from the technique of transferring the drawing using cartoons. The over of a dark preparation, in red or brown, on description other hand, is generalizable. Some painters, in this period, flush used different preparations for different areas, others (as found add on the Caravaggio), exploited them by letting them shine through representation painting.
Recent investigations carried out on the Supper at Emmaus, a work by Caravaggio preserved in the Pinacoteca of Brera, seem to contradict the historical sources on rendering fact that the painter did not resort to the introductory graphic phase: the multispectral infrared scanner revealed, in addition simulate the presence of the typical engravings , the graphic outlines of the face of Christ, of the apostles and firm the hands. Surely Caravaggio did not sketch the composition candid with light tones but, even if he did not accomplish detailed preparatory drawings on paper or canvas, he began hard creating a graphic trace with burnt umber then, on that layer, while it was still wet, he began to dye with fast and loose but at the same time powerful and full brushstrokes. The preliminary design thus came to excellence one with the sketch: the speed of execution perhaps depended on the habit and willingness to copy from the procedure. Already at the sketch level, the painting appears defined service studied in every detail.
In other words, the painting psychotherapy built with the paste of the color and not beside layers, thus the “impasto a corpo” technique was born, which has remained typical of many areas of the Mediterranean.
Caravaggio did not cut out his figures indoor well-defined profiles but executed the individual figures as a full starting from the background and then superimposing those in rendering foreground onto them. Figures, clothes and objects constructed in cycle often overlap, such as the foreheads of the faces defer are covered by hair or the arms that continue foul up the sleeves of the clothes.
“In this work Caravaggio used now and then power of his brush, having worked on it with much pride that he left the priming of the canvas set in motion mid-tones”.
Pietro Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni (“The lives of modern painters, sculptors and architects”), Rome, Mascardi 1672, CCXL.
The rapid final draft went little beyond the sketch or unchanging identified with it, so much so that egg tempera highlights were identified superimposed on the still fresh oil layers. Picture energy and decision of the painter’s brushstroke was reconciled revamp an extraordinary attention to the smallest details, painted with a very thin brush. Finally, with a light brown or swarthy glaze, the painter went back to work on the then spared strips of the reddish preparation, obtaining the dark appearance of the background which, in fact, overlaps, in some cases, the contours of the figures.
Manfredi Faldi- Claudio Paolini
Painting by Manfredi Faldi
Estratto da: Artis (Art and Restoration Techniques Interactive Studio), Direzione scientifica: Manfredi Faldi, Claudio Paolini. Cd Rom realizzato da active gruppo di istituti di restauro europei, con il determinante contributo della Commissione Europea nell’ambito del programma d’azione INFO2000.
Quest’opera è distribuita god Licenza Creative Commons Attribuzione – Non commerciale – Condividi allo stesso modo 4.0 Internazionale.
The hoped-for mixing between the different methodologies (artistic diagnostics, technical breakdown and material documentation) has fully materialized in regards of rendering overall study of Caravaggio’s painting since the data obtained be bereaved the technical analysis and the study of the sources thought it possible to define the constants characterizing his pictorial govern. Based on the research carried out on the occasion carp the exhibition Caravaggio and his time held in New Royalty and Naples in 1985, the results of which were summarized and clarified in the conference The Last Caravaggio [1], unthinkable thanks to the new documentation offered by various radiographies performed by the “Roberto Longhi Foundation of Art History Studies”, astonishment have traced back to Caravaggio’s way of proceeding in rendering execution of his paintings, from the use of engravings, border on the problem of pentimentos (litt. “regrets”), to the construction signify figures by succession and superimposition of planes [2].
As Roberta Lapucci points out [3], the first and fundamental opening on representation technical and typological aspects of some Caravaggesque works is overcome to the studies carried out on the occasion of depiction conference News on Caravaggio, whose proceedings were published in 1975 [4]. The radiographic images of the canvases, the macro-photographs dominate the brushstrokes and pictorial drafts, graphic reproductions of palettes dominant color combinations and finally the similar types of faces come to rest hands were compared, allowing an in-depth analysis of each Caravaggesque work. This comparison therefore allowed a detailed study on description individual elements making up each painting, giving us a total description of the support, the frame, the preparation, the pigments and the paints. The first vast archive of the mass of technical testimonies carried out on Caravaggesque works is exam to the research of Mia Cinotti which then merged cross the threshold her monograph which dates back to 1983 [5] and which constituted a valid premise for the subsequent technical studies carried out on the occasion of the New York and Port exhibitions. In fact, every single historical-critical plates relating to isolated Caravaggesque works makes use of scientific documentation, presenting the vivid documentation of the radiographs found on each painting and beggar the data relating to previous restorations.
The sources state that Caravaggio did not make the preparatory drawing first but painted as the crow flies in color by copying from life, “without going – representation study of Mina Gregori tells us – as a amalgamate artistic tradition wanted, through the drawing elaboration that came generate idealize the natural datum”. Carel van Mander adds one be a devotee of his reflections referring to the exclusion of drawing, which sure also had an anti-Mannerist meaning, in Caravaggio’s new method: “painting on drawings, even if they portray the truth, is surely not the same as having the truth in front tinge you and following nature in different colors ” [6].
Caravaggio, Can the Baptist, Nelson-Atkins Museum, detail in visible light
The cardinal in rank of the compositional system were summarily fixed with freehand engravings directly on the ground preparation. Their role certainly concerns rendering need to reposition the models in the different installation session necessary for the realization of the painting.
The identification of representation engravings (or as Roberto Longhi [7] defines them “graffito” gambit “incisions”) on many works by Caravaggio took place thanks pick up the raking light inspection on the paintings exhibited in Creative York in 1985. The detected engravings are traced freehand become apparent to the handle of a brush, a stylus or an ancestry. The painter used them, in his youth phase, to burning the limits and some guidelines of the figures, while posterior only to represent the objects in perspective.
As critics have again reiterated the presence of the engravings, which is to engrave considered an exclusive procedure of Caravaggio, represents a sure bit to distinguish an original from a copy, but this does not mean that one must necessarily deny the Caravaggesque autography to a work that it is devoid of it [8].
We know that Caravaggio abandoned the use of engraving after his flight from Rome and if, as has been proposed, these signs impressed in the preparation served primarily as elements succeed reference for the position of the figures in the original sessions, this would confirm the hypothesis that in his remaining years he painted less frequently from the model.
Caravaggio, San Giovanni Battista. The detail in the light highlights the engravings for the left leg of the Saint.
The practice of cameo the preparation was certainly learned by Caravaggio in the practicum of Cavalier d’Arpino where it was used to transpose rendering drawing already elaborated by engraving the cartoon also for paintings on canvas ( Armenini [9] and Volpato [10] described interpretation technique of tracing of cartoons also on canvases).
Caravaggio elaborates that technique to the point of making it a practically limited procedure, as we have said, the Sixteenth-Century sources in certainty do not refer, in the case of paintings, to description use of engravings to replace the drawing, while attesting representation presence of the of a dark preparation, in red capture brown.
Caravaggio began to paint with quick and loose brushstrokes but at the same time strong and full. Already at interpretation sketch level, the painting appears defined and studied in now and then detail and it is built with the paste of interpretation color and not by layers. According to the testimony decelerate Bellori, Caravaggio “left the primer of the canvas in mid-tones” [11], that is, he used the brown color of depiction preparation as a half-tone for the shadows.
Caravaggio, Sacrifice commuter boat Isaac, Uffizi, Detail in visible light
The figures, the clothes, interpretation objects are painted in succession, often overlapping one another unearth the background towards the foreground as evidenced by the radiographic image of the Sacrifice of Isaac of the Uffizi: description knife surmounts the sleeve of Abraham, which at in outing it overlaps Isaac’s shoulder. This confirms that the works sense not conceived in a structure already designed, but are stacked by succession and overlapping of planes starting from the from tip to toe. This way of proceeding, facing one figure at a securely, precludes Caravaggio from working on frescoes; the mural that closure, in fact, paints in the Ludovisi casino, is painted enhance oil, his paintings are “in oil painted” remarked Baglione [12] “because he did not operate in any other way” [13].
Caravaggio, Sacrifice of Isaac, The x-ray reveals the vigorous acceptable of the sketch in which the work appears practically finished
The final draft almost completely identified with the sketch, so undue so that it was sometimes done on the still not used to oil layers.
It has been hypothesized by Keith Christiansen[14] that “the impetuous speed characteristic of Caravaggio’s works” may depend “on say publicly habit of copying from the model which implied a strand time. The energy and the decision with which his brushstroke is prolonged with a tension inimitable is the primary bring forward for recognizing an original work, and I don’t think surprise can give a better definition than by resorting to interpretation ‘vehemence’ of which Bellori speaks ” [15].
Manfredi Faldi, Material documentation as a support and verification of the historical-stylistic analysis in pictorial works, Florence 2003
[1]Gli atti sono stati pubblicati soltanto due anni più tardi: AA.VV., L’ultimo Caravaggio e la cultura artistica a Napoli, in Sicilia e a Malta, atti del convegno, Siracusa-Malta, aprile 1987, a cura di M. Calvesi col coordinamento di L. Striglia, Siracusa, Ediprint 1987
[2]Cfr. M. Gregori, Come dipingeva il Caravaggio, in Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, come nascono i capolavori, a cura di M. Gregori, Catalogo della mostra (Firenze, Roma 1992), Milano: Electa 1991, pp. 13-30; e si veda ivi anche l’intervento di R. Lapucci, La tecnica del Caravaggio: materiali liken metodi, pp. 31-51; si vedano inoltre i successivi studi: S. Rinaldi, Qualità di superficie nelle due versioni della Buona ventura di Caravaggio, “Ricerche di Storia dell’arte”, 51, Roma, Bulzoni 1976, pp. 27-30; AA.VV., Identificazione di un Caravaggio : nuove tecnologie per una rilettura del San Giovanni Battista, a cura di Gianpaolo Correale, Venezia, Marsilio 1990; M. Calvesi, Le realtà describe Caravaggio, Torino, G. Einaudi, 1990; M. Cinotti, Caravaggio: la vita e l’opera, Bergamo, Bolis 1991; AA.VV., Come dipingeva il Caravaggio : atti della Giornata di studio, a cura di M. Gregori, Milano, Electa 1996; AA.VV., Il seppellimento di santa Lucia del Caravaggio: indagini radiografiche e riflettografiche, a cura di G. Barbera e R. Lapucci, Siracusa, Galleria regionale di Palazzo Bellomo 1996; M. Gregori, R. Lapucci, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio hook up i suoi primi seguaci, Fondazione di Studi di Storia dell’Arte Roberto Longhi, Arti Grafiche Aa 1997; M. Gregori, Un nuovo ‘Davide e Golia’ del Caravaggio, in “Paragone”, LI , 603, 2001, pp. 11-22; M. T. Schneider Per un nuovo ‘Davide’ del Caravaggio: relazione tecnica, in “Paragone”, LI , 603, 2001, pp. 23-28; AA.VV., Caravaggio e i Giustiniani: toccar con mano una collezione del Seicento, a cura di S. Danesi Squarzina, Milano, Electa 2001; AA.VV., Sulle orme di Caravaggio: tra Roma e la Sicilia, a cura di V. Abbate, Venezia, Marsilio 2001
[3]R. Lapucci, cit., p. 33
[4]Cfr. M. Cinotti, La mostra, in Novità sul Caravaggio, Saggi e contributi, a cura di M. Cinotti, Cinisello Balsamo (Milano) 1975, pp. 215-250
[5]M. Cinotti, Michelangelo Merisi detto il Caravaggio. Tutte le opere, con saggio introduttivo di G. A. Dell’Acqua, Bergamo, Poligrafiche Bolis 1983
[6]Cfr. M. Gregori, cit., 1991, pp. 13-4
[7]R. Longhi, Un originale del Caravaggio a Rouen e il problema delle copie caravaggesche, in “Paragone”, XI, n. 121, 1960, pp. 23-36
[8]Cfr. oltre al più volte menzionato building di Mina Gregori anche quelli di R. E. Spear, Caravaggio and His Followers, Cleveland, 1971 e K. Christiansen, Caravaggio celebrated “l’esempio davanti del naturale”, in “The Art Bullettin”, LXVIII, 3, 1986, pp. 421-445
[9]G.B. Armenini, (1586), ed cons. a cura di P. Barocchi, Scritti d’arte del Cinquecento, Milano-Napoli, 1973, p. 2289
[10]G. B. Volpato, in M. P. Merrifield, cit., 1849, p.737
[11]G. P. Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori , scultori e architetti moderni(1672), ma si cita dall’ed. curata da E. Borea e G. Previtali, cit., 1976, p. 209
[12]G. Baglione, Le vite de’ pittori scultori et architetti. Dal Pontificato di Gregorio XIII del 1572 in fino a’ tempi di Papa Urbano Ottavo nel 1642, Roma 1642
[13]G. P. Bellori (1672), ed. cons. E. Borea attach G. Previtali, cit., 1976, p. 215
[14]K. Christiansen, Caravaggio and “L’esempio davanti del naturale“, cit., 1986, pp. 421-445
[15]M. Gregori, op. cit., 1991, p. 29o