Almost a century after its publication, Pissarro still recommended Valenciennes’ textbook on landscape painting. Here’s why.
Claude
Modern landscape painting, since before the Impressionists, relies on oil sketches made in front of the motif. Was it Vernet who advised Valenciennes to adopt this practice?
Paintings from 1750 on didn’t show ‘Christian’ sibyls, but returned to their classical meaning. Then came Turner’s marvellous narrative landscapes.
He made friends with Rubens, who helped him improve his narrative painting, and them travelled to Italy, where he painted the first plein air oil sketches in European art.
Gérôme’s ‘Ave Caesar’ was a visually stunning wide-angle spectacular, with its detailed reconstructions. Examined in the light of Claude, Girtin, Turner, and others.
Lead antimonate yellow was the original Naple Yellow, but had first been used long before in glassware. Paintings by Claude Lorrain, Böcklin, Renoir, and others.
Paintings by Poussin and Claude give different accounts of the meeting and separation by death of King Numa and the nymph Egeria. Did she dictate to him the laws of Rome?
Take some blue glass, grind it, and turn it into paint: Smalt is one of the strangest of pigments. It extensively used until replaced by Prussian Blue in the early 1700s, and is making a comeback.
Two interlinked stories about the Sibyl, who will live for a thousand years but age until she is just a voice. Painted by Turner (three magnificent works shown), and Claude.
A story of murder by a would-be lover, or perhaps of voyeuristics obsession. How Polyphemus murdered Acis, as shown by Claude, Tischbein, Moreau, Redon, and others.
