Artists who sketched in front of the motif using oil paints to gather image libraries often kept those on paper, rather than wood panel or stretched canvas.
Valenciennes
How painting in oils in front of the motif became popular fifty years before paint became available in tubes, and how it was done by the experts.
Paintings of the Roman countryside by Michallon, Blechen, Camille Corot, Arnold Böcklin, and others following Valenciennes’ teaching.
Remarkable oil sketches made in the countryside around Rome that laid the foundation for training in landscape painting, and ultimately Impressionism.
Some of the greatest paintings forming the zeitgeist of the genre, from Poussin, Rubens, Valenciennes, Turner, Monet, Renoir, Pissarro, and others.
From Velázquez’s pioneering sketches of 1630, through Valenciennes in 1780, to Constable, Corot, and Pissarro, Manet and John Singer Sargent in the late 19th century.
Paul Cézanne led the way in Aix-en-Provence, followed rapidly by Renoir, Signac, Cross, Luce, van Rysselberghe, and Pierre Bonnard.
By the end of the 18th century, remains of Pompeii were being excavated and inspired painters to re-imagine life and death in the city.
A princess takes her handmaids to the coast to wash her fine robes and themselves. Out steps Odysseus, naked except for strategic leaves, and asks for their help.
How to paint a landscape with faithful and coherent cast shadows, why most painters don’t do so, and a few get it wrong.
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