Uploaded by chimere on Oct 28, 2004
When one thinks of a portrait, perhaps one of the many paintings that
flash by is that of Leonardo da Vinci: the Mona Lisa. But in fact,
portraits do not have just one style. The subject does not have to be
seated facing a certain way so that the artist can take advantage of the
“curving” effect. It can be of a man, a woman, a god, or a child,
religious or secular, idealized, or abstact.
In Portrait of a Man and a Woman at a Casement, Fra Filippo Lippi portrays
a man and his wife somewhat facing each other. Although they are man and
wife, they do not look intimate, and in fact, do not appear to be looking
at each other. Because the woman is bigger in scale compared to the man,
she seems closer to us. Moreover, everything recedes from her: the
background seen through the window gives us an illusion of depth. The
artist’s emphasis is on the wife: we see only part of the profile and
hands of the husband. Why is more than half of the painting covered by
only the woman? This painting was supposed to have been a commemoration of
a wedding or the birth of a child. If this painting was about a birth of a
child, it certainly makes sense that Fra Lippi gave more importance to the
mother figure. He pays great attention to her dress and jewelry although
we cannot see at all what her husband is wearing except for his “hat”
(head-covering?). The female is idealized in that she has the
characteristic Rennaissance smoothness and roundness. The man is looking
inside, and the woman is looking outside through what we perceive to be a
door. It is not drawn, but based on the light source, which is coming from
the top left – we can tell because of the shadow that the husband’s face
casts on the back wall – it seems like it is a door, and that the woman is
looking outside at the world, thinking of the baby that is to see and
share it with her. Overall, the painting is done in such a way that we
feel like we’re looking at the two people through a frame or a window as
well.
Rembrandt’s Flora idealizes the woman figure as well. She has a double
chin, but her skin is smooth and her figure is round. This idealization is
appropriate because Flora is the goddess of spring. Goddesses are not
supposed to look like real humans. She looks neither young nor old.
However, Flora also looks human because her overall composition derives
from Rembrandt’s portraits of Saskia, his wife. Rembrandt uses elaborate
drapery, especially at the sleeves. Rembrandt uses impasto where the
sleeves bunch up, creating not just an illusion but also a physical
texture. Her skirt looks long and full, and her blouse seems somewhat
transparent, especially where the light hits her. The light is coming from
the top left, creating a shadow on her face from her bonnet. Her hands are
in shadow, and in her right hand, Flora holds some flowers that are
(probably) withering and dying. Flora looks down at them, and knows that
flowers, youth, beauty, and love do not last.
Don Manuel Orsio Manrique de Zuniga by Goya is a portrait of a young boy
who has already died. The child wears a red jumpsuit with elaborate lacy
sleeves and collar, fancy shoes and sash. The light is coming in almost as
if there is a door being opened, and through the crack the hallway light
shines inside an otherwise pitch-black room. It is as if the light is only
temporary, and as soon as the door closes, the child will be left in
darkness with the three wide-eyed cats, magpie, and finches in a cage. In
that sense, the room functions almost as a cage itself: the child is left
there to play by himself. In Baroque art, caged birds are symbolic of
innocence, and if he is caged as well, he also symbolizes innocence. He is
playing with his pet magpie which holds Goya’s calling card in its beak.
Everything about him is black or gray: he is the only source of “color” in
the picture. The child almost has a halo effect for his face is much
whiter than his hands. He is the source of innocence in this portrait,
vulnerable to the world.
Cézanne’s Madame Cézanne in a Red Dress differs greatly probably because
of the era it was painted in. It is more abstract, and the lines to not
recede to any certain point, creating a rather disturbing, two dimensional
illusion. Nothing is drawn “to scale.” For example, the woman’s wais is
too thin compared to her upper torso. She is supposed to be seated, yet
the yellow “chair” doesn’t look like a chair at all, but a board. The
lines of the wall do not match up with the painting on the upper left or
with anything else. It is too slanted, almost as if it is on a different
plane, like cubism. This woman is not idealized at all. In fact, she looks
pale and bluish, and covered with dust, almost as if she is a doll that
had been in storage for a while. Her clothes are faded, she has no
jewelry, and her face is not symmetrical. Symmetry and beauty often go
hand in hand, and clearly, Cézanne was not after her beauty in this
portrait. There is no real sense of unity in the painting, no unifying
color. However, the enormous curtain keeps the painting in, framing the
woman.
