A Journey Through Art History: From Canova to Picasso
Three Graces, A. Canova:
Comment:
The Three Graces sculpture is the work of Italian sculptor Antonio Canova. Despite not having studied art formally due to his family’s low income, Canova achieved great prestige and reputation in the art world after moving to Venice. “The Three Graces” is one of the most recognized works of the Italian sculptor. These figures embody and represent the female nude in a perfect manner that reveals Canova’s artistic skills. Beyond representation, The Three Graces delves deeper, as the sculptor reflects the inner mythological world of the Graces in the composition. In Greek mythology, the Graces were goddesses of beauty and fertility. The three most prominent Graces in mythology are Aglaia, Euphrosyne, and Thalia. According to experts, the Graces were also associated with the underworld and the Eleusinian Mysteries.
Analysis
Antonio Canova’s The Three Graces is made of marble, a material that would become associated with and identify him throughout his career as a sculptor. The Three Graces is a marble sculpture with perfect finishing and polishing. Canova uses this material to embody the ideal beauty of the Graces in a simple yet meticulous manner, following the artistic taste of the time. The Three Graces are depicted resting on one foot and holding each other gracefully. The color of the marble is exquisite and allows the sculptural form to emanate a characteristic lightness and elegance of Canova’s work. Along these lines are inscribed two widespread creations: the portrait of Napoleon’s sister, Pauline Borghese as Venus, carved on a couch, and Theseus and the Minotaur.
The Oath of the Horatii, J.L. David:
Analysis
The composition is balanced and symmetrical, with the father as the central axis, dividing the characters into two evenly distributed groups: the Horatii on the left and the women on the right. It is typical of Neoclassical painting to find clear compositions; here, we can see that the figures are ordered parallel to the picture plane, corresponding with the architecture. The figures are divided into two groups: the men on the left, symbolizing the heroic act of swearing to death, and the women on the right, symbolizing emotion. The composition is orderly, reminiscent of Roman reliefs. Neoclassical painting is characterized by clear figures with precise contours and a predominance of drawing. This dominance leads to more precise forms, similar to those used by Renaissance and Classical artists, where figure and ground are not merged. The light is cold and natural, serving to highlight the drawing and shape, influenced by Caravaggio. The light comes from the left side of the painting, giving a theatrical quality to the work and creating volume in the bodies by focusing on the most essential elements. The color is cool and rational. Only the red robes provide a warmer and more emotional feeling. The colors are pure and unmixed. The creation of space is based on classical perspective, with a vanishing point in the father’s hands, towards the swords. Another vanishing point is found at the heads of the women. Most expressions are tense, with tight muscles, emphasized by the ritual of the oath with their swords. This contrasts with the passive and grieving attitude of the sisters. The figure in the dark cloak with the children accentuates this tension. There is a great naturalism evident in the study of anatomy. The impact of light on the bodies gives them a sense of volume. This naturally leads David to consider proportions.
Comment:
This work belongs to the second stage of Goya’s artistic career, which can be divided into three stages:
First Stage (1760-1792):
This stage is characterized by happy and jovial paintings, reflected in the cartoons he created for tapestries at the Royal Factory. Neoclassical composition is prevalent, with figures grouped in geometric patterns. Popular themes were represented.
Second Stage (1792-1808):
This stage marks Goya’s first crisis. It is the stage of portraits, including the work we have seen, and the series Los Caprichos, where Goya satirizes common human errors in society: greed, vanity, etc. This satire begins by addressing general problems, each with a title. There are eighty plates in total. During this time, Goya also painted the greatest portraits of the aristocracy.
Third Stage (1808-1828):
This stage marks Goya’s second crisis, extending until his death in 1828. It is the period when he experienced the consequences of the Napoleonic invasion (the War of Independence). Goya lived with bitterness, which resulted in a series of engravings titled The Disasters of War. The protagonist of these engravings is the people, degraded by war. In these works, he represents cruelty, hunger, injustice, and the irrationality of war. He also reflects this theme in two paintings from 1814: The Second of May 1808 and The Third of May 1808. Two years later, at the age of 70, and after the tragic stage of the war, he developed a series of etched engravings (Black and White) depicting bullfighting scenes. By 1820, he lived in a house on the banks of the Manzanares River and painted the famous Black Paintings of La Quinta del Sordo, featuring scenes of witchcraft, such as the Witches’ Sabbath, the festival of San Isidro, and Saturn devouring his son. From a historical perspective, Goya lived from 1746 to 1828, during the reigns of Carlos III and Carlos IV. These were years of attempted reforms through the Enlightenment. Goya witnessed the success of some of these reforms under Carlos III, but under his successor, Carlos IV, these efforts were hindered by a clash between the enlightened reformist minority and the conservative majority, who resisted change. It was precisely in this atmosphere of confusion and social conflict that Goya’s Los Caprichos emerged.
The Third of May 1808, Goya:
Reviews:
The painting is done on canvas using the oil technique. The composition is divided into two main parts: the first, on the left, consists of a group of civilians, about a dozen, in various poses: one covers his face, others lie dead on the ground, another appears praying, one with open arms… The right part is formed by a group of six soldiers pointing their guns at the group of civilians in front of them. On the side of the civilian group is the mountain of Principe Pio. In the background, we see architecture belonging to the city of Madrid and the black night where the action takes place, covering the rest of the composition. Goya used a predominantly dark palette in this painting, dominated by the black color of death, with significant mixing of colors associated with the green range. The other color families are ochre and brown. Not forgetting the white of the shirt of the man with open arms, which creates a strong contrast with the rest of the mostly dark palette. We could say that this composition is a “crescendo” of color ranging from the white of the civilian’s shirt to the black clothes of the soldiers.
Comment:
This is a painting by the Aragonese painter Francisco Goya y Lucientes, titled The Third of May 1808 or The Shootings of May 3rd 1808 in Madrid: The executions on Príncipe Pío hill. It was painted in 1814. The exact purpose for which it was designed is unknown, but it is suggested that it was intended to be placed in some ephemeral architecture. It entered the Prado Museum in the early nineteenth century (where it is currently located) but was not exhibited until 1868, as mentioned in a catalog of the time. The event depicted in the painting occurred in 1808. Napoleon had invaded Spain, and the royal family had to follow his orders. On May 2, 1808, the people of Madrid tried to prevent the departure of Prince Francisco de Paula to France, organized by the French. The situation escalated, and French troops fired on the people of Madrid, in what is known as the uprising of May 2. The outbreak of the War of Independence in May 1808 represented a serious internal conflict for Goya, and his liberal ideology leaned towards the French style and Joseph I, while his patriotism was attracted to those fighting against the French. The canvas shows a patriotic vision of the events of May 3, 1808, in Madrid. It was painted years after the events, and it is unknown if Goya witnessed them firsthand. What we do know is that Goya tries to draw attention to the painting, reflecting a sense of a photographic chronicler. With his brushes, he captures the episode that sparked the war with all its violence and cruelty, expressing his opposition to these events and providing a lesson against the irrationality of human beings, as befitted his enlightened spirit. The execution is quite violent, with fast and thick brushstrokes and large patches, as if the violence of the action had invaded the painter himself.
Eiffel Tower:
Analysis:
The tower stands 300 meters high. It rests on four massive feet, connected by arched structures that resemble the appearance of the iron bridges that were Eiffel’s specialty. The arches connecting the feet feature a clear decorative element with braided ornamentation. The tower develops with a strong vertical emphasis, and from the first platform, the path narrows into a pronounced pyramid, accentuating the sense of verticality. It is an open structure that highlights the aesthetic function of the tower, as it stands out against the sky, not just as a silhouette but also with its interior volume, conveying a sense of lightness that belies its actual weight. The tower is a building with no other function than to make the elements of its own structure visible. It becomes a symbol of modernity, rising above traditional symbols like the towers of Notre Dame or the Dome of the Invalides. It is a commemorative monument devoid of content: it does not celebrate any victory or past event but the success of the present and future. The role of ornamentation becomes less important, and purely constructive elements prevail: structures of interlocking iron pieces, the calculation of metal expansion and stress, etc.
Comment:
The construction of this architectural work was commissioned to Gustave Eiffel. It is a symbolic monument representing the triumph of art in the modern world. It was built in Paris between 1887 and 1889 for the Universal Exhibition of 1889, which celebrated the centenary of the French Revolution. It belongs to the era of iron architecture and new materials. Its key feature is the importance given to technical solutions for new construction problems (bridges, factories, etc.) based on the use of innovative materials made available to developers by the industrial revolution. The Chicago School, in the late nineteenth century, represents the consecration of new materials and techniques and the beginning of the modern movement in architecture. The use of iron as a key element in building structures began with the construction of bridges and railway stations. However, its great potential for any type of construction was soon discovered. It was engineers, trained in a utilitarian spirit, who introduced these new materials, while traditional architects were still considered creators of beauty, concerned only with form. The great triumph of iron and glass architecture came with the celebration of the Universal Exhibition, large-scale events created to exalt the achievements of industry, commerce, and the arts. The first of these exhibitions was held in London in 1851, for which architect Joseph Paxton designed the Crystal Palace. For the Universal Exhibition of Paris in 1889, two important buildings were created: The Gallery of Machines by Conttancin and Dutert, and the Eiffel Tower.
Casa Milà:
Analysis:
Building Type:
A domestic architecture.
Type of Material:
It is made of stone and brick, incorporating new materials such as iron, glass, and painted ceramics. The stone carving exhibits a granular texture, giving it an almost geological consistency. The combination of stone blocks with vaguely organic forms and iron balconies creates a powerful expressive force, which some authors (Oriol Bohigas) have seen as a precursor to expressionist architecture. Gaudí used sculpted stone with an expressive intention, just as he did with iron. The distribution of floor space is entirely free and imaginative, organized irregularly around two courtyards that become authentic Gaudí interior facades. The courtyards are large and were originally decorated with frescoes. Gaudí broke with the traditional concept of symmetry in the organization of the floor plan. This whimsical play in the floor plan’s organization is made possible by the use of a bold and advanced construction technique for its time: the replacement of load-bearing walls with iron structures, allowing the concentration of all the weight on specific points and enabling the use of curved lines in the floor plan’s design. This gives a sense of movement that is transmitted to all floors and the entire building. The floor plan is defined by curves, creating a dynamic and fluid space. Gaudí’s original design included a ramp from the garage, allowing vehicles to reach the upper floors. However, the large amount of space required for the ramp led him to abandon this idea.
Comment:
A. Gaudí:
He was born in Reus into a family of iron forgers. From childhood, he learned the craft of ironwork. He trained as an architect in Barcelona, where he carried out most of his work. His career can be divided into several stages:
1st Stage – French Eclecticism:
This stage includes the waterfall in Ciutadella Park in Barcelona.
2nd Stage – Moorish or Oriental:
This stage features Islamic or Gothic-inspired structures with naturalistic decoration. There is a use of oriental elements (tiles, blinds, colors) that create mysterious environments. This stage includes Casa Vicens in Barcelona and Palau Güell (Calle Conde del Asalto).
3rd Stage – Gothic Stage:
This stage shows a reverence for medieval architecture, especially Gothic. This phase includes the Episcopal Palace of Astorga, Casa de los Botines in León, and Casa Calvet (Calle Caspe nº 52).
4th Stage – Stage of Maturity:
This stage marks the full implementation of Modernism. This stage includes Park Güell, Casa Batlló, and Casa Milà or La Pedrera.
Date:
Built between 1906-1910.
Location:
Located on Passeig de Gràcia nº 92, occupying part of one of the blocks in l’Eixample district, on the corner of Carrer de Provença.
Style:
Modernism in Catalonia was an art movement that began in Europe around 1890, reached its peak in the late nineteenth century, and concluded more or less by 1905 in Europe. It began in Spain around 1914. It originated in Brussels and spread rapidly through France (Art Nouveau), England (Modern Style), Germany (Jugendstil), Austria (Secession), Italy (Liberty), and Spain (Modernism).
Guernica, Picasso:
Analysis
The painting is rendered in black and white, with varying tones of gray and blue. This choice of color may be due to Picasso learning about the bombing of the Basque town of Guernica (1937) by German planes through newspapers. Another explanation is that the painter from Malaga wanted to convey his sorrow, anguish, and indignation by representing this attack as a tragedy. To create this work of immense dimensions (349 x 776 cm), he turned to Cubism to give it a more agonizing feel. The different figures in the painting have large open mouths, bulging eyes, and deformed bodies.
Composition
Guernica is a painting that consists of eight figures that underwent various changes as they were painted. Although Guernica may seem like a chaotic canvas, Picasso carefully studied the position and shape of the various components. Before starting the final work, he made several studies of what would become the Guernica we know today. The painting consists of a central pyramid crowned by the light bulb, the candle held by a woman emerging from a window, and the head of the dying horse. This pyramid contains the body of the horse, the half-naked woman on the right, and the mutilated body of the knight on the left. On the sides of the pyramid, we find a woman with raised arms and the head of the woman holding the candle on the right. On the left side, we find the bull, standing erect and impassive to the situation, a symbol of Spain, a woman embracing the dead body of her son, and a bird.
Comment:
Picasso used different sketches for the final Guernica. These sketches have their origin in the series Dream and Lie of Franco, where two plates divided into nine comic-strip-like vignettes ridiculed and criticized the Franco regime. Guernica is said to be the thirteenth vignette in this sequence. In the various drafts of Guernica, the use of Cubism, a style also followed and appreciated by the Surrealists, is always evident, in which a figure is represented through different images, a multiple image. During the interwar period, Picasso continued to use Cubism in painting, collage, and sculpture. The Civil War marked a new stage in his life and work. Picasso embraced the cause of the Republic and accepted the directorship of the Prado Museum. Guernica belongs to Picasso’s mature period and is one of the most important works of art of the twentieth century. It was painted as a response to the impact the bombing of this Basque city on April 26, 1937, had on the artist. The city was largely populated by women, children, and the elderly at the time, as the men were at the front. The profound shock that this event caused Picasso resulted in Guernica, exhibited in the Spanish Pavilion at the Paris Universal Exhibition of that year. In Guernica, different symbols can be found: a strong, erect, and impassive bull symbolizes the Spanish people, who were defended by the Franco regime. At the same time, the horse in the center of the painting symbolizes the femininity of Spain, and the bird flying between the bull and the horse represents the desire for peace and freedom. The other characters represent agony, despair, and sadness, as reflected in their deformed bodies, open mouths, and bulging eyes.
Role
Guernica was a cry against Franco’s ideology and politics and was presented the same year as the attack on the Basque city. However, due to the Franco regime, it had to be removed and could not be returned for fifty years.
Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening, Dalí:
Analysis:
Gala, Salvador Dalí’s wife and muse, sleeps peacefully on a rock in a tranquil seascape. Beneath her naked body, two drops of water and a pomegranate float, with a bee buzzing around it. The bee’s hum triggers a dream in Gala that materializes above as an exploding pomegranate, releasing a fish from which two ferocious tigers and a bayonet emerge. It is this bayonet that, a second later, will awaken Gala from her peaceful slumber. Although Dalí lived in the U.S. in 1944 and painted very little, this work revisits his “paranoiac-critical method” which, following Freud’s theories, supported the multiple meanings of images and made him one of the leading figures of the Surrealist group. In this “hand-painted dream photograph” – as Dalí often called his paintings – we see a seascape with distant horizons and calm waters, perhaps Port Lligat, where Gala once again takes center stage. Alongside her naked and sleeping body, levitating on a flat rock that floats on the sea, Dalí places two suspended drops of water and a pomegranate, a Christian symbol of fertility and resurrection. A bee, an insect that traditionally symbolizes the Virgin, flies around it. The bee’s hum triggers a dream in Gala’s mind, in which the pomegranate above explodes, releasing a huge fish from within. This fish, in turn, releases two menacing tigers and a bayonet, which will prick Gala’s arm a second later. Above them, a long-legged elephant with flamenco dancers, which appears in other compositions from this period, carries an obelisk on its back, similar to Bernini’s elephant in Piazza Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome, symbolizing the power of the Pope.
Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, Picasso:
Analysis
The painting is clearly divided into three vertically arranged zones. The central part is the most classical in appearance, but even in these two figures, a partitioning of their bodies is perceived. Despite this, there are references to traditional nude painting, with a particular similarity to Goya’s “majas,” even in their posture, as if they seem to be standing while lying down, with their arms behind their heads. These two figures demonstrate an important principle of what would become Cubist painting: the different points of view that coexist within the same work. Just as the Egyptians used a frontal law in which figures appeared with their faces in profile and their torsos facing forward, Picasso positions these two figures as if seen from above, as this is more recognizable when viewing them from the same horizontal plane. In this central zone, the colors are more classical, less severe (between white and blue), and the tone of the two women is gentler compared to the other three. However, contrary to what might seem initially, as they are in the center, the most important part of the painting is not these figures, but the broken lines that fill the canvas and lead our gaze beyond the frame. When looking at the painting, we are drawn back to the canvas repeatedly, as the work takes us beyond its limits.
Comment:
Pablo Ruiz Picasso, arguably the most influential artist of the twentieth century, was born in Malaga in 1881. The son of an art teacher, he displayed impressive talent as a painter and draftsman from a young age. From Barcelona (where he began painting), he eventually moved to Paris in 1904, where he came into contact with the Post-Impressionists and the Fauves, periods during which he developed his “blue” and “pink” periods. By 1907, following Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, he began his collaboration with Braque, from which Cubism emerged (based on the teachings of Cézanne) between 1908 and 1914. During this time, Picasso was in contact with all the artistic movements of the early twentieth century, occupying an important place among the Surrealists, but returning to classicism in certain periods of his life. Although he resided in France permanently (after the war, he would never return to Spain), he has always been claimed as a Spanish painter, as the themes he used and his statements always placed him within the tradition of great Spanish painters like Velázquez (with his series on Las Meninas) and Goya. It was during these years that he created Guernica, one of the icons of twentieth-century culture, a powerful statement against war and the death of innocents. In his later years, Picasso was even more relentless in his production than in his youth, casting his shadow over all the art produced during the twentieth century, even after his death in Mougins in 1973.
The Green Stripe, Matisse:
Analysis:
The work depicts a portrait of Matisse’s wife, a bold and colorful portrait that perfectly defines the moment when the artist identified with the “Fauves,” his favorite compositions, his fierce individuals. The woman, serious and posing for a portrait, her eyes slightly shifted from the front of the painting, offers a look of both calmness and tension. But the most important aspect of the composition is the set of lines and colors that define the portrait: sharply defined lines that delimit the shapes of the face and clothing, and mixed colors, applied with apparent lack of order and common sense. The famous green stripe that gives the painting its title stands out above all, sharply delimited on both sides of the face. And to define the lighter areas from the darker ones, he uses two colors, orange and pink, which do not correspond to a naturalistic depiction of a portrait. The composition of colors in the painting caused a particular outrage at the Salon d’Automne of the Fauves in 1905. The range of bright colors applied not only to the background or the clothes but also to the face made the painting even more provocative.
Comment:
Matisse’s artistic development was slow and interspersed with trips to London and Italy. His production until 1899 focused on Impressionism, but from that date until 1904, a period known as his “dark period,” he was influenced by the Nabis and Cézanne and created still lifes and landscapes of great structural strength and color planes, as seen in Dishes and Fruit (1901) and Bois de Boulogne (1902). In 1904, he painted Luxe, Calme et Volupté, which follows Neo-Impressionism but already foreshadows Fauvism, which would burst forth in the summer of 1905 in Collioure. This work was heavily criticized by Denis, who defined it as a “schematic theory.” In Collioure, he painted pictures that are still close to pointillist methods, such as Woman with a Parasol, to achieve absolute freedom and spontaneity in other works such as View of Collioure. A few months later, at the Salon d’Automne, he presented a work – which was acquired by the Stein brothers – Woman with a Hat, which is significant in the evolution of his color method, leading him to discover that the interaction of spot colors gives coherence to the work. In 1906, he painted Le bonheur de vivre, which can be considered a traditional work in its theme but quite modern and free in its execution. In May 1906, he embarked on a two-week trip to Algeria, where he visited the oasis of Biskra. Interestingly, he did not paint any pictures there, but upon his return to France, he painted the work Blue Nude (Souvenir of Biskra) in Collioure, in which the influence of African sculpture and the use of poorly differentiated colors can be observed. The nude, dominated by line, can be related to some of his sculptures. In Paris, Matisse acquired traditional pottery and other objects that he had seen in Biskra and represented them in his works. He was enthusiastic about Africa and its exoticism and made several trips between 1911 and 1913 and in 1923 to Tangier, which completely changed the light and color in his work, as seen in The Painter’s Studio (1911), Landscape Viewed from a Window (1912-1913), and others.