Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Painting: From Tempera to Tubes
The technology of painting has evolved over the centuries.
1400s
Artists used tempera (pigments dissolved in egg yolk) on wood.
1500s
Still painting on wood, artists mainly used oil (pigments dissolved in vegetable oil, such
as linseed, walnut, or poppy).
1600s
Artists applied oil paints to canvases stretched across wooden frames.
1850
Paints in convenient, collapsible tubes are invented, making open-air painting feasible.
The Frames:
Although some frames are original, having been chosen by the
artist, most are selected by museum curators. Some are old frames from other paint-
ings, others are Victorian-era reproductions in wood, and still others are recent re-
productions made of a composite substance to look like gilded wood.
• Backtrack through Rooms 6 and 8, returning to the big Room 9. Exit this room at the
far end and turn right, entering the long Room 29 (with forest-green wallpaper). Midway
through Room 29, turn left and find Room 25.
(See “National Gallery” map,
here
.)
We switch from CinemaScope to a tiny TV—smaller canvases, subdued colors, everyday
scenes, and not even a bare shoulder.
Money shapes art. While Italy had wealthy aristocrats and the powerful Catholic
Church to purchase art, the North's patrons were middle-class, hardworking, Protestant
merchants. They wanted simple, cheap, no-nonsense pictures to decorate their homes and
offices. Greek gods and Virgin Marys were out, hometown folks and hometown places
were in—portraits, landscapes, still lifes, and slice-of-life scenes. Painted with great atten-
tion to detail, this is art meant not to wow or preach at you, but to be enjoyed and lingered
over. Sightsee.
Vermeer—
A Young Woman Standing at a Virginal
(c. 1670)
Inside a simple but wealthy Dutch home, a prim virgin plays an early piano called a “vir-
ginal.” We've surprised her, and she pauses to look up at us.
