Baroque Light and Movement: Tenebrism and Dynamism in Biblical Narrative

          The sixteenth century witnessed a number of transformative religious artistic movements in Western Europe, one of which was the Counter-Reformation, or Tridentine, era. Counter-Reformation art flourished in the last half of the 1500s as the Catholic Church, after the Council of Trent in 1545, aimed to standardize art and therefore harness artistic ability to serve the Church and incite devotion among the people. Academies fell to the wayside and artists’ works were repeatedly rejected by the Church because they did not follow certain Tridentine decrees. The artistic independence and status that was gained during the Renaissance by giants such as Donatello and Michelangelo was now in tension with the Church acting as the arbiter of representation and iconography.
            However, the end of the century introduced an aesthetic movement within this context of Catholic reformation. This movement aimed to intentionally unite the supernatural, divine world with the energy and form of humanity into a dramatic, aesthetically-conscious representation. The Baroque era artists, such as Caravaggio and Artemisia Gentilleschi, produced art with drama, dynamism, tenebrism, and energy that had not embodied the previous visual culture.
            How does the Biblical narrative in art change during the Baroque period, and how do the use of darkness and light, naturalistic representation, and activation of space communicate a drama that had not been seen in previous sacred art? This exhibition explores the development of the Biblical narrative in art, and how the Baroque engagement with emphatic light and space challenges previous representations and also confronts the viewer with a more engaging, religious and emotional experience.

Caravaggio, David and Goliath, c. 1599, Oil Painting, Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain.

One of the founders of the Baroque style was Michelangelo Merisi de Caravaggio, an artist who brought his Lombard style to Rome in the 1590s. Caravaggio’s paintings were less safe than the more easily-accepted styles in Roman churches, and therefore his scenes challenged his viewers. This painting was not intended for a religious setting like a chapel or altar, yet it is still powerful in its unprecedented character. The figures seem like they almost glowing against the inky background. The composition is not symmetrical and the main figure’s orientation is not towards the viewer, communicating that we have suddenly become witnesses to something. Caravaggio’s extreme contrast between light and dark highlights the drama of the scene and the naturalistic figures confront us with a representation that makes real to us a story we have heard all our lives.

 Giotto, The Arrest of Christ (Kiss of Judas), c. 1304, Fresco, Scrovegni (Arena) Chapel, Padua, Italy

The late medieval, or proto-Renaissance artists began to break from Byzantine style and two-dimensional representations of religious scenes became gradually more naturalistic. A Florentine named Giotto is one of these most influential proto-Renaissance artists. He drew upon the classical, Medieval style in his composition but incorporated space and naturalism to communicate his narratives. This fresco is one of his many commissions in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua. The composition is linear and balanced, the figures arranged in a horizontal fashion. Yet the figures are truer to nature in their emotional expressions and slight activation of space, unlike the idealized and stylized figures that occupied the Byzantine era years before.

Melchior Broederlam, The Flight into Egypt (Right Panel), 1399, Tempera on wood, Musée des beaux-arts, Dijon, France

In the early Renaissance, the Netherlands were undergoing similar stylistic and compositional developments that accompanied the departure of medieval artistic standards. Broederlam was a Netherlandish court artist whose altarpieces combined both gothic and medieval components with early Renaissance naturalism, similar to Giotto’s ideas of stylistic synthesis. Gothic symbolism and stylization still exists in this altarpiece panel which depicts a rest during the flight into Egypt. The sky is painted gold and the seemingly out-of-place architecture references previous medieval stylization. The figures do not leap from the scene but they are represented semi-naturalistically, not appearing at all like the iconic figures of the 1200s.

Pisanello, The Conversion of St. Paul, c. 1440, Tempera colors, gold leaf, gold paint, silver leaf, and ink on parchment, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles

Pisanello, who was painting religious narratives about a century after late-medieval frescoist Giotto,  merged his own gothic artistic style with the Italian Veronese style. This piece is one of Pisanello’s more two-dimensional works, as its materials are mixed media instead of paint like most artists were using at the time. However, this is a representation of a Biblical narrative—the conversion of Saint Paul—that is not naturalistic or activating space in any sort of way. This scene has dark contour lines and is mostly two-dimensional in composition, like many Gothic mixed media works. It shows us that during this period of Renaissance naturalism that religious scenes still had a variety of appearances, depending on the workshop, commission, location, and function. The purpose for a work like this is most likely more didactic than to incite religious piety or emotion.

Michelangelo, Sistine Chapel Ceiling: God Dividing Land and Water,  1508-12, fresco, Sistine Chapel, Vatican City, Italy

Renaissance practices of artistic naturalism and linear perspective had deeply affected visual culture to the point of it dominating the standards for church commissions by the early sixteenth century. Michelangelo, one of the giants of the Renaissance style, exhibited a consciously classical attention to the human form and engagement of space in his paintings on the Sistine Chapel Ceiling in 1508. These frescoes displayed well-known Biblical narratives, painted with a vivid color palette and rich tonal shifts. The figures actively engaged the ceiling space, bringing the scenes to life with their extremely naturalistic physiques and dynamism. Michelangelo brought Renaissance art to a high standard in portraying religious scenes naturalistically with classical-like, active figures.

Guercino, Samson Captured by the Philistines,  1619, Oil Painting, 1984.495.2

            A century later than Michelangelo, and also about a decade after Caravaggio’s death, Guercino paints within the Italian Baroque tradition characterized by dramatic representation. His Biblical scenes displayed the intense, engaging qualities of religious seventeenth-century works with his dramatic use of light and activation of space. His oil painting depicts Samson in the process of being captured by the Philistine, Samson’s flailing, naturalistically-styled figure appearing to almost invade the viewer’s plane. The painting’s space is activated by the story’s many chaotic figures. The foreground does not safely separate the viewer from the action, like medieval or early Renaissance works accomplished. Instead, the theatrical nature of the scene invites the viewer to be a part of this drama.

Artemisia Gentileschi, Judith Beheading Holofernes, 1620, Oil Painting, Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy

Another artist in this era is Artemisia Gentileschi, whose Biblical narratives confront the viewer with intense emotional and religious experiences through her use of naturalism and dramatic tenebrism. Her style very closely resembles Caravaggio’s in the extreme contrast between light and dark, although her figures are usually more intensely depicted in their activity. This religious painting shows us a dark scene from deuterocanonical literature—Judith beheading Holofernes—while making the viewer feel like a witness to the action. The drama rests in the figures emerging from the darkness, light emphasizing the postures and expressions of the women in their violent act.  Baroque paintings tell Biblical narratives in ways that confront the viewer with humanity and emotional poignancy that is not found in the medieval styles, due to the intentional use of emphatic light and engaged space.