A visual Journey into the Bible The Book of Genesis

A Visual Journey into the Bible Page: 38
energetically waves his arms. The animals stand out in the brown colours. Bassano
painted in extra patches of light to accentuate the line of the animals and he added
animals in white at regular intervals such as a white dog and a white horse. This was a
painter who mastered light and darkness as well as Tintoretto.
Bassano was a precursor of the dramatic use of the contrast of light and darkness and
in this late painting – it dates from around 1590, while Bassano died in 1592 – we
sense fully the coming of Caravaggio and of Baroque. The scene is filled with epic
and dynamism, emotion and movement. The disorderly animals, and the motions of
the figures grasping the animals and driving them forward is eminently Baroque.
Energy, motion, passion, involvement in the scene, contrasts of black and white are
all the ingredients of the Baroque and these can be found accomplished in the Bassano
picture. Jacopo Bassano combined the style elements of many other masters to the
way of painting that would conquer the seventeenth century.
Where did Baroque art originate It was probably only in the rich grand cities of
Western Europe that had accumulated wealth that such an art form could thrive.
Venice was in a period of slow decline. But because of the mass of funds in the city it
continued to augment its revenues of trade. The same was true of Antwerp. And in
Rome, the Roman Catholic Popes stood at the centre of a steady inflow of money
from the sale of indulgences and of parts of the revenues of the European clergy. All
this wealth was spent in the late sixteenth century and even more in the seventeenth
century, to at least a significant extent on art. No art form represents more the
spending of riches than Baroque art. Its flamboyancy declares a joy of living, a
confidence in wealth, a desire to dwell in extravagant beauty and the will to boast
with the acquired abundance. The middle class of traders and merchants could
compete with the courts of Europe in magnificence and thus affirmed its power. In
Venice, Tintoretto, Veronese and Jacopo Bassano were the foremost proponents of
this movement.
Noah’s Sacrifice
Joseph Anton Koch (1768-1839). Staatliche Museen zu Berlin Preussischer
Kulturbesitz. Nationalgalerie – Berlin. 1814.
Joseph Anton Koch was born in the Tyrol region of Austria, but the German Bishop
of Augsburg remarked him and recommended him to go to an art school. He first
studied in Augsburg, and then could attend the Karlsschule of Stuttgart from 1785 on.
In 1791 he ran away from this rigid and hard school and travelled through the Alps. In
1795 an English Maecenas gave him a scholarship to go to Rome and he became
acquainted there with the painter Jakob Asmus Carstens. He shared a workshop with
Carstens in Rome. He also learnt to know other German painters. He was particularly
fond of a small village outside Rome, called Olevano Romano, and married the
daughter of a winegrower there. He painted mainly the country landscapes of the
Roman surroundings. Throughout his whole life he would thus remain a painter of
Copyright ©: René Dewil Date: October, 24 2000