Historical Painting Techniques, Materials, and Studio Practice

Figure 2. Roelandt Savery, Landscape with Animals and Figures, signed and dated 1624. Panel, 54.6 X 91.4 cm. National Gallery if Art,
Washington, D. C. (1989.22. 1). Gift of Robert H. and Clarice Smith in honor if the fiftieth anniversary if the National Gallery of Art.
were completed did a workshop assistant fill in minor foliage details. The
assistant's work has a mechanical, repetitive quality, and shows a cautious respect
for the work of the master; the monkey on a low branch at the left is
surrounded by a halo of the base color, where the assistant scrupulously avoided
overlapping the master's work with his blades of grass.
Landscapes by Flemish immigrants
Landscapes by Flemish immigrants such as Gillis van Coninxloo, who arrived
in Amsterdam from Frankenthal in 1595, and Roelandt Savery, who arrived
with his family in 1591, are clearly in the Flemish tradition, both compositionally
and technically (10). There are, however, variations of emphasis in
the compositions that have consequences for the technique. The compositions
retain the conventions of Flemish landscape. Dark and light passages are
strongly juxtaposed and the three zones in brown, green, and blue organize
the recession into space, but there is a much greater emphasis on the nearer
zones. In Coninxloo's forest landscapes, such as the Landscape with Hunters of
1605 in Speyer, the second and third zones are reduced to glimpses caught
through the dense growth of monumental trees that fills the foreground zone
(11). The result is a newly limited tonal range, one that emphasizes the browns
and deeper greens of the middle and foreground. This self-imposed limitation
is in itself a first step toward naturalism.
The techniques of these immigrant artists are consistent with contemporaries
still working in Flanders. The compositions were planned in underdrawings
that made provision for all but the minor figures. Over a light-colored ground
the artists established a base color for each area with a brushy underpaint;
each area was then worked up with loosely painted, final details in a color
that harmonized with the underpaint showing through from below. To avoid
the danger of monotony in their emphasis on the brown foreground and
green middle zones, the artists introduced a range of subtle variations within
the harmonies of browns and greens.
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Historical Painting Techniques, Materials, and Studio Practice