Modern Renaissance

 

Renaissance Write Up

Jacopo Tintoretto (real name Jacopo Comin) was an Italian painter known for his famous Renaissance pictures. For his phenomenal energy in painting he was termed II Furioso. His work is characterized by its muscular figures, dramatic gestures, and bold use of perspective in the Mannerist style. Tintoretto was born in Venice in 1518 as the eldest of 21 children! His father was a dyer, or tintore; hence the nickname of Tintoretto, little dyer. Only a child, Jacopo would draw on his fathers walls. One day his father took him to the studio of Titian where he practised drawing. Titian told Jacopo that he would never be able to be a painter, so Jacopo stopped going. However, he continued to paint on walls and was eventually painting on the walls and ceilings for churches, becoming better known. Tintoretto also did portrait paintings, quickly getting a reputation for his darker lit, formal portraits. Tintoretto has many famous, well known paintings to date, including his version of The Last Supper, which was painted with oil paint on canvas as were the majority of his paintings. Oil was newly discovered and made it so that it was not a big deal if mistakes were made, it also gave a different texture and effect, Tintoretto strived with this. He died in 1594, living a very long life (during that time) of 75 years.

The painting I chose is one of Tintoretto's earlier work, it has a simple title of "Portrait of a man". Like many of Tintoretto's portraits, this is dark with a serious looking man as the focus. It looks as though this was painted with oil paint, again like many of Tintoretto's portraits.

The main characteristics of the renaissance were painting and sculpting and the elements of paintings were colour, shape, space, texture, tone and value. On a side note, some of the key inventions during the renaissance time include the golf ball (a very popular game during the time), muzzle loaded rifles, the first known copyright granted, dry-point engravings, the first parachute, created by Leonardo DaVinci as well as the theory of flying machines, bell chimes, and the first map globe. Many key things that we still use today were thought up and invented during the renaissance time and it obviously changed painting forever.