History of Art | Art and the Human Body

Art and the Human Body

Artists' views of the human body.

The human figure has always been a favorite subject for artists. Since ancient times, painters and sculptors have portrayed the most important people in their societies: kings and queens, heroes, deities, foreigners, saints, artists, the common people, and more.

For artists, representing the human figure means more than simply reproducing a likeness of a person. A portrait or sculpture can also capture and express the artist's special view about the subject. Such art can make us feel sympathy, amusement, identification, pity, or even adoration.

In this lecture, we will study not just the treatment of the human body throughout history, but also the motivations and psychological factors involved in portraying a human subject. You'll also learn why the body of the artist plays such an important role in the contemporary art world.

In the last lecture, we learned about the architecture of ancient Egypt. In this lecture, we will begin by examining the Egyptians' treatment and representation of the human body.

To grasp their approach to representing the human figure, we must first learn about the Egyptians' attitude towards life and death. In a word, we need to talk about:

Mummification

Have you ever wondered why the Egyptians embalmed and mummified corpses? The Egyptians believed that a person's body must be preserved after death, if his soul was to live on in the afterlife. And so they embalmed their dead kings, wrapping them in layers of cloth, and placing the mummy in a series of coffins inside other coffins. (The process was like a Russian matrioska doll, in which the smaller wooden doll goes inside a bigger one, and so on.)

The tomb of the pharoah Tutankhamen (1327 BC) is the site of the most famous mummification in history. Tutankhamen's tomb consisted of three coffins, two outer ones made of wood, and an interior one made of solid gold. The exterior coffin conformed to the shapes of the king's body, showing Tutankhamen in a rigid frontal pose, with his arms crossed across his chest.

This frontal pose is one of two common human poses in Egyptian imagery. In a variation, sometimes the arms are shown extended downwards by the sides, with the hands closed in tight fists.

Tutankhamen's mask. The golden layer of the mask indicates that the king is of a higher social status than his subjects. Tutankhamen wears a stern yet benevolent expression that is fitting for a king.

The second pose used frequently by Egyptian artists was a profile pose in which each part of the body was shown from its most characteristic angle. In this type of pose, the head is generally shown in profile, but with a single eye pointing forward. Similarly, while the torso might be in profile, the shoulders and chest would be seen from the front, so that we can see how the arms are hinged to the body. Arms and legs are shown sideways, and both feet are seen from the inside, to clearly outline the foot from the big toe upwards.

The characteristic profile pose can be seen in this reproduction of Egyptian wall paintings.

This approach to depicting the figure in profile can be seen on the wooden carving Portrait Panel of Hesy-ra, from Saqquara (c. 2660 BC).

Most Egyptian carvings, paintings, and sculptures depict Pharaohs or high-ranking officials and their wives. Most of the human representations are statues recovered from funerary temples or tombs. One of the finest is that of Chefren (c. 2500 BC), from Giza. It is carved out of diorite—a very hard stone—and it shows the King seated at his throne.

Proportion

Viewed with modern eyes, the Egyptians' pictures of the figure in profile seem very flat and contorted. The artists had not yet developed an approach to portraying the human figure in perspective from a single point of view.

However, it should be noted that the Egyptians did follow a very strict canon of proportion for drawing, painting, or sculpting the human body.

The surface on which a figure was portrayed was divided into a grid of squares, each equivalent to the width of the figure's fist. The Egyptians would then use the length of the fist to keep everything in proportion.

On average, the Egyptian artists calculated that the distance from the hairline to the ground was 18 fists. The distance from the base of the nose to the shoulder was found to be one fist, while from the fingers of a clenched fist to the elbow it was four and half fists. The length of a foot (from heel to toe) was estimated to be three and a half fists.

Egyptian carving demonstrating proportion. Take your time to prove the Egyptian canon in this image. With a ruler and pencil, you can count 18 fists in the body length of the biggest figure.

Following a system of exact proportions made possible it for Egyptian artists to maintain continuity in style for over 2,000 years.

Ancient Greece

After the civilization of ancient Egypt waned, Ancient Greece emerged to become the birthplace of western civilization, about 2,500 years ago. The great achievements of the Greeks still influence our lives, not only in the arts, but also science, philosophy, and politics.

Few Greek paintings have survived. Our knowledge of Greek painting comes mainly from painted pottery, though some mosaics and frescoes remain. We can understand how the Greeks depicted the human body by examining different historical periods and pottery techniques.

Historic Styles of Pottery

The first style of pottery to emerge in ancient Greece was the geometric style (1000-700 BC). The ancient Greeks would decorate a vase called an amphora and use it as a grave marker. Around the side of each amphora, artists would inscribe scenes depicting mourning rituals. In the geometric style, the human body was represented by a flat black triangle for the torso, a round head, and slightly-formed sticks for the arms and legs.

Detail from an urn showing the geometrical style.

This style evolved into the orientalizing style (700-600 BC). Under the influence of Egyptian canons, the figure became larger and more curvilinear than those in the geometric style. The profile view of the figure was the same as the contorted Egyptian one. Mythological scenes start to appear at this time.

The archaic style emerged around 600-480 BC. While the style of drawing the human figure remained consistent, the techniques and materials used began to change. The painting technique used during this period is called black figure. The artists painted figures in black silhouettes with a paste made of clay and water. Details were incised with a sharp tool, exposing the orange clay below. After the vase was baked, the painted parts remained black and the surface of the vase turned reddish-orange.

Exekias (c. 550 BC) is the best-known black figure artist. Figures during this period are still depicted sideways, with the Egyptian frontal eye, but their postures are rendered in a more three-dimensional manner.

Achilles and Ajax - Exekias. Movement and a lively quality is obtained by the pose of two figures engaged in some sort of board game.

Midway through the archaic period, the classical style (530-400 BC) emerged. This style involved a red figure technique that was basically the reverse of the black figure technique. Figures were left in red against a black painted background, and details were painted in black. This approach permitted the representation of more natural forms and the orange clay was close to the actual skin color of the Greeks.

Detail of a classical Greek vessel. The figures are less stiff than in the black figure technique, although the scene is still flat and lacking in perspective.

As the Classical period drew to a close, the well-known Hellenistic style (450-1 BC) took the stage and white-ground vases were introduced. In this style, a wash of white clay formed the background. Figures were then added in black, and additional colors were sometimes added after the baking process was complete.

Illusionism was in vogue, so figures were depicted as naturalistically as possible, from any view and in any pose. Zeuxis was a Hellenistic painter who perfected trompe l'oeil (fooling the eye). He was reputed to have painted grapes that were so perfect they fooled a bird who tried to pick them.

Classical Sculpture

Greek sculptors portrayed figures of gods, goddesses, and human beings. Sculptures were produced in every era of Greek civilization, but in this course, we will focus on the classical and Hellenistic periods of sculpture, when the great masterpieces were produced.

Classical artists (450-323 BC) idealized the human form. Sculpted figures in this period are usually young, with no trace of physical defect. They are well proportioned and symmetrical in form, but they lack personality and expression. Most of the figures were inspired by athletes, who enjoyed a high rank in the social strata.

One of the most impressive works of this period is the Discobolus (Discus Thrower, c. 450 BC) by Myron. The original does not exist, only a Roman marble copy exists. Discobolus consists of a freestanding statue of an athlete ready to throw the discus. The twisted body of the athlete in perfect balance conveys the essence of the action.

Discobolus (460 - 450 BC) - Myron. This sculpture reflects the fascination of the Greeks with the human figure and their total understatement in representing balance and perfection in human anatomy and athletic activity.

Another great figure sculptor of this period is Phidias. He directed the sculpture carvings of the Parthenon (448-432 BC), which has some of the finest sculptures and friezes of all time. Each figure portrayed is infused with life and movement, from the mortals to the divinities with their rippling draperies, to the horses that gallop across the frieze.

Praxiteles is another late classical sculptor well known for mastering feminine grace and for the sensuous evocation of the flesh through his art. His most acclaimed statues are Demeter (340-330 BC), Cnidian Aphrodite (350 BC), and Hermes and Infant Dyionisius (340 BC). Lyssipos of Sikyon sculpted mainly youths. He favored thinner bodies and smaller heads. In his Apoxymenos (320 BC) he increased the movement of freestanding sculpture, making the whole appearance of his work lighter and livelier. He is a key artist in the transition from late classical to Hellenistic style.

Hellenistic Sculpture

The Hellenistic period (323-31 BC) started with the death of Alexander the Great and lasted until the Romans took control of Greece. The sculpture in this period leaned toward a more expressive and dramatic style. Figures in the sculpture began to exhibit extremes of emotions: pain and pleasure, anguish and sweetness, withered old age and the flower of youth, victorious athletes and those who have been crushed, and most of all, royal battles.

This dramatic effect can be seen in The Altar from Zeus in Pergamon (164-156 BC). The group of figures in the sculpture represents a battle between the Titans and the Gods. The scene rages with terrible violence, frenzy, and pathos. It is very different from the harmony and refinement of early Greek sculpture.

Another Hellenistic masterpiece is the Nike or Winged Victory of Samothrace (190 BC). It depicts a winged goddess descending from the skies. The drapery of the figure's dress evokes the pressure of the wind as she comes down from the heavens. Her stretched out wings indicate that she hasn't yet settled to earth.

Winged Victory of Samothrace (Discovered 1863). Though the body is not twisted as in the Discobolus sculpture, there is a sense of movement and action provided by the wonderful carving of the figure's robes.

Probably the greatest example of Hellenistic sculpture is the larger than life sized marble Laocoon and His Two Sons (175-150 BC). What remains today is a Roman adaptation. It depicts an incident from the end of the Trojan War in which Laocoon and his sons are devoured by a pair of giant serpents. The sculptors were Athanodorus, Hagesandros, and Polydorus of Rhodes.

The Roman Empire

Roman sculptors and painters (509 BC - 337 AD) borrowed from the Greek artists in their idealization of human form. However, Roman artists went further in creating realistic sculptural portraits that revealed the individual personalities of their subjects.

The most popular subject matter for Roman artists was the important events of the day, and the most important medium was sculpture depicting figures in a narrative relief. Painting was used for decorative purposes; large wall paintings showing garden landscapes, still-life images, mythology, and everyday life scenes adorned the houses of wealthy Romans.

In this section, we will concentrate on the study of sculptural portraits and narrative relief, areas of Roman art that employed the human body as their main subject matter.

Portraiture

One of the most characteristic types of Roman portrait was the human head detached from the body, or bust. Busts were usually carved in marble, often from a wax mask, so that even the finer physiognomic details were preserved.

Bust of a Roman youth from 40 AD.

Why was the bust so popular? Portraits of upper-class Romans were popular throughout the whole Roman empire. This reflects a patriarchal Roman custom that dates from antiquity. At the death of the head of the family, a waxen mold of his face was preserved in a special family altar. In the 1st century BC, Roman families began to demand to have facial portraits duplicated in marble.

The "father image" spirit can be found in the life-size marble Portrait of a Roman (80 BC). The figure shows an elderly man. His facial wrinkles are true to life, and the carver has treated them with a selective emphasis in order to bring out their distinctive personality: stern, rugged, and devoted to duty. It is a father image of frightening authority.

Portraits of women became popular around the 1st century AD, when women began to enjoy increasing emancipation, retain their own legal identity, have independent wealth, and participate in politics and the arts. The Portrait of a Flavian Lady (90 AD) shows a young woman with a fashionably curled coiffure that frames the softly carved face. Her head is gracefully tilted and the glance of her wide eyes is gentle.

While everyday people were often captured in portrait, the most important subject of Roman portraiture was the emperor himself. There were two major ways of depicting the emperor: freestanding sculptures, and the equestrian monument, a type of imperial portrait invented by the Romans.

One of the finest freestanding sculptures of an emperor is Augustus of Prima Porta (1st century AD). It is slightly larger than life-sized (6 foot, 8 inches tall) and it shows Augustus addressing his troops as a general. Though Augustus was 76 years old when he died, the statue represents a self-confident, dominating, and youthful figure. We can perceive the Greek influence of idealizing the human figure in this marble statue.

The most impressive equestrian monument is a bronze statue of Marcus Aurelius (164-166 AD). In this statue, the emperor is unarmed and his right arm is extended in the conventional gesture of an orator. Both domination and conquest are implied by equestrian iconography. The horse and rider are depicted in a highly illusionistic way, with veins, skin folds, and muscles all visible.

Statue of Marcus Aurelius. Only emperors were depicted in this majestic fashion. I imagine Aurelius entering Rome from a successful campaign, greeted by his cheering citizens.

Later in the 4th century, the emperor Constantine (the first Christian emperor) was depicted in a colossal marble statue (313 AD). The monumental head alone is 8 foot, 6 inches tall! Everything is so out of proportion to the scale of ordinary men that we feel crushed by its immensity (probably an intended reaction). This piece is called superhuman not only because of its size, but also because it is an image of absolute imperial majesty. In the end, the colossal marble tells us more about Constantine's view of himself than about his actual physical appearance.

Narrative Relief

The focus on government and the military power is also present in the Romans' use of narrative relief, but the presentation is quite different.

In Roman society, the reliefs on commemorative architecture such as arches, columns, or altars, functioned somewhat like war reports in a newspaper today. In the exceptional Trajan's Column in Rome (114 AD), a detailed chronicle of an emperor's campaigns is carved in a unique manner that is almost movie-like. The documentary narrative of the battles is carved into stone, starting from the bottom of the column and winding around the column all the way to its top, 128 feet high.

Trajan's Column - Apollodorus of Damascus. The spiral composition reminds us of a movie roll. The impressive level of detail shows us how important historic monuments of this kind were to keeping the people of Rome informed.

The column depicts no fewer than 2500 figures in an exquisite low relief, capturing moment-by-moment the fighting and conquering. It is a true cinematographic experience. In contrast to the solemnity and stillness of Roman portraiture, narrative reliefs depict the human body in full action and vitality.

Other important works of commemorative architecture of the period includes the Ara Pacis or Altar of Peace in Rome (13-9 BC) and the Arch of Titus also in Rome (81 AD).

For more on the human figure, let's discuss the following work, which you may already be somewhat familiar with.

African Sculpture

We turn our attention now to Africa, where important human figure artwork emerged around the same time as that of the ancient Greeks and Romans.

Sculpture is the best-known African art form. The primary materials used by African artists are wood, iron, clay, bronze, ivory, and textiles. The human body is the main subject matter, and many African sculptures share the same characteristics: heads that are enlarged, big stomachs, arms held to the side, eyes in the frontal position, weight equally distributed on both feet, and protruding navels. The head is often exaggerated because it is considered the center of character and emotion.

African artists through the ages combined naturalistic and geometric shapes to produce a recognizable human body. They also distorted human features and limbs in order to achieve dramatic effects. African sculptures are religiously empowered—they are rarely displayed in public and are stored in shrines, buried, or placed in containers. African art was intended to not only please the eye, but also to uphold moral values.

The longest surviving African sculptures are figures in terra cotta, dating back to the 5th century BC (contemporary to ancient Greece's classical period). They are Nok sculptures (named for their tribe) from northwest Nigeria. Terra cotta figures have also been found in Ife (Nigeria) and Mali, dating from the 12th to the 15th century AD.

A terra cotta Nok sculpture. The emphasis of the head creates a disproportion in the figure. However, the statue enjoys a grace typical of African sculpture.

Most wooden carvings have been lost throughout the years, because of the perishable attributes of wood and the fatal work of termites. However, some tribes mastered the bronze and metal casting technique. During the 15th century in Benin, powerful bronze and copper heads and life-sized masks were produced. They are surprisingly realistic.

Japanese Erotica

Much later and halfway around the world, a very different style and technique of representing the human figure began to develop. During the Edo period in Japan (1600-1868), Uyiko-e art flourished. Uyiko-e is the art of "the floating world of pleasures." The most commonly used technique was woodblock printing that depicted the daily life of the common man. Among these everyday images, artists inspired by the pleasure and theater quarters of Edo (now Tokyo) produced romantically intimate and sexually explicit images called Shunga (spring pictures) or Makure-e (pillow pictures).

These pleasure-seeking woodblocks were used to inspire and instruct in the art of love. Many forms of human sexuality were portrayed, though Shunga woodblocks do not portray actors or prostitutes. Instead, they show married couples of all ages, shy and inexperienced youngsters, adulterous wives and husbands, liaisons across class boundaries, and same-sex lovers.

As dresses were almost identical for women as for men, the sexual differences in Shunga prints are explicitly stressed in oversized and minutely depicted genitals. Other parts of the body (with the exception of face and legs) were usually concealed under superb folds of fabric. Many Shunga have comical texts and dialogues accompanying the graphics, which makes the genre essentially humorous.

The Adonis Plant (1815) - Katsushika Hokusai. Hokusai emphasizes the genitalia by showing them in extreme detail, while depicting other parts of the body in a less elaborate manner.

Shunga erotic pictures and book illustrations were enjoyed by all ranks of society, and the woodblock printing technique made it possible to mass-produce them at low cost. I think the popularity of pornography, the graphic novel, and manga anime in modern Japan is, to some extent, the result of the popularity of Shunga books.

Many Shunga woodblocks were unsigned by the artists, but among its famous artists we can count Hishikawa Moronobu (died c. 1695), Suzuki Harunobu (1725-1770), and Kitagawa Utamaro (1754-1806). They all produced color and monochrome woodblock prints, but sometimes they would hand-color their pictures.

 

High Renaissance

In the last lecture, we looked at the representation of nature in the High Renaissance (1490-1527). While nature was important in the Renaissance, the period is very much dominated by art representing the human figure. Masters such as Da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael, each forged individual styles while taking the classical Roman treatment of the body and the canons of proportion into account.

Perspective theory was to become the most important new technique of the era. The study of the human figure was so precise that artists could draw a portrait of a person from any angle. For example, Michelangelo's painting at the Sistine Chapel must be appreciated from below—a very difficult angle for a painter. Yet all the human figures seem impressively alive because they have naturalistic proportions and the laws of perspective are perfectly applied.

Leonardo Da Vinci

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452-1519) was one of the most versatile geniuses in history. A master painter, Da Vinci also studied anatomy, astronomy, botany, geology, geometry, and optics. He designed the airplane, the parachute, and the catapult. He dissected human bodies and pioneered the study of embryology. He was an expert in human proportions. One of his most widely recognized drawings is the Vitruvian Man (1492). In this drawing, he demonstrates the statement by a Roman architect Vitruvius that a man should fit perfectly in a circle and a square.

Vitruvian Man (1492) - Leonardo Da Vinci. Leonardo's gesture of fitting a human body into geometric shapes reflects his desire for a scientific explanation for every natural phenomenon.

One of Da Vinci's main contributions to painting was to develop a technique called sfumatto. In Italian, this literally means "vanished in smoke."

Sfumatto can be seen in certain lighting conditions whereby delicate graduations of light and shade form a blurred outline. Da Vinci achieved it in oil painting through the use of glazes, producing a misty, dream-like effect. We can see this technique in Da Vinci's most famous painting, the Mona Lisa (1503-1505). The picture shows a woman staring directly at the observer, with a mysterious expression: half smiling, half daydreaming. Leonardo created parallels between the human figure and the landscape, inviting comparisons of flesh to soil, bone to rocks, and blood to waterways.

Virgin of the Rocks (1506-1508) - Leonardo Da Vinci. You can see the sfumatto technique in the face and body contours of the characters. This technique gave a soft quality to the skin texture.

Leonardo Da Vinci's masterpieces include Virgin of the Rocks (1483), The Last Supper (1495-1498), Madonna and Child with St. Anne (1503-1506), and Woman with an Ermine (1483-1490).

Michelangelo Buonarroti

Like Da Vinci, Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564) was an anatomy expert. He was a painter, a sculptor, an architect, and a poet. His first monumental sculpture is the marble Pietà (1498-1500), which depicts a young Mary mourning the dead Christ. This sculpture has a unique rhythm guided by Christ's position and Mary's drapery work. Michelangelo had the capacity to lead the eye of the observer throughout the whole marble statue, so that viewers do not miss a single detail.

Pietà (1498- 1499) - Michelangelo. Michelangelo guides our eye through the statue, starting at the virgin's face, jumping to Christ's agonizing facial gesture, following his weakened body all the way to his feet, and ending on the folds of the virgin's elaborate clothing.

In 1501, Michelangelo was commissioned by the city of Florence to carve a marble of David. The result is the masterpiece David (1501-1504), an impressive carving of heroic scale, depicting a young David in an alert pose, ready for battle. His hands are large in proportion to the rest of his body, and his neck and torso muscles and veins are strained, giving him an appearance of power and grandeur.

The statue of David consolidated Michelangelo's fame, and he was summoned by the Pope to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican. This was to be his most impressive work. It took Michelangelo four years to finish the frescoes (1508-1512). It is said that during this time Michelangelo shut himself up in the chapel and worked lying and standing on scaffolding he designed. He even used live male models to plan the female characters. This gigantic work (45' x 138') represents images from the Old Testament, including the famous creation of Adam. It is said that Leonardo and Michelangelo competed with each other to be considered the leading artist in Florence.

Raphael

Born Raffaello Sanzio (1483-1520), Raphael was a painter and an architect. He is well known for painting altarpieces, frescoes of historical and mythological scenes, and portraits. His most popular works are his gentle paintings of Virgin and Child, such as Madonna of the Meadow (1505) and Madonna of the Goldfinch (1506). As an architect, he directed the construction of the St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. His portrait of Pope Julius II (1511-1512) captures the pope's personality, making it a psychological portrait, rather than an icon of power.

Portrait of Julius II - Raphael. Raphael depicts the Pope in a meditative attitude with a deep sadness in his eyes. The passing of time is implied not only by his white beard, but also by the slight inclination of his head.

Raphael mastered Leonardo's sfumatto technique, and he knew how to achieve a sense of depth without upsetting the balance of a design. This can be seen in School of Athens (1509-1511), a fresco painted for the Pope's apartments at the Vatican. In it, he depicted not only Classical Greek philosophers, but also portrayed artistic personalities of the time such as Michelangelo and Leonardo. He even included a self-portrait in the composition. In his final works, such as The Nymph Galatea (1512-1514), Raphael shifted towards a style of greater emotion and movement that would influence the next generation of Italian artists.

The Northern European Renaissance

During the 15th and 16th centuries, artists in countries like Germany, the Netherlands, and Flanders (part of modern day Belgium), shared the Italian preference for representation of three-dimensional space and lifelike figures. However, they were less affected by the classical revival. Artists in northern Europe continued to work primarily in a Gothic tradition of figure painting, which they integrated with elements of Renaissance style.

Meanwhile in Italy, panel paintings were mainly executed in tempera until the 16th century, Dutch and Flemish painters preferred oil paint because it satisfied their interest in meticulous, naturalistic detail. This approach characterizes much of the 15th and 16th century northern European painting.

Albrecht Dürer

Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528) was the most famous painter and printmaker in the history of German art. A scholar and an author, he published books on geometry and perspective and the measurements of the human body. Between the ages of 13 and 40, Dürer painted and drew a remarkable series of revealing self-portraits. The most famous one is Self-Portrait (1500), where he appears solemnly staring straight into the viewer's eye. The portrait has a Christ-like idealization of the features that asserts his sense of authority.

In his engraving Adam and Eve (1504), Dürer uses a biblical subject as an excuse for displaying two ideal nudes. Skin, muscles, and hair are wonderfully represented, though the genitalia are strategically covered by twigs from nearby trees.

In 1514, Dürer made a portrait of his mother. The drawing, a black chalk on paper, is a truthful study of a worn old woman. The detail of the wrinkles and saggy skin may shock us at first, but the drawing has a tremendous sincerity. The beauty of the drawing does not lie in the beauty of its subject, but in the true rendering of human aging.

In his engravings and watercolors, Dürer also studied nature: animals and landscapes. He devoted much labor to his works. Though we are studying the human body in this lecture, I want to point out Dürer's watercolor A Young Hare (1502). Every tiny hair and whisker is carefully recorded. It is an excellent example of his loving patience towards all of his subjects.

A Young Hare (1502) - Albrecht Dürer. Dürer imparts tri-dimensionality to this simple image by slightly shading the floor beside the hare. Note the attention put into every brush stroke.

Jan Van Eyck

Jan van Eyck (1380?-1441) also achieved stunning realistic effects through his mastery of the oil painting technique. Some scholars even say he invented this technique. He was certainly one of the first artists to adopt oil as his primary medium.

Amongst his masterpieces we can count the Ghent Altarpiece (completed in 1432) and The Crucifixion; The Last Judgment (1430-1425). It is believed he collaborated with Hubert van Eyck, probably his brother, in the realization of these art pieces.

Many of van Eyck's paintings include a disguised symbolism. The realistic objects in the pictures often have a deeper meaning. In his oil The Arnolfini Portrait (1434), a young merchant and his bride are exchanging wedding vows. The ceremony is taking place in the couple's room; a single candle burns in the chandelier as a symbol of unity. Their shoes are off to remind them of the holy ground as they exchange vows. The little dog represents fidelity in marriage. In a small mirror on the back wall, two persons are reflected: the witnesses, one of them the artist himself. Over the mirror the phrase "Johannes de eyck fuit hic" (Jan van Eyck was here) can confirm this.

The Arnolfini Portrait (1434) - Jan van Eyck. Van Eyck had the capacity to create many different textures in his oil painting. The skin quality is totally different from the velvet of the dresses and the hairy fur of the dog.

My favorite painting of all time is a van Eyck painting called Man in a Red Turban (1433) and scholars say it may be a self-portrait. I am convinced this small (10' x 7') but powerful painting is van Eyck's self-portrait. He has a stern but piercing gaze, and his lips are tightly sealed as if something is worrying him. The red turban on his head is masterfully executed. But what really fascinates me about this picture is the golden frame painted around it, creating an illusion of a real wooden frame, with the words engraved (really painted) on it. It reads "Als Ich Kan" which can be loosely translated as "As good as I can."

When I lived in London, every time I had an artistic block or serious doubts about my practice, I would go to the National Gallery to look at this painting. You can see it here. I would look at Mr. van Eyck's worried expression, and I would remind myself that even the masters suffer from insecurities or doubts regarding the work. I also told myself that as long as "I did it as best as I could" everything would be okay.

Rogier Van Der Weyden

Rogier van der Weyden (1399/1400-1463), known as Rogier, was strongly influenced by van Eyck, although his human figures are longer and larger in relation to their spatial setting. The painter's Descent from the Cross (1435) is a set of wooden panels depicting a biblical scene. The crowd around Jesus and the fainting Mary fills up the space, leaving no room for any kind of background.

In Saint Luke Depicting the Virgin (1435), Rogier captures the psychological aspect of the mother-child relationship. Mary looks down at Christ while she breast feeds him, while he gazes up at her. His physical pleasure in breastfeeding is revealed by his upturned toes and extended fingers.

Hans Holbein

Slightly after Rogier's time came Hans Holbein, also known as Hans Holbein the younger (1497?-1543). Holbein ranks amongst the world's greatest portrait painters. He portrayed many personalities of his time, notably the Dutch scholar Desiderius Erasmus (1523).

Portrait of Desiderius Erasmus (1532) - Hans Holbein. Erasmus is portrayed by Holbein as a noble character, with his scholarship represented by his books. Note the careful work on the details in the face details and hands.

In 1532, he became court painter to King Henry VIII of England, and in 1540 he illustrated Henry VIII, reinforcing the King's strong personality through his picture. Fusing style with content, Holbein captures Henry's wealth, power, self-confidence, determination, and political acumen in this picture.

Hiëronymous Bosch and Pieter Brueghel

Bosch (1450-1516) is one of the most puzzling artists, taking a far turn from the artists we just discussed. He has been called the "creator of devils" due to the outlandish alien creatures that populate his work. Bosch is the first artist who disarticulated and disfigured the human body. Though most of his subject matter is religious, he combines it with alchemist symbols, popular literature, Dutch proverbs and puns, astrology, and witchcraft.

Bosch's favored format was the triptych (a three-paneled painting), which he populated with malformed people, fantastic demons, distorted animals, large and oddly-shaped pieces of food and, sometimes, unidentifiable objects. Bosch's largest and most complex work is the triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights (1504). The left panel depicts the Garden of Eden, God presenting it to Adam and Eve. The central panel shows the world before the Flood. In this panel, humans are committing all kinds of folly and stupid acts, also engaging in sexual pursuits. Decadence is imminent. The right panel is hell. Humans are tortured in all possible ways by a legion of animal-like demons. An arrow pierces two ears with no head. Chaos reigns.

Hell (part of The Garden of Earthly Delights) (1504) - Hiëronymous Bosch. The complexity of the composition makes Bosch a great story teller. He guides our eye from the frontal and lower plane upwards to the upper, darkest part of the picture.

Pieter Brueghel (1525-1569), or Brueghel the Elder, was a follower of Bosch. In his paintings instead of idealized humans, you can see normal people: drunks, farmers, blind-men and gossiping women. His works include Hunters in the Snow (1565), The Peasants' Wedding (1565), and Blind Leading the Blind (1569).

The Harvesters (c. 1560) - Pieter Brueghel. Normal people abound in this Brueghel painting; so normal, they are depicted eating and sleeping as well as working.

Mannerism

If classical Renaissance symmetry created a natural, stable feeling for the viewer, Mannerist art (1520-1600) did quite the opposite. The main subject in Mannerism is the human body, which is often elongated, exaggerated, elegant, and arranged in complex and twisted poses. A sense of instability in figures and objects is created. Spaces tend to be crowded and compressed, classical proportions are rejected, and odd juxtapositions of size, space, and color often occur.

Famous Italian mannerist painters include Jacopo da Pontorno (1494-1557), who started experimenting with contorted poses and contrasting colors; Parmigiano (1503-1540), who stated that there is no single correct reality and that distortion is as natural as the appearance of things; Angolo Bronzino (1503-1572), whose paintings were very sexually charged; Jacopo Tintoretto (1518-1594), who had both anti-classical but elegant effects in his work; and Sofonisba Anguissola (1532-1625), the first renowned female artist since the heyday of Ancient Greece.

Self-Portrait (1554) - Sofonisba Anguissola. Sofonisba depicts herself in a girlish manner, by enhancing the size of her head relative to her body, and enlarging her blue eyes, which stare at us with a kind of innocent glare.

Mannerism also was found in sculpture. Benvenuto Cellini (1500-1571) created elaborate and richly-ornamented utilitarian objects, such as the golden Saltcellar of Francis I (1543), as well as oversized bronzes, such as the statue of Perseus (1545-1555). Gianbologna (1529-1608) is known for his painting Mercury, a small bronze depicting the god stretched upwards as if he is flying.

The most famous Mannerist artist is El Greco (1541-1614). He was born in Crete but did most of his work in Spain. His paintings are done with a mystical fervor and exalted emotion. His singular style consists of over-elongated figures, acid colors, and swirls of unreal atmospheric events. His best works include The Burial of Count Orgaz (1586), The Resurrection of Christ (1597-1610), and Laocoon (1610-1614).

Baptism of Christ (1590s) - El Greco. Greco's figures are distorted and seem to be floating in space. The swirly characteristics of their bodies gives us a sense of their loss of gravity in the water.

Baroque

Slightly overlapping and following the Mannerist period is the Baroque period. The Baroque era started around 1600 in Italy, spread through Europe, and lasted until around 1750 in areas of Germany and Austria.

Baroque artists rejected the virtuosity and the stylization of the figure of the Mannerists, but absorbed their use of chiaroscuro technique and their theatrical effects. Baroque art achieved a new kind of naturalism, based in the direct study of nature.

Dramatic action, violent narrative, contrasting color and light, rich textures, and asymmetry were widely used in Baroque artists' compositions.

Baroque art was also strongly influenced by the historical context: the perceived decadence of the Holy Roman Empire, the colonization of the "uncivilized" world, rationalism, and the discovery that the sun is the center of the solar system. Let's meet some of the Baroque artists.

Italian Baroque Artists

Gianlorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) was the most famous Baroque sculptor. His life-size white-marble David (1623) represents a David in full action. The fighter is leaning to his right and stretching his sling, while looking over his shoulder at Goliath. The body forms a dynamic diagonal, which extends from head to foot.

The diagonal plane is a recurrent style in Baroque sculpture and painting. In contrast to Michelangelo's David, this statue almost seems to move; the figure's facial expression indicates he is in the middle of a battle. Looking over his shoulder, he seems aware of the presence of Goliath, expanding the sculptural space psychologically as well as formally. This is a Baroque technique for involving the spectator in the work.

Apollo and Daphne (1622-1625) - Gianlorenzo Bernini. The arms of the characters make a clear diagonal that gives movement to the composition, at the very moment when Daphne is turning into a bay tree.

Among Baroque painters, Caravaggio (1573-1610) was leader. He had an innovative style of working directly on the canvas without making preliminary drawings. Caravaggio's painting appealed to the ordinary observer and was not aimed at the elite. He studied nature and was able to render realistic images of the body. Far from painting classical, idealized bodies, however, he would paint everyday, imperfect humans in a "perfect" illusionistic way. His violent contrast of light and shade is called tenebrism. His subject matter ranges from biblical scenes to themes of a homoerotic nature. His masterpieces include Boy with a Basket of Fruit (1594), The Calling of Saint Mathew (1599-1600), and Doubting Thomas (1602-1603).

The Calling of Saint Matthew (1599-1600) - Caravaggio. Tenebrism is achieved by dramatically shading the scene to enhance the effect of the light entering through the window. The ray of light from the window points directly to the main character: a crouched St. Matthew.

Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1653) was one of the first female artists to emerge as a significant personality in Europe. She was one of Caravaggio's followers, called the Caravaggisti. She is known for her pictures of heroic women and violent scenes—they contain an inner drama that is unique to her. Her most famous painting is Judith Slaying Holofernes (1614-1620).

Baroque Outside of Italy

Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) was a Flemish artist known for his sensual depiction of the human body and bright color palettes. Consistent with the beauty standards of his time, Ruben's characters are full and fleshy. The men in his paintings are generally overweight or have exaggerated musculature. Women are round and generous in flesh; by today's standards, we might say they are slightly overweight. Children are chubby with red cheeks.

Self-Portrait with Isabella Brant in the Honeysuckle Bower (1610) - Peter Paul Rubens. Ruben's fascination for detail can be seen in his depiction of the muscles of his crossed legs, and in the different textures of the fabrics.

In Ruben's painting Venus and Adonis (1635), Venus is depicted nude, in an active and sensual pose. She is stretched forming a diagonal, trying to convince her lover to stay. Rubens emphasized her generous breasts and rippling, dimpled flesh. She has a round belly and ample hips. She even has a double chin! For Rubens, such full figures reflected the Flemish equation of fleshiness with prosperity.

Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669) was born in Holland. Rembrandt is one of my favorite artists, partly because he produced an amazing number of self-portraits (around 100 are known). I like to look at them and imagine what was passing through his head at the moment. No other artist has left such an account of the transformation of age, physical and emotional. He was a prolific etcher, drawer, and painter. Rembrandt was a genius at manipulating light and dark, which he used to create the characters of his figures. For me, he is the father of psychological portrayal—he would really analyze the personality of his subject and bring it out in the portrait...starting with himself!

Self Portrait (c. 1660) - Rembrandt. The Dutch master painted more than 100 self portraits.

Rembrandt was an expert in facial expressions and gestures. His subject matter included biblical scenes, mythology, portraiture, landscapes, animal studies, history, nudes, and everyday life scenes. His works include The Blinding of Samson (1636), Anatomy Lesson of Professor Tulp (1632), and the famous Night Watch (1642) that was brutally slashed with a knife by a mad person in the 1990s.

Night Watch (1642) - Rembrandt. Though this picture is dark, Rembrandt illuminates every face in the picture. Note that the bright character on the left hand side is the only female in the group.

Diego Velazquez (1599-1660) was the greatest Spanish painter of the Baroque period. Velazquez was the court painter of Philip IV. At court, Velazquez painted the royal family, as well as dwarves, jokers, and servants who served at the palace. He portrayed both the beautiful and the ugly.

The painter's monumental masterpiece Las Meninas (1656) shows his use of realism and his ability to control the viewer's gaze through the composition. On the left side, we see the painter himself working on a canvas, from which we only see the backside of the canvas. In the center, Princess Margarita has entered the room with her maids and entertainers. She seems to arrogantly despise a little drink that is being offered to her. A dog lies peacefully on the right side, while a little person kicks him. In the back of the room, an open door lets us see a waiting nobleman, or perhaps another servant. Beside this door, a mirror reflects the King and Queen, who are probably the subject of Velazquez's canvas.

Las Meninas (1656) - Velazquez. Note how every single character in the picture is engaged in some sort of activity, giving the painting a unique dynamic quality and a sense of vitality.

Velazquez created an illusion of space both within and beyond the painting. By including the reflection of the King and Queen, who would be standing where the viewers stand, he includes the space in front of the canvas as part of the composition. He also makes a tribute to the very art of painting, by including himself in action. Another one of his great works is the Surrender of Breda and Venus with a Mirror (1648).

19th and 20th Century Sculpture

We'll now turn our attention back to sculpture, exploring some of the ways in which modern sculptors have represented the human body.

We start with the famous Auguste Rodin (1840-1917), a French sculptor who revolutionized the working methods of sculptors. He was primarily a modeler, preferring to work with clay or wax rather than carving in stone. Rodin would leave surfaces unpolished and rough, showing traces of the instruments used to model. He was interested in the experimental process of sculpting, rather than the finished work.

Rodin would use unprofessional models in unprofessional poses. His figures had a great emotional intensity and explored a wide range of human passions. Their inner feelings were expressed by gestures that emphasized different parts of the body. Many of his figures are incomplete or fragmented: a torso, a head, or just hands.

My favorite Rodin piece, and one of the best known, is The Thinker (1879-1902). It depicts a seated man, hand holding his chin, carried away by deep thoughts. It is a large muscular body that gives a sense of contained energy.

The Thinker (1876-1902) - Rodin. Notice how Rodin is able to imply the pose of the feet without having to detail every last nerve and muscle. Also note how different this texture is from the stone the subject is seated on.

While Rodin was inspired much by the sculptor's process and by specific feelings and gestures, Henri Matisse (1869-1954) was inspired by ethnographic sculpture. In his Reclining Nude I Aurora (1907), we can perceive a well-defined nude, despite the bulging distortions of the anatomy. He manipulates the human figure to obtain an intricate rhythm and a muscular tension.

Taking a different approach to figure representation was Humberto Boccioni (1882-1916), part of the Futurist movement. In his running figure entitled Unique Forms of Continuity in Space (1913), he attempts to represent not the human form itself, but the imprint of its motion in the surrounding space. The result is a quasi-robot human, with flares protruding from the limbs that give the sense of movement.

Henry Moore (1898-1986) was an English artist with an abstract approach. His sculptures are based on the human form, though they are abstract expressions of the body. He did not try to make a body in stone, but a stone which suggests a body. His figures are composed of flowing convex and concave curves that create rich contrasts of light and dark. His surfaces are polished smooth. I think of cliff or rock formations when I look at his work. A good example of how he treated the human figure is his stone Family Group (1955).

Three Piece Reclining Figure Draped (1976) - Henry Moore. In Moore's abstract work, the polished surface of the sculpture resembles the skin and though a complete human body is not depicted, we can recognize a neck, an arm, and a leg. It can be found on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Alberto Giacometti (1901-1966) concentrated on human figures after 1945 (the end of the World War II). These modeled and later cast figures are small, thin, and elongated, as if they could disappear in any moment. They have rough surfaces and blank, expressionless faces. Whether single figures or in groups, the sculptures are arranged to suggest a sense of loneliness, isolation, and existential anxiety.

20th Century Expressions

To wrap up our look at the human form in art history, we'll briefly explore some Expressionist pieces that do not necessarily represent specific figures at all. Rather than present a realistic or abstract figure, the 20th century abstract Expressionists put their own human experience into their work, mirroring human emotions and efforts, though not necessarily human forms.

Action Painting

An important variant of Abstract Expressionism was action painting. Action painters developed characteristic methods of applying the paint. They dripped, splattered, sprayed, rolled, and threw paint onto their canvases. The final image was a reflection of the artist's body activity in the creative process.

Jackson Pollock (1912-1956) is the best-known action painter. From 1947 onward, he used a dripping technique to produce his paintings. He engaged his whole body in the act of painting. He would stretch the canvas on the floor, instead of vertically, and he would control the drips with the motion of his arm and body. He would often leave chance to take its course, but there is an underlying chromatic organization in his canvases. His habit of cropping finished canvases adds to their dynamic quality, for the lines appear to move in and out the picture plane.

Autumn Rhythm (Number 30) (1950) - Jackson Pollock. The energy in Pollock's paintings is elemental; it can be compared to the forces of nature.

Other notable action painters are Franz Kline (1910-1962), Lee Krasner, and Wilem de Kooning.

Performance Art

Also called live art, or in some occasions "happenings," performance art originated in the early 20th century with the Dadaist performances in the Cabaret Voltaire (which we will study in a later lecture). However it was not until the 1960s that it exploded as an art trend with the activity of the Fluxus group.

Fluxus was a group of intellectuals organized by George Maciunas. It included musicians like John Cage, artists like Yoko Ono, and video artists like Nam June Paik. Fluxus organized events that incorporated literature, music, theater, dance, video, and other materials. In a reaction to minimalism, artists sought to assert their presence once again, by becoming, in effect, living works of art.

Farbtest, Die Rote Fahne ll (video installation) - Felix Gmelin. In this contemporary performance piece, Gmelin re-enacts an action made by his father 30 years ago, by running with a red flag through the streets of a city.

In performance art, a "performance" could consist of one person or a group. It could take place anywhere and last any length of time. Performance art used (and still uses) the performer's body as the primary art medium. It may be autobiographical or make a political statement. It often merges art with every day life.

The German artist Joseph Beuys (1921-1986) was an important pioneer in performance art. For Beuys, life was a creative process in which everyone can be an artist. In his piece Coyote, he spent one week caged up with a coyote in a New York gallery. The coyote represented America, a country he was visiting for the first time, and with whom he intended to start a relationship. Eventually the coyote and the artist co-habitated in the space and got used to each other.

During the 1960s and 1970s, the English artists Gilbert and George combined elements of traditional sculpture with performance art. They would dress like traditional English men and stand over low platforms, sometimes singing, but mostly assuming static poses. By calling themselves living sculptures, Gilbert and George explored the ambiguous areas between living and non-living, illusion and reality, and art and life.

Discussion Share your thoughts on art history with your fellow students. Exercise Analyze artworks that represent men and women in different periods.