Media

Leonardo's Types of Media, Significance/Innovations, and Use of Compositional Imagery

By Mikey Harrington

Paintings (oil)

- Baptism of Christ, 1472

- Annunciation, 1475

- Last Supper, 1498

- Mona Lisa, 1505-7

- Virgin and Child with St. Anne, 1510

- St. John the Baptist, 1513

Drawings (ink, silverpoint)

- Study of Arms and Hands, 1474

- Grotesque Profile, 1487-90

- Proportions of the Head, 1488-9

- View of a Skull, 1489

- Study of Womb, 1489

- Study for the Head of Leda, 1505

- Studies of the Arm Showing Movements made by the Biceps

Study for the Head of Leda, ink

Study of Arms and Hands, silverpoint

Leonardo uses a multitude of technical approaches in his works. Examples include:

  - Chiaroscuro:         

         Preparing a painting by drawing a sketch, followed by filling in darks and lights in a brown to remind the artist where the contrasts will appear. (The painting is then completed by the adding of color)

  An example can be seen in an unfinished “Adoration of the Magi” painting by Leonardo.

  

- Contrapposto:

         Italian for describing a human figure with more weight on one foot. In terms of its use in Leonardo’s work, Leonardo seemed to illustrate all of his characters with one shoulder higher than another to give a sense of animation or movement. 

Contrapposto  pose used for the "Study for the Kneeling Leda" sketch, notice the weight shift on the foot and Leonardo's angled shoulders, a common approach to the figure in his artworks.

Sfumato : 

 

     Italian, translation to English: “To evaporate like Smoke”. In a painting, “sfumato” can be understood as the ever so slightly blurring of shapes in a painting to create soft, subtle changes that lead into a more “realism” type of form.

  Leonardo termed the sfumato technique in one of his journals as “without lines or borders”.

Detail of the Mona Lisa and the sfumato in the face.

 

Leonardo’s technique is significant/innovative because he:

     a.) creates subtleness that has not been achieved by any previous artist- this is evident through his often “half-smile” women portraits, animated light sources seeming to “glide” along objects and people. In other words, no artist could exhibit the same amount of grace that Leonardo executed in his works. 

     b.) references classical art with the “contrapposto” pose, references Greek artists doing the “chiaroscuro” in the 5th century, referred to as “shadow-painting” then.

     c.) Leonardo exhibits a philosophical as well as humanistic nature in his works; He arguably creates the shift of emphasis from status of woman in portraits to the individual and focuses more on the psychological complexity of woman, showing them unique with the same amount of importance as men.

  Leonardo’s work is usually made with composition in mind. He uses the organization of his imagery in multiple ways, and uses the media (typically, his oil paintings reflected his best executed works) to it’s full potential. Some examples include: 

 a.) Madonna on the Rocks (“Virgin on the Rocks”)

       - Leonardo uses a variety of techniques that add to the stronger points of the composition, such as chiaroscuro (of the figures and light sources), foreshortening in the figures, and the position of the imagery.

       - Compositionally: The imagery is definitely "effective". The figures are organized in the shape of a triangle, while each character gestures towards one another, ultimately leading the eye to circle around in the center of the piece then exit. Leonardo's use of gesture and how he approaches it make up a very complexity and depth to his work that most others had not yet thought of.

 

       - Like most of his other works, the light is very controlled and seems to glide along the objects. The characters are also in an animated form, each giving off the illusion of being in motion. The anatomical side of Leonardo really pushes the realism of his art through his understanding of how the body functioned inside and out.

    b.) Vitruvian Man (“Study of Proportions”)

      - The Vitruvian Man is an ink drawing in one of Leonardo's journals. Although it may not be full of color and complexity physically, it still is able to stimulate the mind to ask itself many questions.

      - Leonardo captures the human figure of perfect proportions inside two shapes (circle and square) that are also to have perfect proportions. It is possible to make an argument that Leonardo is pressing the human subject to be of a perfect creation.

      - How could an artist come up with this notion? Well, Leonardo not only was an artist but he was also a scientist, anatomist, engineer, etc.) so it seemed only natural that he would come to this conclusion when thinking about the human figure.

      - The depth of this piece, psychologically, is very vast. Leonardo is using humanist ideas and approaches to this work of art which reflects the type of society he lived in. The society was obviously full of people who genuinely cared about others and what others had to say, feel, and think. Leonardo was a thinker- which is revealed in all of his art, which may have been influenced by where he was living while creating all of these masterpieces.

 c.) St. John the Baptist

    

       - Leonardo's dark colors and background add to the mysteriousness of the piece, which can share a haunting experience with the viewer.

 

       - Note John the Baptist's pointing upwards; this gesture has been used back when Byzantine art was around, but Leonardo completely changed what the gesture could mean, in terms of the psychological, adding yet another depth of mystery to the piece.