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77-627: Thomas Henry Illidge (26 September 1799 – 13 May 1851) was an English portrait painter . Illidge was born in Birmingham on 26 September 1799, belonging to a family resident near Nantwich , Cheshire . Illidge's father moved to Manchester , and, dying young, left a young family ill-provided for. Illidge was educated in Manchester, and taught drawing. He was subsequently the pupil in succession of Mather Brown and William Bradley . He initially tried landscape painting, but married early, and, as

154-418: A caricature which attempts to reveal character through exaggeration of physical features. The artist generally attempts a representative portrayal, as Edward Burne-Jones stated, "The only expression allowable in great portraiture is the expression of character and moral quality, not anything temporary, fleeting, or accidental." In most cases, this results in a serious, closed lip stare, with anything beyond

231-400: A client's dissatisfaction with his wife's portrait by retorting, "You brought me a potato, and you expect a peach!" A successful portrait, however, can gain the lifelong gratitude of a client. Count Balthazar was so pleased with the portrait Raphael had created of his wife that he told the artist, "Your image…alone can lighten my cares. That image is my delight; I direct my smiles to it, it

308-455: A client. Managing the sitter's expectations and mood is a serious concern for the portrait artist. As to the faithfulness of the portrait to the sitter's appearance, portraitists are generally consistent in their approach. Clients who sought out Sir Joshua Reynolds knew that they would receive a flattering result, while sitters of Thomas Eakins knew to expect a realistic, unsparing portrait. Some subjects voice strong preferences, others let

385-516: A common Roman practice; these portrait heads are not included in this article. Equally, sculpted heads stopping at the neck are sometimes mistakenly called busts. The portrait bust was a Hellenistic Greek invention (although the Egyptian bust presented below precedes Hellenic productions by five centuries), though very few original Greek examples survive, as opposed to many Roman copies of them. There are four Roman copies as busts of Pericles with

462-440: A face. In his notebooks, Leonardo advises on the qualities of light in portrait painting: A very high degree of grace in the light and shadow is added to the faces of those who sit in the doorways of rooms that are dark, where the eyes of the observer see the shadowed part of the face obscured by the shadows of the room, and see the lighted part of the face with the greater brilliance which the air gives it. Through this increase in

539-399: A format that allows the most distinctive characteristics of an individual to be depicted with much less work, and therefore expense, and occupying far less space than a full-length statue , the bust has been since ancient times a popular style of life-size portrait sculpture. A sculpture that only includes the head, perhaps with the neck, is more strictly called a "head", but this distinction

616-510: A full-face painting. He also placed his self-portrait figure (as an onlooker) in several of his religious paintings. Dürer began making self-portraits at the age of thirteen. Later, Rembrandt would amplify that tradition. In Italy, Masaccio led the way in modernizing the fresco by adopting more realistic perspective. Filippo Lippi paved the way in developing sharper contours and sinuous lines and his pupil Raphael extended realism in Italy to

693-569: A great patron of artists and an avaricious art collector who invited Leonardo da Vinci to live in France during his later years. The Mona Lisa stayed in France after Leonardo died there. During the Baroque and Rococo periods (17th and 18th centuries, respectively), portraits became even more important records of status and position. In a society dominated increasingly by secular leaders in powerful courts, images of opulently attired figures were

770-472: A greater variety of poses, lighting, and technique. Rather than producing revolutionary innovations, Raphael's great accomplishment was strengthening and refining the evolving currents of Renaissance art. He was particularly expert in the group portrait. His masterpiece the School of Athens is one of the foremost group frescoes, containing likenesses of Leonardo, Michelangelo, Bramante, and Raphael himself, in

847-420: A means to affirm the authority of important individuals. Flemish painters Sir Anthony van Dyck and Peter Paul Rubens excelled at this type of portraiture, while Jan Vermeer produced portraits mostly of the middle class, at work and play indoors. Rubens’ portrait of himself and his first wife (1609) in their wedding attire is a virtuoso example of the couple portrait. Rubens' fame extended beyond his art—he

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924-953: A much higher level in the following decades with his monumental wall paintings. During this time, the betrothal portrait became popular, a particular specialty of Lorenzo Lotto . During the early Renaissance, portrait paintings were generally small and sometimes covered with protective lids, hinged or sliding. During the Renaissance, the Florentine and Milanese nobility, in particular, wanted more realistic representations of themselves. The challenge of creating convincing full and three-quarter views stimulated experimentation and innovation. Sandro Botticelli , Piero della Francesca , Domenico Ghirlandaio , Lorenzo di Credi , and Leonardo da Vinci and other artists expanded their technique accordingly, adding portraiture to traditional religious and classical subjects. Leonardo and Pisanello were among

1001-434: A new level of balance, harmony, and insight, and the greatest artists (Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael) were considered "geniuses", rising far above the tradesman status to valued servants of the court and the church. Many innovations in the various forms of portraiture evolved during this fertile period. The tradition of the portrait miniature began, which remained popular until the age of photography, developing out of

1078-423: A normal portrait when sitter and artist are opposite each other. In a self-portrait, a righted handed artist would appear to be holding a brush in the left hand, unless the artist deliberately corrects the image or uses a second reversing mirror while painting. Occasionally, the client or the client's family is unhappy with the resulting portrait and the artist is obliged to re-touch it or do it over or withdraw from

1155-405: A painted portrait is intended to achieve a likeness of the sitter that is recognisable to those who have seen them, and ideally is a very good record of their appearance. In fact this concept has been slow to grow, and it took centuries for artists in different traditions to acquire the distinct skills for painting a good likeness. A well-executed portrait is expected to show the inner essence of

1232-541: A result, took up portrait-painting as a more profitable endeavour. Illidge was successful as a portrait-painter in the great manufacturing towns of Lancashire , painting many of the civic or financial celebrities of the locality. He was a frequent exhibitor at the Liverpool Academy from 1827. In 1842 he came to London , and was from that time was a constant exhibitor at the Royal Academy . In 1844, on

1309-574: A self-portrait by the writer, mystic, scientist, illuminator, and musician Hildegard of Bingen (1152). As with contemporary coins, there was little attempt at a likeness. Stone tomb monuments spread in the Romanesque period. Between 1350 and 1400, secular figures began to reappear in frescos and panel paintings , such as in Master Theodoric 's Charles IV receiving fealty , and portraits once again became clear likenesses. Around

1386-456: A slight smile being rather rare historically. Or as Charles Dickens put it, "there are only two styles of portrait painting: the serious and the smirk." Even given these limitations, a full range of subtle emotions is possible from quiet menace to gentle contentment. However, with the mouth relatively neutral, much of the facial expression needs to be created through the eyes and eyebrows. As author and artist Gordon C. Aymar states, "the eyes are

1463-419: A wide-ranging palette of colors, as with Pierre-Auguste Renoir 's Mme. Charpentier and her children , 1878 or restrict themselves to mostly white or black, as with Gilbert Stuart 's Portrait of George Washington (1796). Sometimes, the overall size of the portrait is an important consideration. Chuck Close 's enormous portraits created for museum display differ greatly from most portraits designed to fit in

1540-460: Is about four. Portraitists sometimes present their sitters with a portfolio of drawings or photos from which a sitter would select a preferred pose, as did Sir Joshua Reynolds . Some, such as Hans Holbein the Younger make a drawing of the face, then complete the rest of the painting without the sitter. In the 18th century, it would typically take about one year to deliver a completed portrait to

1617-593: Is also one of the first artists in Europe to sign their work, though he rarely dated them. Later in the 16th century, Titian assumed much the same role, particularly by expanding the variety of poses and sittings of his royal subjects. Titian was perhaps the first great child portraitist. After Titian, Tintoretto and Veronese became leading Venetian artists, helping the transition to Italian Mannerism . The Mannerists contributed many exceptional portraits that emphasized material richness and elegantly complex poses, as in

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1694-417: Is another fine example of Rembrandt's mastery of the group painting, in which he bathes the corpse in bright light to draw attention to the center of the painting while the clothing and background merge into black, making the faces of the surgeon and the students standout. It is also the first painting that Rembrandt signed with his full name. In Spain, Diego Velázquez painted Las Meninas (1656), one of

1771-580: Is beloved, often making him kiss and speak to it. –Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo's Ginevra de' Benci ( c.  1474–8 ) is one of the first known three-quarter-view portraits in Italian art. Partly out of interest in the natural world and partly out of interest in the classical cultures of ancient Greece and Rome, portraits—both painted and sculpted—were given an important role in Renaissance society and valued as objects, and as depictions of earthly success and status. Painting in general reached

1848-473: Is more than half a face). Occasionally, artists have created composites with views from multiple directions, as with Anthony van Dyck 's triple portrait of Charles I in Three Positions . There are even a few portraits where the front of the subject is not visible at all. Andrew Wyeth 's Christina's World (1948) is a famous example, where the pose of the disabled woman – with her back turned to

1925-591: Is my joy." Portraiture's roots are likely found in prehistoric times, although few of these works survive today. In the art of the ancient civilizations of the Fertile Crescent , especially in Egypt, depictions of rulers and rulers as gods abound. However, most of these were done in a highly stylized fashion, and most in profile, usually on stone, metal, clay, plaster, or crystal. Egyptian portraiture placed relatively little emphasis on likeness, at least until

2002-514: Is not always observed. Display often involves an integral or separate display stand . The Adiyogi Shiva statue located in India representative of Hindu God Shiva is the world's largest bust sculpture and is 112 feet (34 m) tall. Sculptural portrait heads from classical antiquity , stopping at the neck, are sometimes displayed as busts. However, these are often fragments from full-body statues, or were created to be inserted into an existing body,

2079-404: Is particularly useful if the sitter's available time is limited. Otherwise, the general form then a rough likeness is sketched out on the canvas in pencil, charcoal, or thin oil. In many cases, the face is completed first, and the rest afterwards. In the studios of many of the great portrait artists, the master would do only the head and hands, while the clothing and background would be completed by

2156-489: The Baroque school the round-bottomed Roman style, including, or designed to be placed on, a socle (a short plinth or pedestal), became most common. Gian Lorenzo Bernini , based in Rome, did portrait busts of popes, cardinals, and foreign monarchs such as Louis XIV . His Bust of King Charles I of England (1638) is now lost; artist and subject never met, and Bernini worked from the triple portrait painted by Van Dyck , which

2233-684: The Etruscans and Greeks, and developed a very strong tradition, linked to their religious use of ancestor portraits, as well as Roman politics. Again, the few painted survivals, in the Fayum portraits , Tomb of Aline and the Severan Tondo , all from Egypt under Roman rule, are clearly provincial productions that reflect Greek rather than Roman styles, but we have a wealth of sculpted heads, including many individualized portraits from middle-class tombs, and thousands of types of coin portraits. Much

2310-768: The Late Antique period the interest in an individual likeness declined considerably, and most portraits in late Roman coins and consular diptychs are hardly individualized at all, although at the same time Early Christian art was evolving fairly standardized images for the depiction of Jesus and the other major figures in Christian art, such as John the Baptist , and Saint Peter . Most early medieval portraits were donor portraits , initially mostly of popes in Roman mosaics , and illuminated manuscripts , an example being

2387-431: The 16th century, oil as a medium spread in popularity throughout Europe, allowing for more sumptuous renderings of clothing and jewelry. Also affecting the quality of the images, was the switch from wood to canvas , starting in Italy in the early part of the 16th century and spreading to Northern Europe over the next century. Canvas resists cracking better than wood, holds pigments better, and needs less preparation―but it

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2464-602: The Baroque period, particularly in the Netherlands. Unlike in the rest of Europe, Dutch artists received no commissions from the Calvinist Church which had forbidden such images or from the aristocracy which was virtually non-existent. Instead, commissions came from civic and businesses associations. Dutch painter Frans Hals used fluid brush strokes of vivid color to enliven his group portraits, including those of

2541-641: The British school were English painters Thomas Gainsborough and Sir Joshua Reynolds , who also specialized in clothing their subjects in an eye-catching manner. Gainsborough's Blue Boy is one of the most famous and recognized portraits of all time, painted with very long brushes and thin oil color to achieve the shimmering effect of the blue costume. Gainsborough was also noted for his elaborate background settings for his subjects. The two British artists had opposite opinions on using assistants. Reynolds employing them regularly (sometimes doing only 20 percent of

2618-584: The Corinthian helmet , but the Greek original was a full-length bronze statue. They were very popular in Roman portraiture . The Roman tradition may have originated in the tradition of Roman patrician families keeping wax masks, perhaps death masks , of dead members, in the atrium of the family house. When another family member died, these were worn by people chosen for the appropriate build in procession at

2695-608: The addition of increasingly thick layers one over another (known by painters as ‘fat over lean’). Also, oil colors dry more slowly, allowing the artist to make changes readily, such as altering facial details. Antonello da Messina was one of the first Italians to take advantage of oil. Trained in Belgium, he settled in Venice around 1475, and was a major influence on Giovanni Bellini and the Northern Italian school. During

2772-399: The artist decide entirely. Oliver Cromwell famously demanded that his portrait show "all these roughnesses, pimples, warts, and everything as you see me, otherwise I will never pay a farthing for it." After putting the sitter at ease and encouraging a natural pose, the artist studies his subject, looking for the one facial expression, out of many possibilities, that satisfies his concept of

2849-563: The centuries. Northern European artists led the way in realistic portraits of secular subjects. The greater realism and detail of the Northern artists during the 15th century was due in part to the finer brush strokes and effects possible with oil colors , while the Italian and Spanish painters were still using tempera . Among the earliest painters to develop oil technique was Jan van Eyck . Oil colors can produce more texture and grades of thickness, and can be layered more effectively, with

2926-685: The civil guards to which he belonged. Rembrandt benefitted greatly from such commissions and from the general appreciation of art by bourgeois clients, who supported portraiture as well as still-life and landscapes painting. In addition, the first significant art and dealer markets flourished in Holland at that time. With plenty of demand, Rembrandt was able to experiment with unconventional composition and technique, such as chiaroscuro . He demonstrated these innovations, pioneered by Italian masters such as Caravaggio , most notably in his famous Night Watch (1642). The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp (1632)

3003-453: The commission without being paid, suffering the humiliation of failure. Jacques-Louis David celebrated Portrait of Madame Récamier , wildly popular in exhibitions, was rejected by the sitter, as was John Singer Sargent 's notorious Portrait of Madame X . John Trumbull 's full-length portrait, General George Washington at Trenton , was rejected by the committee that commissioned it. The famously prickly Gilbert Stuart once replied to

3080-478: The commissioner. In religious paintings, portraits of donors began to be shown as present, or participate in the main sacred scenes shown, and in more private court images subjects even appeared as significant figures such as the Virgin Mary . If the poet says that he can inflame men with love… the painter has the power to do the same… in that he can place in front of the lover the true likeness of one who

3157-438: The complexity of group portraits. Rococo artists, who were particularly interested in rich and intricate ornamentation, were masters of the refined portrait. Their attention to the details of dress and texture increased the efficacy of portraits as testaments to worldly wealth, as evidenced by François Boucher 's famous portraits of Madame de Pompadour attired in billowing silk gowns. The first major native portrait painters of

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3234-882: The death of Henry Perronet Briggs , R.A., Illidge purchased the lease of the deceased artist's house in Bruton Street , Berkeley Square , where he commenced practice as a popular and fashionable portrait-painter. Illidge died unexpectedly of fever on 13 May 1851. Portrait painter Historically, portrait paintings have primarily memorialized the rich and powerful. Over time, however, it became more common for middle-class patrons to commission portraits of their families and colleagues. Today, portrait paintings are still commissioned by governments, corporations, groups, clubs, and individuals. In addition to painting, portraits can also be made in other media such as prints (including etching and lithography ), photography , video and digital media . It may seem obvious today that

3311-579: The declining state of Roman portrait art, "The painting of portraits which used to transmit through the ages the accurate likenesses of people, has entirely gone out…Indolence has destroyed the arts." These full-face portraits from Roman Egypt are fortunate exceptions. They present a somewhat realistic sense of proportion and individual detail (though the eyes are generally oversized and the artistic skill varies considerably from artist to artist). The Fayum portraits were painted on wood or ivory in wax and resin colors (encaustic) or with tempera , and inserted into

3388-546: The end of the century, the first oil portraits of contemporary individuals, painted on small wood panels, emerged in Burgundy and France, first as profiles, then in other views. The Wilton Diptych of ca. 1400 is one of two surviving panel portraits of Richard II of England , the earliest English king for whom we have contemporary examples. At the end of the Middle Ages in the 15th century, Early Netherlandish painting

3465-574: The famous Bust of Charlemagne in gold, still in the Aachen Cathedral treasury, from c.  1350 . Otherwise it was a rare format. Busts began to be revived in a variety of materials, including painted terracotta or wood, and marble. Initially most were flat-bottomed, stopping slightly below the shoulders. Francesco Laurana , born in Dalmatia , but who worked in Italy and France, specialized in marble busts, mostly of women. Under

3542-559: The first Italian artists to add allegorical symbols to their secular portraits. One of best-known portraits in the Western world is Leonardo da Vinci 's painting entitled Mona Lisa , named for Lisa del Giocondo , a member of the Gherardini family of Florence and Tuscany and the wife of wealthy Florentine silk merchant Francesco del Giocondo. The famous "Mona Lisa smile" is an excellent example of applying subtle asymmetry to

3619-454: The first rank, and artists like Holbein were in demand by English patrons. His painting of Sir Thomas More (1527), his first important patron in England, has nearly the realism of a photograph. Holbein made his great success painting the royal family, including Henry VIII . Dürer was an outstanding draftsman and one of the first major artists to make a sequence of self-portraits, including

3696-459: The funeral, in front of the propped-up body of the deceased, as an "astonished" Polybius reported, from his long stay in Rome beginning in 167 BC. Later these seem to have been replaced or supplemented by sculptures. Possession of such imagines maiorum ("portraits of the ancestors") was a requirement for belonging to the Equestrian order . Some reliquaries were formed as busts, notably

3773-461: The guise of ancient philosophers. It was not the first group portrait of artists. Decades earlier, Paolo Uccello had painted a group portrait including Giotto , Donatello , Antonio Manetti , and Brunelleschi . As he rose in prominence, Raphael became a favorite portraitist of the popes. While many Renaissance artists eagerly accepted portrait commissions, a few artists refused them, most notably Raphael's rival Michelangelo , who instead undertook

3850-407: The head. The subject's head may turn from " full face " (front view) to profile view (side view); a " three-quarter view " ("two-thirds view") is somewhere in between, ranging from almost frontal to almost profile (the fraction is the sum of the profile [one-half of the face] plus the other side's "quarter-face"; alternatively, it is quantified 2 ⁄ 3 , also meaning this partial view

3927-406: The home or to travel easily with the client. Frequently, an artist takes into account where the final portrait will hang and the colors and style of the surrounding décor. Creating a portrait can take considerable time, usually requiring several sittings. Cézanne, on one extreme, insisted on over 100 sittings from his subject. Goya on the other hand, preferred one long day's sitting. The average

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4004-487: The huge commissions of the Sistine Chapel . In Venice around 1500, Gentile Bellini and Giovanni Bellini dominated portrait painting. They received the highest commissions from the leading officials of the state. Bellini's portrait of Doge Loredan is considered to be one of the finest portraits of the Renaissance and ably demonstrates the artist's mastery of the newly arrived techniques of oil painting. Bellini

4081-542: The individualized busts of Hellenistic rulers on coins, show that Greek portraiture could achieve a good likeness, and subjects, at least of literary figures, were depicted with relatively little flattery – Socrates' portraits show why he had a reputation for being ugly. The successors of Alexander the Great began the practice of adding his head (as a deified figure) to their coins, and were soon using their own. Roman portraiture adopted traditions of portraiture from both

4158-540: The largest group of painted portraits are the funeral paintings that survived in the dry climate of Egypt's Fayum district (see illustration, below), dating from the 2nd to 4th century AD. These are almost the only paintings of the Roman period that have survived, aside from frescos , though it is known from the writings of Pliny the Elder that portrait painting was well established in Greek times, and practiced by both men and women artists. In his times, Pliny complained of

4235-436: The likeness, consists more in taking the general air, than in observing the exact similitude of every feature." Also prominent in England was William Hogarth , who dared to buck conventional methods by introducing touches of humor in his portraits. His "Self-portrait with Pug" is clearly more a humorous take on his pet than a self-indulgent painting. Portrait bust A bust is a sculpted or cast representation of

4312-577: The many expressions of the human face, especially as one of the premier self-portraitists (of which he painted over 60 in his lifetime). This interest in the human face also fostered the creation of the first caricatures, credited to the Accademia degli Incamminati , run by painters of the Carracci family in the late 16th century in Bologna, Italy. Group portraits were produced in great numbers during

4389-414: The moral or religious character of the subject, or with symbols representing the sitter's occupation, interests, or social status. The background can be totally black and without content or a full scene which places the sitter in their social or recreational milieu. Self-portraits are usually produced with the help of a mirror, and the finished result is a mirror-image portrait, a reversal of what occurs in

4466-462: The most famous and enigmatic group portraits of all time. It memorializes the artist and the children of the Spanish royal family, and apparently the sitters are the royal couple who are seen only as reflections in a mirror. Starting out as primarily a genre painter, Velázquez quickly rose to prominence as the court painter of Philip IV , excelling in the art of portraiture, particularly in extending

4543-448: The mummy wrapping, to remain with the body through eternity. While free-standing portrait painting diminished in Rome, the art of the portrait flourished in Roman sculptures, where sitters demanded realism, even if unflattering. During the 4th century, the sculpted portrait dominated, with a retreat in favor of an idealized symbol of what that person looked like. (Compare the portraits of Roman Emperors Constantine I and Theodosius I ) In

4620-443: The newly developed technique of oil painting pioneered by van Eyck, which revolutionized art, and spread throughout Europe. Leading German portrait artists including Lucas Cranach , Albrecht Dürer , and Hans Holbein the Younger who all mastered oil painting technique. Cranach was one of the first artists to paint life-sized full-length commissions, a tradition popular from then on. At that time, England had no portrait painters of

4697-621: The painting himself) while Gainsborough rarely did. Sometimes a client would extract a pledge from the artist, as did Sir Richard Newdegate from portraitist Peter Lely (van Dyck's successor in England), who promised that the portrait would be "from the Beginning to ye end drawne with my owne hands." Unlike the exactitude employed by the Flemish masters, Reynolds summed up his approach to portraiture by stating that, "the grace, and, we may add,

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4774-624: The period of Akhenaten in the 14th century BC. Portrait painting of notables in China probably goes back to over 1000 BC, though none survive from that age. Existing Chinese portraits go back to about 1000 AD, but did not place much emphasis on likeness until some time after that. From literary evidence we know that ancient Greek painting included portraiture, often highly accurate if the praises of writers are to be believed, but no painted examples remain. Sculpted heads of rulers and famous personalities like Socrates survive in some quantity, and like

4851-469: The place one looks for the most complete, reliable, and pertinent information" about the subject. And the eyebrows can register, "almost single-handedly, wonder, pity, fright, pain, cynicism, concentration, wistfulness, displeasure, and expectation, in infinite variations and combinations." Portrait painting can depict the subject " full-length " (the whole body), " half-length " (from head to waist or hips ), " head and shoulders " ( bust ), or just

4928-414: The principal apprentices. There were even outside specialists who handled specific items such as drapery and clothing, such as Joseph van Aken Some artists in past times used lay-figures or dolls to help establish and execute the pose and the clothing. The use of symbolic elements placed around the sitter (including signs, household objects, animals, and plants) was often used to encode the painting with

5005-656: The shadows and the lights, the face is given greater relief. Leonardo was a student of Verrocchio . After becoming a member of the Guild of Painters, he began to accept independent commissions. Owing to his wide-ranging interests and in accordance with his scientific mind, his output of drawings and preliminary studies is immense though his finished artistic output is relatively small. His other memorable portraits included those of noblewomen Ginevra de’ Benci and Cecilia Gallerani . Raphael's surviving commission portraits are far more numerous than those of Leonardo, and they display

5082-401: The sitter to the point of diminishing the reality of physical appearance. One of the best portraitists of 16th-century Italy was Sofonisba Anguissola from Cremona, who infused her individual and group portraits with new levels of complexity. Court portraiture in France began when Flemish artist Jean Clouet painted his opulent likeness of Francis I of France around 1525. King Francis was

5159-400: The sitter's essence. The posture of the subject is also carefully considered to reveal the emotional and physical state of the sitter, as is the costume. To keep the sitter engaged and motivated, the skillful artist will often maintain a pleasant demeanor and conversation. Élisabeth Vigée-Lebrun advised fellow artists to flatter women and compliment their appearance to gain their cooperation at

5236-429: The sitting. Central to the successful execution of the portrait is a mastery of human anatomy . Human faces are asymmetrical and skillful portrait artists reproduce this with subtle left-right differences. Artists need to be knowledgeable about the underlying bone and tissue structure to make a convincing portrait. For complex compositions, the artist may first do a complete pencil, ink, charcoal, or oil sketch which

5313-536: The skills of painters of the miniatures in illuminated manuscripts . Profile portraits, inspired by ancient medallions, were particularly popular in Italy between 1450 and 1500. Medals, with their two–sided images, also inspired a short-lived vogue for two-sided paintings early in the Renaissance. Classical sculpture, such as the Apollo Belvedere , also influenced the choice of poses used by Renaissance portraitists, poses that have continued in use through

5390-429: The subject (from the artist's point of view) or a flattering representation, not just a literal likeness. As Aristotle stated, "The aim of Art is to present not the outward appearance of things, but their inner significance; for this, not the external manner and detail, constitutes true reality." Artists may strive for photographic realism or an impressionistic similarity in depicting their subject, but this differs from

5467-417: The upper part of the human body , depicting a person's head and neck , and a variable portion of the chest and shoulders . The piece is normally supported by a plinth . The bust is generally a portrait intended to record the appearance of an individual, but may sometimes represent a type. They may be of any medium used for sculpture, such as marble , bronze , terracotta , plaster , wax or wood. As

5544-502: The viewer – integrates with the setting in which she is placed to convey the artist's interpretation. Among the other possible variables, the subject can be clothed or nude; indoors or out; standing, seated, reclining; even horse-mounted. Portrait paintings can be of individuals, couples, parents and children, families, or collegial groups. They can be created in various media including oils , watercolor , pen and ink , pencil , charcoal , pastel , and mixed media . Artists may employ

5621-575: The works of Agnolo Bronzino and Jacopo da Pontormo . Bronzino made his fame portraying the Medici family. His daring portrait of Cosimo I de' Medici , shows the austere ruler in armor with a wary eye gazed to his extreme right, in sharp contrast to most royal paintings which show their sitters as benign sovereigns. El Greco , who trained in Venice for twelve years, went in a more extreme direction after his arrival in Spain, emphasizing his "inner vision" of

5698-528: Was a courtier, diplomat, art collector, and successful businessman. His studio was one of the most extensive of that time, employing specialists in still-life, landscape, animal and genre scenes, in addition to portraiture. Van Dyck trained there for two years. Charles I of England first employed Rubens, then imported van Dyck as his court painter, knighting him and bestowing on him courtly status. Van Dyck not only adapted Rubens’ production methods and business skills, but also his elegant manners and appearance. As

5775-528: Was initially much scarcer than wood. Early on, the Northern Europeans abandoned the profile, and started producing portraits of realistic volume and perspective. In the Netherlands, Jan van Eyck was a leading portraitist. The Arnolfini Marriage (1434, National Gallery , London) is a landmark of Western art, an early example of a full-length couple portrait, superbly painted in rich colors and exquisite detail. But equally important, it showcases

5852-443: Was key to the development of the individualized portrait. Masters included Jan van Eyck , Robert Campin and Rogier van der Weyden , among others. Rather small panel painting portraits, less than half life-size, were commissioned, not only of figures from the court, but what appear from their relatively plain dress to be wealthy townspeople. Miniatures in illuminated manuscripts also included individualized portraits, usually of

5929-569: Was recorded, "He always went magnificently dress’d, had a numerous and gallant equipage, and kept so noble a table in his apartment, that few princes were not more visited, or better serv’d." In France, Hyacinthe Rigaud dominated in much the same way, as a remarkable chronicler of royalty, painting the portraits of five French kings. One of the innovations of Renaissance art was the improved rendering of facial expressions to accompany different emotions. In particular, Dutch painter Rembrandt explored

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