Leonardo's Colour and Chiaroscuro Author(s): John Shearman Source: Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, 25. Bd., H. 1 (1962), pp. 13-47 Published by: Deutscher Kunstverlag GmbH Munchen Berlin Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1481484 . Accessed: 27/02/2014 13:46 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Deutscher Kunstverlag GmbH Munchen Berlin is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 128.111.215.12 on Thu, 27 Feb 2014 13:46:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions LEONARDO'S COLOUR AND CHIAROSCURO By JohnShearman It is unfortunatelythe case that the analysis and interpretationof colour in paintings lags far behind other aspects of formal historical criticism.The subject seems to be in some degree of dis- repute,or at the best open to suspicion,and not without reason. It is rare that observationsin this field descend fromthe general to the particular1, or fromfrank subjectivity(even quasi-mysticism) to the admittedlymore tedious but ultimatelymore rewardingobjectivity that is, for example, nor- mally regarded as indispensablein modern studies of perspective.The following study was under- taken in the belief that colour (and its dependents,light and chiaroscuro)can just as well be sub- 2 mittedto argumentand historicalcriticism The analogy between perspectiveand colour is not casual. One initial clarificationis demanded: light, in painting,is absent, or present,or deployed and characterizedin this or that way, always as a resultof handling colour, the primaryvisual constituentof the work, in a certain fashion.This is too oftenforgotten, and lightis discussedas if it were a self-sufficientelement which arrived via the artist'sbrush. Similarly, linear space, in its absence or presence,is the productof the treatmentof the perspective of objects. It is not an accident that those artists in the Renaissance who made most discoveriesabout space also explored and definedthe possibilitiesof pictorial light; the interestin, and understandingof, each problem requires the same state of mind. This is as clear in the art of Giotto as in the words of Alberti; Leonardo is another conspicuouscase. Anotherclarification must be made. How oftenhas it been said that Leonardo was not interested in colour, but in chiaroscuroor tone? This is a statementthat is based on a modernanalytical distinct- ion, and no Renaissance text on colour can be understoodbefore the anachronismis removed. For example, in 1-504Ugo da Carpi's "chiaroscurowoodcuts" are called stampe di legno a 3 colori . There is in Leonardo's paintings and theoreticalwritings4, as in those of his contemporaries,no oppositionbetween colour on the one hand and lightand shade on the other; it is inexact to separate colour - in the customarysense of the chromaticelement of colore - fromchiaroscuro, and to say that he found the formerof secondary importancecompared with the latter. Leonardo developed both, in new directionsand for new purposes.To him theywere not separate departmentsof his art, but were in most respectsinseparable; at timesthey are complementary,at other timestheir interact- ion is so complex that they may be regarded,in all but the scientificcontext, as one medium. It is highlysignificant that when he talks of colour and chiaroscuroin pictorial,and not scientific,theory, the treatmentof light and shade is designatedcolore, as in Alberti. Dividesi la pittura in due parti principali; delle quali la prima e figura,cioe la linea, che destinguela figuradelli corpi e lor parti- cule; la seconda e il colore contenutoda essi termini;when this division is repeated in all essentials in a second text,la seconda e detta ombra5. The developmentof the handling of colour in Tuscan painting achieves its greatestacceleration between the earliestworks of Leonardo and the death of Andrea del Sarto. Its pace may be compa- red fruitfullyto those of plasticityand disegnobetween, say, Filippino and Salviati. It was Leonardo who gave the firstimpetus in each case, and in colour his contributionis measurablythe greatest.It is not my purpose to describethis contributionin all its many aspects,but ratherto demonstrateone relatively simple point and to explore its consequences. From the methodological point of view I have taken the obvious opportunity,in the second section,to checkobservations and interpretations '3 This content downloaded from 128.111.215.12 on Thu, 27 Feb 2014 13:46:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions against Leonardo's many notes on the subject; this expressesthe assumptionthat techniquesof ana- lysis and termsof referenceare most relevantwhen they can be found in the literarymaterial which is closestto the work of art6. The tonal scale of pigments and the tonal unity of colour. One of the propertiesof the Absolute Colour of mediaeval paintingwhich most vigorously resisted the realistic tendenciesof early Renaissance art was the modelling of formsexclusively in colour. With significantexceptions, most quattrocento painting achieves the relief of form in this way. Generally, a formof a certain colour is definedby variations in the intensityor saturationof this colour; variations in intensityyield automatically a range of tonal differencesand these express lightingand relief. Each pigment,however, in its pure and fully saturated state, has its own specifictonal value; blues are inherentlydarker than yellows. If, hypothetically,we take the most familiarpigments on the Renaissance palette,fully saturated, it is possible to produce a tonal, as well as a chromatic,scale: from yellow, the lightest,down throughcinnobar (or vermilion),apple-green, turquoise, rose-red, to the darkest,lapis lazuli. If an artistworks within the conventionof colour-modellingthese tonal propertiesof pigmentsare imposed upon him and lead to certainresults. The awarenessof theseproperties in the Trecentoand Quattrocentois demonstratedby the way in whichmany artistsexploit them.An alternativeto simple saturation-modellingis the phenomenonof colour-change;this is the variation of the local-colour of a formbetween its highlightand shadow - a device much favoured for its decorative contributionby many of the Tuscan gothic artistssuch as Agnolo Gaddi or Lorenzo Monaco, and obviously sympatheticto an age whichassessed the beauty of colour quantitatively,both in the sense of variety and of brilliance. Frequently colour-changes are no more than decorative,and thereis no otherlogic in the selectionof these pairs, but the tonal differenceinherently present in the coupling of, say, yellow and blue, may be made to model form. Masolino, in the frescoesat Castiglione Olona, is typical of several Quattrocentoartists who consist- ently select their colour-couplesin this way, so that the tonal contrastof pigmentsalone provides an alternativeto variationsof saturation7 Anothermore importantfact follows fromthe tonal scale of pigments.If an artistin this conven- tion paints St. Peter, by traditionclothed in a yellow robe over a blue vestment,with each drapery modelled by saturation-changesand the full intensityof the pigmentused for the deepest shadows, then those two formsare bound to be plastically inconsistent.The potentialrange of tone offeredby each pigmentcannot be matched,and the modellingof the yellow draperywill be less powerfulthan that of the blue. The full meaning of this problem may be seen in Masaccio's S t. A n n e in the Uffizi (figurei); at this early stage of his career Masaccio worked without modificationwithin the technicaltradition of late gothic art. A case where the consequences are least obvious is the rela- tionshipbetween the rose-redand deep blue draperiesof the Madonna, for these are pigmentsclose to each other on the tonal scale; even so, if one compares the plasticityattained on the sleeve of the Madonna in red, with that on the knee below in blue, the inevitable disparity is apparent. More striking,however, is the disparityin potential modellingbetween formsof colours at opposite ends of the scale, between, say, the relatively strongrose-red of S. Anne's robe and the much weaker cinnobar-redof the angel at the top, and most strikingof all, if one takes the extremesof the scale, between the full saturated yellow of the highlightsof the upper left-handangel and his equally pure, but far deeper blue wing. This angel has a vestmentthat turnsfrom this full value of yellow to a full cinnobar-redshadow, whichis an example of the device of colour-change,used by Masaccio '4 This content downloaded from 128.111.215.12 on Thu, 27 Feb 2014 13:46:34 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions i..?;:"t' "I '" ?E* rlk ~ I t:1! r " 6...:.1 i;'t.f' ~??r - ? dl:rA;.'LF'?ii ?r" a.?4e Z~i * ~i? . * ?:~?? ?k ?.? . f ?, .i .* i. *: r 'f. .?`?: I .,? :'i -1 ;?it.' k. ?: i:?.Y 4 1 it ~EI~ ~B~L:Y' ill T:. ?n.: i:'-?? "'I?:: r :r ~ ?:'* ?,? ?k; fq':'' I ??'~r ??l~i~Si:~ : ? i.. j~3~ *5. ?r e~yCI- ii ?, ~iC "i;P j?l~f~a: 'U13~ * 'b r-, * i rr d2.1r: ~nnr. f r *s~ -1 i. It ~ ?~R ,I?r -~ ?I ,?r? ,.I r: I ; j 1,,*'% tt?; ii t, I