Judy Harrington led us through an overview of the technique relating photography to both painting and movie films.   

Chiaroscuro is Italian for ‘light-dark’ ( chiaro “clear” and  oscuro  “obscure”) In art it is a term used by artists and art historians to describe the use of strong contrasts between light and dark, usually affecting a whole composition. It can be used to achieve a sense of volume in modelling three-dimensional objects and figures – and was developed in this way by early proponents. Light often comes from one source to produce the desired effect.

The term chiaroscuro originated during the Renaissance as drawing on coloured paper, where the artist worked from the paper’s base tone toward light using white gouache, and toward dark using ink, body colour or watercolour. Christ at Rest, by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1519, a chiaroscuro drawing using pen, ink, and brush, washes, white heightening, on ochre prepared paper. Initially was particularly associated with Caravaggio (and his followers including Artemisia Gentileschi) and Rembrandt

Similar effects in black and white and low key photography are also called chiaroscuro. Many famous photographers understood the power of chiaroscuro in photography and it has been used across all genres of photography. For example: Landscapes Ansel Adams

Street Photography Henri Cartier-Bresson – eg La pazienza delle nonne, Barrion Chino Bill Brandt – eg  Halifax 1937 Don McCullin  eg Early Morning, Steel Foundry, West Hartlepool  

Still Life Edward Weston,  Pepper 30 1930

Portraits Yousuf Karsh  – eg Muhamed Ali Dora Maar – eg Nusch Eluard, plus Surrealist version with a spider’s web Lee Miller – self portrait Zanele Moholi – examples in Somnyama Ngonyama (Hail the Dark Lioness) series

Colour Photography William Eggleston –1985 ( known as Supermarket Boy with Carts) Nan Goldin – colour portraits and scenes Henry Gruyaert Gao, Mali. 1988. Annie-Leibovitz, Disney Dream Portrait

Photojournalism Arkady Shaiket, 1920s Soviet photography  Industrial Workers  Sebastiao Salgado eg An Archaeology of the Workers Industrial Age Tom Hunter eg Woman Reading Possession Order (based on Vermeer’s Woman at a Window) Karen Kanouski eg Mohakhali-Korail-Slum Tina Modotti  eg Worker Reading “El Machete Newspaper

Painting with Light – our images relating to the theme:

Judy Harrington

 

 

Ian Welsby

Kathryn Alkins

Barry Cole