Today we finally made the leap from the Renaissance to the Baroque in Italy. I think it’s interesting that the Baroque sort of distills everything that was revolutionary and praiseworthy from the Renaissance while eliminating the psychological distance between the viewer and the artwork. I appreciate the visible emotion of Baroque figures, and the emotions expressed by the dynamism and movements of figures like in Caravaggio’s The Calling of Matthew. One interesting thing about Caravaggio is that we don’t have any drawings of his. I don’t know if he was a student of Annibale Carracci’s, whose art school in Bologna hammered home the importance of drawings in response to the unproportionality and unevenness of the Mannerist period, but I would assume given Carracci’s influence on the Baroque style itself Caravaggio would also see the importance of making drawings.
Speaking of Carracci, I think his quadri riportati work is absolutely astounding. His understanding of a whole laundry list of artistic skills like grisaille, trompe-l’oeil, and of course fresco painting make his patchwork ceilings like the one in the Palazzo Farnese amazing feats.