Mai,
As someone who has had access to what is now considered "classical training", I shall post my two cents-worth. Some of the aspects that have been involved in classical training have already been touched upon, but with respect, it is not all on-the-mark. Please forgive the length of my posting as I try to shed further light on it.
A good synopsis of an artist's training can be found in this quotation from Jean-Baptiste Chardin, when asked to recall the labour involved in his
years of training:
Quote:
|
They put a crayon in our hands when we are seven or eight years old. We begin to draw from models of eyes, mouths, noses, ears, then of feet and hands. For a long period our backs are bent over our portfolios in front of the Hercules or the torso, and you have not seen the tears brought on by this Satyr, this Gladiator, the Venus de Medici, this Antaeus...After we have spent days and worked nights by lamplight before stationary and inanimate forms they confront us with life and suddenly, the labour of all the preceding years seems to count for nothing....One must teach the eye to see nature, and how many have not seen it and never will! It is the torment of our lives. We are kept working five or six years from the living model before they turn us over to our own genius, if we have any...He who has not realised the difficulties of this art does in it nothing worthwhile.
|
When we now talk of 19th century classical realists, we are really taking about "Academicians", which is how those artists are better-known. (The term "classical realist" is a modern term and one which I am personally not fond of. And, since it is contemporary, it doesn't properly apply to those painters of bygone eras although I know it is used as such.) As Sharon explained, the whole topic is much too broad to completely illuminate here. However, something that should be kept in mind about academic painters is that what they did, or at least, were expected to do, was to paint what is known as "history subjects". This involved designing pictures that depict either historical events, as the name suggests, or fictional events, or mythological and religious themes. In other words, things that could not possibly have been witnessed by the painter. Thus, painters such as Degas, Sargent, and Cassatt, are not today considered academic painters. I will say, though, that of the three, Sargent was the most thoroughly trained, and Cassatt, the least. Those painters were realists and took their subject matter directly from life. Probably the best examples of academic painters from the 19th century would be artists such as Bouguereau, Alma-Tadema, and Leighton, but there were hundreds of others. In any event, they were all direct painters.
Which brings me to the other issue (I realise it might better be discussed on a different thread, but I'll press on) and that is, of direct or
alla prima painting versus glazing. This dichotomy always bothers me because it suggests that those are all there is. Contrary to popular belief (sorry, Sharon) the majority of painters who were not "Sargent-like" did
not use a monochrome underpainting followed by a series of glazes. Most certainly, Ingres - one of the fathers of the 19th century French academy - did not paint in this manner. He painted opaquely, or mostly opaquely, as did all of the academicians.
The use of a monochrome underpainting, such as a verdaccio, followed by coloured glazes was abandoned as sound practice long before the 19th century. It is a somewhat primitive method that was largely adopted by oil painters at the time when the medium was not fully-known to all and was being used quite often by former egg-tempera painters.
Of course, the technique continued to be used by some, just as it is today, but was not the most common and was not taught in the 19th century ateliers. The idea that paintings made using that method was a fairly widespread practice probably has arisen for a couple of specific reasons. But, in the interest of space, I won't go into it.
The last thing I'll mention refers to the notion of studies and cartoons (by the way, the latter term comes from the Italian
cartone, pronounced "car-
tone-ay", which means simply, "big paper"). Two of the artists that Sharon mentions, Degas and Sargent (I don't know much about Cassatt's methods) often did numerous studies and preparatory drawings even of things they would be painting from life. But, one of the reasons they needn't have then made cartoons to transfer onto the canvas is the very fact that they chose subjects from everyday, contemporary life. Sargent often employed what is now known as the "sight-size" method. He definitely did do cartoons for his murals, though, which makes sense because these were more like the history subjects of classical academics, and it goes with the territory.
Finally (will it ever end?) I'll leave you with a couple of quotations from Degas:
Quote:
|
Make a drawing. Start all over again. Trace it. Start it and trace it again. [...] You must do over the same subject ten times, a hundred times. In art nothing must appear accidental even a movement.
|
He also said, "Painting is easy, until you learn how."
All the best in your endeavors.
Juan