Thursday,
March 15, 2007
Renaissance Egg Tempura Painting Returns to
Reflect Italian Heritage
The
ANNOTICO Report
Egg tempera was
prevalent in the Middle Ages and used by nearly all the Italian Renaissance
painters. It is made by adding powdered pigments (mostly metal oxides) into egg
yolk. Sometimes other ingredients such as honey or milk are added, but it's
that stubborn egg yolk that makes the difference. It dries quickly, adheres
firmly and, unlike oil paint that darkens or yellows with age, retains true
colors.
Thomas
MacPherson, an art teacher at the
MacPherson's father was a Scot who died a
hero in World War II. Thomas subsequently grew up among his mother's large
extended Italian family, and most of this exhibition is devoted to them and the
quirks and eccentricities of multi-generational Italian Americans.
Geneseo Art Instructor Explores
His Italian Roots
Shirley
Dawson
March
11, 2007
Have you ever
tried scraping dried egg yolk off a breakfast plate? You've discovered a
component for one of the great historic tools of art: egg tempera painting.
Egg tempera was
prevalent in the Middle Ages and used by nearly all the Italian Renaissance
painters. It is made by adding powdered pigments (mostly metal oxides) into egg
yolk. Sometimes other ingredients such as honey or milk are added, but it's
that stubborn egg yolk that makes the difference. It dries quickly, adheres
firmly and, unlike oil paint that darkens or yellows with age, retains true
colors.
Egg tempera
painting was largely abandoned after the invention of oil paints but was
rediscovered and used extensively by 20th-century realism painters including
Thomas Benton and Andrew Wyeth.
Now the
MacPherson, an art teacher at the
MacPherson subsequently grew up
among his mother's large extended Italian family, and most of this exhibition
is devoted to them and the quirks and eccentricities of multi-generational
Italian Americans. The paintings of grandparents, aunts, uncles and a small
blond-haired boy who must be MacPherson himself are
encrusted with symbols of every kind and stripe. Religion plays a main role.
Jesus often hovers in the background, women are portrayed as saints complete
with halos, and plastic charms of the saints dangle from nearly every picture
frame. These paintings are richly detailed, often humorous and full of historic
nuance.
Scattered around
the gallery space are pieces of furniture grandfather's old stuffed chair, a desk
full of inconsequential mail, a radio that plays Perry Como and Mario Lanza the
"installation" part of the program. Building one cohesive
environmental statement with these objects would have been more effective.
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/
apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070311/
Shirley Dawson
co-owned Dawson Gallery, spent years as a practicing artist and now writes about
art.
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