Veneration ©2000
cast painting, Grisaille,
Adrian Gottlieb
| |
|
Veneration ©2000 |
Grisaille (gri-zi): French from the word gris meaning gray.
Grisaille is a term used to indicate a monochromatic palette consisting of warm and cool shades of gray. Grisaille is used in cast painting, and can be used in underpainting.
After a student has demonstrated proficiency in grisaille a limited and then full color palette is gradually introduced via intensive study of figure painting, portraiture, landscape, and still-life.
"A mixture of Flake White, Ivory Black or Mars Black and the addition of a small amount of Raw Umber for warmth are all the pigments necessary for a grisaille study." -- Richard Frederick Lack
Adrian Gottlieb
Grisaille
Term applied to monochrome painting carried out mostly in shades of grey. The use of the French word can be traced only to 1625, since although grisaille painting was done in preceding centuries, it was not referred to as such. The alternative expression peinture en camaïeu (gris) is also documented only more recently.
In the 16th century there are occasional references to ‘dead colour’, but this term is no longer used. At the time of its origin, in the medieval period, grisaille painting was simply called ‘painting in black and white’... for example, from an entry in the inventories of Jean de France, Duc de Berry, of 1401, 1413 and 1416: ‘Item, unes petites heures de Nostre Dame…enluminées de blanc et de noir’. However, this description is not very precise, as grisaille painting was never merely black and white at that time but was always combined with (more or less sparingly used) colours. The term Grisaille as [it is] commonly used today,...only inadequately describes the various modes it subsumes. Their only common feature is the more or less exclusive use of non-coloured pigments, while they diverge technically and aesthetically to an often astonishing extent.....
Michaela Krieger: "Grisaille" (original article is 10 pages long), Grove Art Online. Oxford University Press, [January 6, 2006], http://www.groveart.com/
