Color modulation (painting)
Color modulation or modulation of color is a term in painting that goes back to a formulation by Paul Cézanne . The representation of the room dimension or the room illusion by means of harmoniously developed changes of the color tones is generated by color modulatory principles . The mathematical perspective and the chiaroscuro are treated as minor aspects of harmony in the color modulation .
The term coined by Cézanne should not be confused with the general term color modulation (see color modulation ).
In the utterances of Cézanne, written down by Émile Bernard , he emphasized that one should say "modulate" rather than model. Cézanne's statements are the first written testimony in which the principle of classical painting is summarized: “There is no line, there is no modeling, there are only contrasts. These contrasts are not produced by black and white, but by color impressions. The modeling results from the correct relationship between the color tones ( here instead of modulation ). If they are placed next to each other harmoniously and are completely present, the picture models itself. ” Maurice Denis comments:“ The mass finds its expression in a color scale, in a series of spots. These spots are lined up in a contrasting or analogous way, depending on whether the form is interrupted or continued. That is what he (Cézanne) preferred to call modulating than modeling. ”Each object modulated in this way on the picture surface merges with the“ color series of the background ”. The starting point for color modulation is the realization within painting that light is not a “thing” that can be reproduced, but that, from a colouristic point of view, must be represented by means of colors.
The discovery and application of color-modulating principles can already be found in the Renaissance , for example in Titian's late work and subsequently in Rubens' work . Preserved mosaics from Roman antiquity even show a much earlier application, with a presumed origin in the lost painting of classical Greek antiquity (see also classical art ). Color modulatory principles have been incorporated into the work of many important colorists since the Renaissance. Written evidence about this can only be found very rarely and mostly of a descriptive nature. One example is Bachaumont's statement from 1767 about Chardin's painting style , who describes it as strange and adds: “He puts one color after the other, almost without mixing them, so that his painting is somewhat like the mosaic. "
The principle of color modulation is to be distinguished from the color perspective . The color perspective, the optical illusion of spatial depth at the transition from “warm” colors (yellow, orange, red) to “cold” (blue, blue-green, green), is only one aspect of color modulation. Only when the color perspective is subjected to harmony is the human eye perceived as color modulation.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Émile Bernard: Paul Cézanne , published in July 1904 in L'Ocident; Conversations with Cézanne , Michael Doran (ed.), (Title of the original edition: Conversations avec Cézanne , translated by Jürg Bischoff), Diogenes Verlag, Zurich, 1982, ISBN 3-2572-1974-1 , p. 54 ff.
- ↑ Maurice Denis: Journal , published in September 1907 in L'Ocident; Conversations with Cézanne , Michael Doran (ed.), (Title of the original edition: Conversations avec Cézanne , translated by Jürg Bischoff), Diogenes Verlag, Zurich, 1982, ISBN 3-2572-1974-1 , p. 120