There's Hyperrealism from the 19th century!?
The skill of executing immense detail.
The amount of detail! Wow!
Inspired by GEORGE BOTHAMLEY's art article from ART EVERY DAY - “Antoine Berjon - Still Life.”
I was curious to see how an artist back in the 19th century was able to paint with such detail to the point where it was really close to being Hyperrealism.
The 2 paintings we’ll be looking at are:
"Still-Life with a Basket of Flowers" by Antoine Berjon
"Still-Life with Flowers, Shells, a Shark's Head, and Petrifications" by Antoine Berjon
What makes it look so Hyperrealistic?
Antoine was known to be one of the best and most skilled flower painters back in his time. The ability to paint like how he did is amazing mostly when all is painted from life. However, I would entirely categorize his painting as Hyperrealism because today’s hyperrealism is a lot sharper and more detailed due to us having the technology and tools of Photography. Which they did not have back in the day. But it was close enough to photorealism with all that detail Antoine could add to his paintings.
We are going to learn and discover to see what makes it look close enough to be hyperrealistic.
The illusion of reality. Being able to capture what it looks like in real life and not distorting it so that it has a painterly texture or effect to it.
Detail. The amount of detail and texture he adds to his paintings is what makes it so photorealistic and hyperrealistic.
Lighting. Using the lighting tones, color intensity, and values of what we see in real life.
Still-Life with a Basket of Flowers
Composition
Here is a study and analysis of our first painting:
The flow of the painting is very well balanced and has a lot of dynamics where the flower at the top is directed towards the top right corner and the angle of the basket along with the contrasted lighting creates a flow and direction toward the bottom right corner.
The painting is also very well balanced depending on where each element is placed. The flower and basket create a very lively and active flow within the painting. By adding the more static and upright motion of the vase, it balances everything out.
Adding the diagonal lines of the table helps create depth and perspective as it directs towards the back and side of the painting leading us to the dark depth of the background.
Color composition
Let’s take a look at the color composition of this piece where we have a palette of :
Yellow = The main subject which is the basket.
Pink/Red = The pink flowers are added as an accent of color in the painting.
White = Will be the white flowers, the counter/table and also the vase
Black = The dark background, dark shadows
Still-Life with Flowers, Shells, a Shark's Head, and Petrifications
Composition
Here is a study and analysis of the next painting:
This painting is a lot more crowded than the other one. More messy, more complicated.
The main focus would be the shark head or the vase of flowers since they are aligning with the golden ratio.
The painting is quite balanced since we see this large triangle with a wide base making it very solid and even.
Color composition
Let’s take a look at the color composition of this piece where we have a palette of :
Green and Orange = This painting has a color harmony of split complementary. The orange would be the wooden desk and drawer and the green would be the leaves of the flower and the porcelain vase.
White = The flowers within the painting that have a variety of different color tones.
Black = The dark background and dark shadows.
Mini Exercise for you!
Try and merge and combine hyperrealism with a painterly method, together to create something new. What can you do to make the two work together and become something new?
Have fun!
What did you discover?
I’m curious to see what your thoughts are on these hyperrealistic aspects of a 19th-century painting and how the composition of these are. If you also discovered something new, I would love to know! (You can comment and share your thoughts below!)
Thank you for reading my fun little discovery and I hope you also get to learn and share your discoveries too!
You can also share it with fellow friends, artists, and cellists of today's Victoria Yu Art on social media, forward it to someone who might benefit, or text it to a friend. Thanks for reading!
PS Feel free to watch my new YouTube video about this new post! Sharing thoughts and ideas!