A Short History of Western Painting: From the Middle Ages to Modern Art

Western art has gone through many changes and developments over the centuries. During the Middle Ages (from the 5th to the 15th century), Western art had a religious purpose and was often primitive and two-dimensional. The main characters were often made much larger than everyone else to show their importance. This began to change in the 13th century with Giotto di Bondone (1267-1337). While his paintings still had religious themes, they showed real people in a real environment. In particular, his paintings are set apart from other paintings by their realistic human faces and deep emotional impact.

The Renaissance (from the 14th to the 17th century) saw a shift towards a more humanistic attitude to life. As a result, painters concentrated less on religious themes. They began to adopt a more humanistic attitude to life. An important breakthrough during this period was the use of perspective by Masaccio (1401-1428). Influential painters such as Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), Michelangelo (1475-1564), and Raphael (1483-1520) built upon Giotto and Masaccio’s innovations to produce some of the greatest art that Europe had ever seen.

Another innovation was the use of oil paints. With their deep colours and realism, some of the best oil paintings look like photographs. While painters as early as Da Vinci had used oil, this technique reached its height with Rembrandt (1606-1669), who gained a reputation as a master of shadow and light.

In subject matter, the emphasis increasingly shifted from religious themes to people and the world around us. Kings, nobles, and people of high rank wanted to purchase accurate pictures of themselves and the people they loved. Others wanted paintings showing important historical events or stories from mythology. Finally, most clients wanted paintings that were beautiful and interesting to look at.

The development of Western art slowed until the invention of photography in the mid-19th century. After that, paintings were no longer needed to preserve what people and the world looked like. Hence, painters had to find a new way of looking at their art. From this, Impressionism emerged in France. The name of this new movement came from the painting by Claude Monet (1840-1926) called 'Impression, Sunrise'. In this work, Monet’s aim was to convey the light and movement in the scene—the subjective impression the scene gave him—but not a detailed record of the scene itself.

While many Impressionists painted scenes of nature or daily life, others, such as Renoir (1841-1919), focused on people. Unlike the cold, black-and-white photographs of that time period. Renoir’s paintings are full of light, shadow, colour, and life. He sought to show not just the outer image of his subjects, but their inner warmth and humanity as well.

Modern Art (from the 20th century to today) has seen artists exploring new ways of seeing and interpreting the world. Painters such as Picasso (1881-1973) tried to analyze the shapes which existed in the natural world but in a new way, with Cubism. Others gave their paintings a realistic but dream-like quality. Still others turned to abstract art. What they attempted to do was no longer show reality, but instead to ask the question, 'What is art?'

Overall, Western painting has been shaped by changing values, ideas, and attitudes towards art and the world around us.