Luis Egidio Melendez Self-Portrait - Essay Example

Luis Egidio Melendez Self-Portrait Today, Vincent Van Gogh is widely regarded as one of the most famous artists of all time. His talent, use of color and heavy use of impasto to help illustrate his vision and emotion regarding his subject has long inspired artists of all types to study his work. He is, perhaps, the most famous post-impressionist, giving birth to the style known as Expressionist thanks to his emotive form of creating images. Most lay-persons in the general community are able to name at least one of his works despite the fact that his paintings command some of the highest prices in the marketplace. Even those works not immediately known today are quickly recognized by his unique style and approach, yet Van Gogh himself saw little of this success or popularity while he was alive. Living approximately a century prior to Van Gogh, Luis Egidio Melendez struggled through his entire life working out brilliant uses of paint and technique to capture a vision that only he was able to see in his time. Although not insane like Van Gogh, Melendez was considered to have a difficult nature and this contributed to his professional struggles. Similar to Van Gogh, though, it was only after his death in abject poverty that his brilliance was finally recognized and honored. Today, the artist is considered one of the great masters of Spanish history, particularly in the area of still lifes. Although the difficulties of his life had a great role in dictating the subjects he painted, an examination of his Self-Portrait, painted in 1747, provides some illumination to his talents and abilities which distinguish him as a masterful painter. Melendez’ full name is Luis Egidio Melendez de Rivera Durazo y Santo Padre. He was born in Naples, Italy in 1716. His father, Francisco, had left his home of Oviedo, Spain to move to Madrid with his brother in order to study art but then moved on to Italy in 1699 in search of more new techniques (Tufts, 1985). It was while Francisco was in Naples that he met and married Maria Josefa Durazo y Santo Padre Barrille and started a family (Tufts, 1985). It wasn’t until 1717, when Luis was a year old, that the family returned to Madrid where Francisco developed his miniature painting skills further and won an appointment as the King’s Painter of Miniatures in 1725 (Martin, 2004). Luis was able to study painting as an assistant to his father until 1737, when he was 21 years old, and he was able to enter the workshop of Louis Michel van Loo (Martin, 2004). From this position, Melendez was positioned for an illustrious career, as was shown in his work at the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, including the production of his Self-Portrait (Martin, 2004). However, his father’s vehement disagreement with the director of the Academy forced Luis’ expulsion and the young artist had to leave the country for Rome and Naples, where he worked for Charles III of Spain (Martin, 2004). It wasn’t until he was 37 that Melendez was called back to Madrid to help replace damaged choir books. Although he managed to support himself to some degree by painting still lifes, he was never able to achieve financial success or professional recognition and died indigent in Madrid in 1780 (Martin, 2004). Within his self-portrait, many of the traits that made Melendez great can be seen. The image features a depiction of the artist at a young age. He is seen from approximately the waist up and stands as if he were posing for a picture with a camera. One hand rests near his waist, although it seems to be somewhat ahead of his body rather than actually resting at his belt. This hand casually grips a rich blue cloth and a golden yet clean paintbrush. He stands in a proud stance with his shoulders back and his chest forward as his eyes gaze straight out of the painting and somewhat down, as if he is respectfully presenting his work and yet remains confident that this work will be satisfactory. His figure stands just left of center, allowing the remaining area of the painting to be filled with a painting of his own drawing, held up by his other hand. The parchment he holds up in his image depicts a pencil drawing of a male nude as seen from the back right and illustrates a strong ability for rendering shadows and dimension. Art historians have speculated that this drawing may have been “his first-place entry in an academy competition” (National Gallery of Art, 2010). The remainder of the picture plane is kept dark with some texturing of the background area but without worrying about giving any indication of a specific space. One of the first things noticed about this painting is the artist’s ability to capture texture and volume. There is a great deal of variety of texture within the picture. Melendez is wearing what appears to be a dark leather jacket over a white cotton ruffled shirt with a deep blue silk fabric draped around him to be held in his hand. These textures are suggested by the fold of the cloth as the jacket bends somewhat reluctantly around his arm and the white ruffles billow around his hand, at his neck, tucked into the front of his vest and down the center of his torso. This decoration is contained within the more tailored fashion of his vest, which is fastened with an elaborate line of cloth-covered buttons spaced closely together yet sewn loosely as seen in the way they each sit in their own direction. The silk of the blue fabric folds easily as it crushes in his hand, sweeps around his body and in its twist at the top of his head. All of these rich textures are immediately contrasted with the relatively flat surface of the drawing. However, even in the area of the paper, Melendez manages to capture an incredible sense of depth and reality. The paper seems textured, as if it were real paper of the period. A horizontal crease can be discerned at the paper’s approximate midpoint as if it has been folded for easy insertion in a portfolio. Melendez allows the paper to curl in along the vertical edges, throwing a shadow on the paper underneath along the left side of the depiction and curling in just a bit on the right. Most significantly, the shadows nearest Melendez’ hand, where the fingers pinch the top of the paper to help hold it up, seem to be much darker, as if the paper is actually being pinched by the holder. Although both artist and drawing are flat, two-dimensional characters on the picture plane, the way in which Melendez creates the shading on each makes it easy to believe the artist is three dimensional while the drawing remains only two. Another element of Melendez’ work that stands out is his use of light. The light contributes greatly to the sense of volume and texture seen in the image. The sheen on the artist’s skin reveals the light source to be coming in from the left, throwing at least half of the drawing into shadow thanks to the deep curl of the parchment. It is in the way that the light plays across the creases in the jacket that give the cloth its heaviness and in the way the light plays in the folds of the blue fabric that gives it an appearance of silk. Although the white of the shirt gleams with brilliance, this is seen to be the result of the color of the shirt rather than the simple reflection of light, giving it a more solid, absorptive quality as in cotton. The light picks out every little detail available in the image imagined, from the sheen on the paintbrush to the dull texturing of the paper containing the drawing, in a technique he employed heavily in creating his still lifes. “Virtually all of Melendez’s paintings combine such precise details, balanced composition and subtle gradations of light on varied textures … as to dazzle the eye” (Bergeron, 2010). Even his use of lighting within the drawing is seen to be exquisite, depicting dimples and muscle tone on the man drawn. Although Melendez never received the recognition he deserved in life, thus confining him to painting images of still lifes as the only means by which he might earn the money he needed to survive, the artist embraced his options and made them his own. The brilliance of his techniques, his fine eye for detail and his ability to capture light and shadow would have enabled him to achieve success in the portrait business to which he aspired. However, in being forced to less considered subjects such as the foodstuffs of the common table, Melendez was able to demonstrate as well his brilliance at composition and his keen sense of individuality as an element of the perfect. Because he was unable to secure a post in the King’s service and because of his reputed temper, Melendez was reduced to working with bread, fruit and meat as his subjects, yet he did this so well that he brought an entirely new field of painting to light, exposing the potential of the still life as a valid means of expression and capturing a moment in time essential to all other elements of life in his time. Works Cited Bergeron, Chris. “MFA Exhibit Features Gorgeous Still Lifes of 18th Century Spain’s Finest Painter.” Daily News. (February 5, 2010). March 8, 2010 Martin, Jana. The Majesty of Spain: Royal Collections from the Museo del Prado & The Patrimonio Nacional. Mississippi Commission for International Cultural Exchange. National Gallery of Art. “Luis Melendez: Master of the Spanish Still Life.” Washington DC, 2010. March 8, 2010 Tufts, Eleanor. “Luis Melendez: Spanish Still-Life Painter of the Eighteenth Century.” Exhibition Meadows Museum. Dallas, TX: Southern Methodist University, 1985. Read More