The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (487 page)
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Authors: Ian Chilvers
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Twombly , Cy
(1929– ).
American abstract painter and draughtsman. His distinctive style is characterized by apparently random scrawls and scribbles on white or black grounds. In his rejection of traditional ideas of composition he shows an affinity with the
All-over
style initiated by Jackson
Pollock
, though Twombly's work is looser and more disorganized than that of Pollock. In 1957 he settled in Rome.
American abstract painter and draughtsman. His distinctive style is characterized by apparently random scrawls and scribbles on white or black grounds. In his rejection of traditional ideas of composition he shows an affinity with the
All-over
style initiated by Jackson
Pollock
, though Twombly's work is looser and more disorganized than that of Pollock. In 1957 he settled in Rome.
typology
.
.
In Christian
iconography
a system whereby figures and scenes from the Old Testament were thought of as prefiguring those of the New Testament. It became the custom in biblical illustration for Old Testament ‘types’ to be juxtaposed with or subordinated to New Testament ‘antitypes’, to demonstrate visually that the promise of the Old Testament was fulfilled in the New. Thus Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son Isaac was seen as foreshadowing God's sacrifice of Christ, and David was seen as a ‘type’ of Christ, his fight with Goliath prefiguring Christ's struggle with Satan. Occasionally classical myths or other secular sources were also accepted as types. Typological illustration is found not only in book illustration, but in virtually every field of art throughout the Middle Ages (the earliest examples date from the 3rd cent.), and occasionally afterwards. It reached a wide popular audience in
block books
.
iconography
a system whereby figures and scenes from the Old Testament were thought of as prefiguring those of the New Testament. It became the custom in biblical illustration for Old Testament ‘types’ to be juxtaposed with or subordinated to New Testament ‘antitypes’, to demonstrate visually that the promise of the Old Testament was fulfilled in the New. Thus Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son Isaac was seen as foreshadowing God's sacrifice of Christ, and David was seen as a ‘type’ of Christ, his fight with Goliath prefiguring Christ's struggle with Satan. Occasionally classical myths or other secular sources were also accepted as types. Typological illustration is found not only in book illustration, but in virtually every field of art throughout the Middle Ages (the earliest examples date from the 3rd cent.), and occasionally afterwards. It reached a wide popular audience in
block books
.
Tzara , Tristan
.
.
U
Uccello , Paolo
(Paolo di Dono )
(Paolo di Dono )
(1396/7–1475).
Florentine painter, one of the most distinctive artists of the early
Renaissance
.
Vasari
says he got his nickname (
uccello
means ‘bird’) because he loved animals, and birds in particular, and to his contemporaries, as well as to many later critics, he appeared an eccentric figure. He is first documented
c.
1412 in the workshop of
Ghiberti
, but he is not known to have worked as a sculptor. In 1425 he moved to Venice, where he worked as a mosaicist, but nothing survives there that can be certainly associated with him. By 1432 he was back in Florence, and in 1436 he painted his first dated surviving work—a huge fresco in Florence Cathedral depicting an equestrian statue, a monument to the English
condottiere
Sir John Hawkwood (d. 1394). It demonstrated the fascination with
perspective
that was central to his style. His two other large-scale works are a series of frescos on Old Testament themes (probably 1430s and 1440s) in the ‘Green Cloister’ of S. Maria Novella and a series of three panels (
c.
1455) on the
Battle of San Romano
, a minor Florentine victory against the Sienese in 1432. The pictures were painted for the Palazzo
Medici
and are now separated, with one panel each in the National Gallery, London, the Louvre, Paris, and the Uffizi, Florence. Uccello's other works include the decoration of the clock-face and designs for stained-glass windows in Florence Cathedral, and two enchanting paintings that are generally considered to date from late in his career—
St George and the Dragon
(NG, London), one of the earliest known Italian paintings on canvas, and
The Hunt in the Forest
(Ashmolean, Oxford). Vasari says that ‘he came to live a hermit's life’, and in his tax return of 1469 Uccello described himself as ‘old without means of livelihood…and unable to work’.
Uccello's work presents a striking—and often captivating—combination of two seemingly opposing stylistic currents: the decorative tradition of
International Gothic
and the scientific involvement with perspective of the early Renaissance. Vasari maintained that Uccello wasted his time ‘on the finer points of perspective’ and presents him as an amiable fanatic who worked into the night and when told to come to bed by his wife would reply: ‘What a sweet mistress is this perspective!’ He undoubtedly took his enthusiasm to extraordinary lengths (in the
Battle of San Romano
the broken weapons and even the corpses recede neatly in accordance with the perspective scheme), but his effects were appropriate to his subjects and to the decorative charm of his pictures rather than mere technical exercises. In
The Hunt in the Forest
, for example, he creates not only an atmosphere of fairy-tale romance, but also, through the way in which the horses and dogs move swiftly back into space, an exhilarating sense of darting energy. Uccello's name became so identified with the subject of perspective that he was often said to have invented it:
Ruskin
, for example, wrote in a letter to Kate
Greenaway
‘I believe the perfection of perspective is only recent. It was first applied in Italian art by Paul Uccello . He went off his head with love of perspective.’
Florentine painter, one of the most distinctive artists of the early
Renaissance
.
Vasari
says he got his nickname (
uccello
means ‘bird’) because he loved animals, and birds in particular, and to his contemporaries, as well as to many later critics, he appeared an eccentric figure. He is first documented
c.
1412 in the workshop of
Ghiberti
, but he is not known to have worked as a sculptor. In 1425 he moved to Venice, where he worked as a mosaicist, but nothing survives there that can be certainly associated with him. By 1432 he was back in Florence, and in 1436 he painted his first dated surviving work—a huge fresco in Florence Cathedral depicting an equestrian statue, a monument to the English
condottiere
Sir John Hawkwood (d. 1394). It demonstrated the fascination with
perspective
that was central to his style. His two other large-scale works are a series of frescos on Old Testament themes (probably 1430s and 1440s) in the ‘Green Cloister’ of S. Maria Novella and a series of three panels (
c.
1455) on the
Battle of San Romano
, a minor Florentine victory against the Sienese in 1432. The pictures were painted for the Palazzo
Medici
and are now separated, with one panel each in the National Gallery, London, the Louvre, Paris, and the Uffizi, Florence. Uccello's other works include the decoration of the clock-face and designs for stained-glass windows in Florence Cathedral, and two enchanting paintings that are generally considered to date from late in his career—
St George and the Dragon
(NG, London), one of the earliest known Italian paintings on canvas, and
The Hunt in the Forest
(Ashmolean, Oxford). Vasari says that ‘he came to live a hermit's life’, and in his tax return of 1469 Uccello described himself as ‘old without means of livelihood…and unable to work’.
Uccello's work presents a striking—and often captivating—combination of two seemingly opposing stylistic currents: the decorative tradition of
International Gothic
and the scientific involvement with perspective of the early Renaissance. Vasari maintained that Uccello wasted his time ‘on the finer points of perspective’ and presents him as an amiable fanatic who worked into the night and when told to come to bed by his wife would reply: ‘What a sweet mistress is this perspective!’ He undoubtedly took his enthusiasm to extraordinary lengths (in the
Battle of San Romano
the broken weapons and even the corpses recede neatly in accordance with the perspective scheme), but his effects were appropriate to his subjects and to the decorative charm of his pictures rather than mere technical exercises. In
The Hunt in the Forest
, for example, he creates not only an atmosphere of fairy-tale romance, but also, through the way in which the horses and dogs move swiftly back into space, an exhilarating sense of darting energy. Uccello's name became so identified with the subject of perspective that he was often said to have invented it:
Ruskin
, for example, wrote in a letter to Kate
Greenaway
‘I believe the perfection of perspective is only recent. It was first applied in Italian art by Paul Uccello . He went off his head with love of perspective.’
Uden , Lucas van
(1595–1672).
Flemish landscape painter and engraver, active mainly in his native Antwerp. Although there is no firm evidence for the tradition that he worked in
Rubens's
studio and painted landscape backgrounds for him, he was certainly strongly influenced by the master. His pictures are often large and have something of Rubens's sweep and richness. The figures were often added by other artists.
Flemish landscape painter and engraver, active mainly in his native Antwerp. Although there is no firm evidence for the tradition that he worked in
Rubens's
studio and painted landscape backgrounds for him, he was certainly strongly influenced by the master. His pictures are often large and have something of Rubens's sweep and richness. The figures were often added by other artists.
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