The 7 Most Important Features of the Baroque

He Baroque the baroque style is a period Historical culture western, That was characterized Or by a paradigm of conceiving the art.

It was developed in Western Europe and in the European colonies in Latin America, and covered between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

Fontana di Trevi

Historians divide the baroque in three stages: "Primitive"(1580-1630),"mature"(1630-1680) and"tardy"(1680-1750) . This new paradigm Produced Changes and new works in all fields Artistic

You may also like This list of authors of the baroque .

Baroque style general characteristics

1- It's an art exaggerated

The baroque artists played with the imbalance and tried to impress those who observed with effective and dynamic forms. The distortion of the classical forms, the contrasts of lights and shadows distinguish it.

The Baroque was a movement that contrasted with the art of the Renaissance and Classicism. Its exaggerated character is reflected in its architecture that had an excess of adornments. For example, The Basilica of St. Peter of Rome designed By Gian Lorenzo Bernini.

2- It is realistic

Baroque art was influenced by The time of religious wars in Europe. It is often shocking or even grotesque. A realistic representation of life prevailed, which at times contradicted religion. Developed in an era of economic hardship, man faces the harsh reality.

Its realistic character was based on famous passages of the Bible and showed to his heroes like humans.

For example, The italian painter Caravaggio , One of the greatest exponents of baroque painting, painted the Death of the Virgin Mary The Death Della Vergine. This painting, which is now exposed in the Louvre in Paris, caused controversy since it is not known whether Mary went to heaven or not as her son. This canvas responds to that question in a very human way.

3- It is syncretic type

Baroque cultural expressions were syncre Ethical , In the sense that each artistic expression was linked to the others.

Architecture was closely linked to painting and sculpture. Wave music, Dance and theater, whose convergence created the opera . In other times, the characteristics of each type of art were more independent of each other.

4- Influence of scientific and geographical discoveries

Galileo Galilei perfected the telescope and Rene Descartes developed rationalism. These discoveries broke the idea of ​​the world that the common man had. That is why the baroque expresses the feeling of fear before the new, of confusion and suspicion.

These feelings are reflected in the music, which is full of feeling and drama. For example, the composition Passions from Johann Sebastian Bach or The works of Shakespeare .

This"emotional weight"is very noticeable in the sculptures, for example, El David By Bernini. Although far from the classic David. Bernini shows David performing an action, his face reflects effort and his movement figure, while classic art seeks to represent the eternal.

Consequently, baroque art has a Weak logical content And confuses the true and the false, the beginning and the end, the clear and the dark. It is a kind of art pedantic and artificial, sarcastic and controversial.

5 - It had a propagandistic purpose

Absolutism, The church and the bourgeois A Used baroque art To promote your ideas . In response, baroque artists were divided into those who worked for the church or for a monarch and in those who wanted to be independent.

As a consequence, the subjects treated by each artist were different. The church, on the other hand, wanted to promote its doctrine and show that the Counter-Reformation was bearing fruit and that the Catholic Church had not been defeated.

In this line, the monarchs wanted to demonstrate that their power was absolute. Thanks to which the painting developed, more than anything the portrait genre.

Finally were the independent artists, who mostly lived in the Netherlands and Germany. His works showed the day to day of the bourgeoisie. For example, works by Johannes Vermeer as Girl reading a letter or The girl of the pearl .

Thanks to the"cultural politics"of these power groups, the Baroque era enjoyed a Patronage boom Ecclesiastical, monarchical and aristocratic. Art became popular and many art schools were created such as the Académie Royale d'Art in Paris in 1648 and the Akademie der Künste in Berlin in 1696.

6- The Tenebrism

It is the contrast of lights and shadows thanks to the illumination. Although this concept is mainly applied to Baroque painting, it can be said Baroque theater, sculpture and other genres of visual representation were influenced by this game with lighting.

This technique helped to highlight the drama of the works and created an optical illusion of a change of mood in the painted men or in the faces of the sculptures.

7- Lack of a central point in his compositions

Unlike Renaissance art, which points to the viewer as The main point of the work , Baroque art was composed of many components each of which represents a story.

For example, according to Classical architecture when constructing a temple or any building, HE Distinguishes A and The altar or the columns, which were more beautiful than the rest of the building and were its center.

Instead, the baroque style invited to create a full building Of details: on the floor, walls, windows. The same applies to painting or music.

From the philosophical point of view, the lack of a central point reflected the broken ideas of the Europeans, who understood that Europe was not the center of the world and that the Vatican was not the lord of Europe.

In painting, the lack of focus was reflected in the absence of clear lines. Compared with Renaissance art, whose lines And perspectives Indicated the primordial and the secondary, the baroque paid attention To the history in the work and the process of creation of the same. It focuses on the feelings it conveys and other factors.

Specific characteristics of the Baroque

Baroque Literature

HE Characterized by denying the serene style, which was stylized during Classicism. Baroque is a conflictive and dramatic style.

In different European countries the Baroque developed specific aspects. English poets developed the Eufuism, while in France and Italy it was reflected at Precious movement and the Marinism, respectively .

The baroque in Spain was called Conceptismo While Germany followed the general trends of the time.

It is interesting to note that the baroque also developed in Latin America. Its main exponents were Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, Pedro de Oña, Bernardo de Balbuena and Francisco de Terrazas. It was characterized by:

1. Touch Negative issues , Such as hunger or suffering
2. Use and excess of Metaphors, periphrasis, alliterations and hyperbates . The hyperbaton or hyperbates are phrases, in which the logical order of the sentence is altered.
3. Latinization Of European languages. That is, they took phrases and grammatical constructions of the Latin.

Baroque sculpture

Laocoonte and his sons

1. The Representation of the movement. With the help of the illumination different perspectives of the work were obtained when being seen from different angles.
2. Representation of nature , but Without idealizing it .
3. Nudes , As in classical sculpture, but the compositions were asymmetrical. No attempt was made to reflect perfection. They predominate The oblique poses and serpentines .
4. They also develop Sources and statuary With religious, mythological and other motives. In this case, sculpture complemented architecture.

Baroque architecture

It is considered by some, not as style Architectural style, but as a decorative style of architectural objects. It is characterized by:

1. The symmetry.
2. Buildings with lots ornamentation. L The columns became an ornament, the walls were filled with paintings and ceilings of frescoes.
3. Curved lines Predominate in front of the straight lines, which Sensation of movement Which creates optical illusions. The structures had ample ships.
4. Plenty of windows.

The Baroque Theater

The Baroque style in plays was characterized by six fundamental rules that governed it:

1. He broke with the 3-unit rule. According to this, each work had a main action, a stage and a day (the actions happened the same day).
2. Reduction of the number of acts: from five to three.
3. Language was adapted, which allowed the unprivileged classes to understand theater.
4. Tragicomedia was introduced.
5. The rhetorical figures in the dialogues of the personages were given importance.
6. The metrics of lyrical poetry are brought to the theater.

Baroque painting

Maria Immaculata. Bartolomé Esteban Murillo.

Although the main technique of the time is oil painting on canvas, there are other characteristics that define the discipline of this era:

1. Naturalism, without idealization. It also presents the old and the ugly. In this sense, it is possible to emphasize the voluptuous and exaggerated forms, that became popular.
2. Color and its contrasts play a major role. As highlighted above, colors play with light. See Tenebrism.
3. Movement and Expressiveness. The paintings were freed of geometric compositions and symmetry.
4. Domain volume and depth of objects. This technique allowed to paint subjects that came from different perspectives and were gathered in the center of the pictures. Each one from different planes told his own story.

Baroque music

Johann Sebastian Bach

1. The contrast. As in other artistic expressions of the time, baroque music shows a great contrast between the notes of each instrument and the voices of the singers.
2. It developed The continuous bass. For example, the same note was played with different instruments, such as the harpsichord or harpsichord and cello. In this way the difference between these sounds was appreciated. This altercation of sounds was followed by slow sounds.
3. It developed The notal music. Before, music was modal and based on ancient modes and scales. In the baroque was created the system of scales: major and minor, with chords.
4. It is created Compass Y rhythm . It develops the regular and marked pulse used today.
5. Instrumental music becomes independent.
6. The profane music Was popularized and developed.
7. The vocal forms are developed: Opera , Oratory, cantata, passion.

Baroque opera

The Opera organized by the monarchs in their palaces had Many characters (Between singers and dancers), while the operas presented in theaters had few characters and could even be represented by Duets .

1. The scenography During the late Baroque.
2. The Castrati They become the most influential artists of the opera. The castrati were singers who castrated during childhood to keep their voice sharp.