Speaking of paragone, people would immediately think of the debate over the primacy of painting and sculpture from the Italian Renaissance. But the term may also refer to the comparisons between the two complementary, if no contrasting, approaches of painting: drawing and color, a persistent rivalry that cyclically reborn throughout the centuries.
Florentines and Venetians
Both Florence and Venice are powerful cities during the time of the Italian Renaissance in the 16th century. As the renaissance arts had strong regional associations, the two regions differ in their emphasis on the two painting approaches. The Florentine style focused on lines and designs ( “disegno” ) while the Venetian School prioritized tones and colors ( “colorito” ). Such preference is mainly reflected in their painting strategies: Florentine painters, like Michelangelo, would use drawing as a pre-step to study anatomy and design the composition before picking up the brush, whereas Venetian artists, such as Titian, would often directly layer and blend color-strokes on the canvas with the composition worked out in a more spontaneous manner.
Poussinistes and Rubénistes
In the late 17th century, a debate broke out regarding the aesthetic qualities and relative merits of the two aspects of painting in the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture in Paris. On one side is Poussinistes, champions of the French painter Nicolas Poussin, arguing the preeminent importance of drawing, and on the other side, the Rubénistes, supporters of the Flemish painter Peter Paul Rubens, advocating the color.
As a leading figure of Poussinistes, Charles Le Brun regarded drawing as the fundamental basis of painting, one can exist by itself, whereas the color “dépend tout à fait de la matière, et par conséquent qu’elle est moins noble que le dessin qui ne relève que de l’esprit.” To this, Roger De Piles responded in his book <Cours de peinture par principes> (notorious for its Balance des Peintres), arguing that drawing is not foundation but rather substrate, a power to be realized by receiving the determination of the color - “au contraire on fait voir par là que le dessein, tout seul, comme on le suppose, n'est le fondement du coloris, et ne subsiste avant lui que pour en recevoir la perfection par rapport à la Peinture et il n'est pas surprenant que ce qui reçoit ait son être et subsiste avant ce qui doit être reçu.”
The battle raged for about thirty years and ended in favor of Rubénistes with the acceptance of Watteau’s Le Pèlerinage à l'île de Cythère into Royale Academy, which also signals the rise of Rococo. Neoclassicism and Romanticism
In the mid-19th century, this debate was reignited in a form of rivalry between the Neoclassic painter Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, defending for the lines, and romantic painter, Eugène Delacroix, promoting the color. Tired of Rococo’s frivolity and excesses, Neoclassicism, the dominant style in the Enlightenment, aimed to revive classic antiquity’s “noble simplicity and quiet grandeur”. Influenced by his teacher Jacques-Louis David, Ingres’s style is reserved and calm, featured crisp outlines and clear lightning. Romanticism, in contrast, rejects rigid confinement and advocates intense emotion and individualism. As such, Delacroix’s work is unrestrained and impetuous, with chaotic arrangements and lush colors. Yet, the antagonism between the two painters was not limited to aesthetic preference, but also involved personal conflicts -
A Lioness and a Caricature of Ingres.
Remarks
This
paragone echoed through the ages, even in the 20th century’s modern art movement, one can trace it in the contrast between Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse. The debates were more than painting approaches themselves as they were inevitably interwoven with political perspectives and historical contexts. When arguing the roles of design and color, the comparison between painting and poetry was often discussed. Frequently invoked were Horace’s famous simile
ut pictura poesis and Aristotle’s analogy in
Poetics assimilating the design in painting to the plot in poetry. Regardless of many times being overworked or quoted out of context, this analogy is in itself illuminating for understanding the distinction of these two manners of expression. Drawing was long viewed as a bearer of intellect and reason, and color of emotion and sensation. This association may partly owe to the comparatively late development of color theory to that of perspective and anatomic studies, but it also reflects their inherent distinctions: drawing as an approach is in its nature more definitive and purposive whereas coloring is more subtle and enjoys more freedom. To me, drawing is the logical structure, the choreograph, and the composer’s score, whilst color is the phrases, the dancer’s steps, and the pianist’s touch. In the end, along with this long-lasting competition and seesaw battles in claiming the art periods and movements throughout the history is the growth of aesthetic philosophy and development of humanistic theories, which I think is the value of this competition.
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| Fig. Ut Pictura Poesis, study after Charles François Hutin |
REFERENCE
[1] Giorgio Vasari, Julia C. Bondanella, and Peter Bondanella. The Lives of the Artists. Oxford University Press, 1998.
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