Day 416 - Sketches and character sketches in oil


 May 3, 2025

Gallery 639 contains a number of small oil paintings, and its introductory wall sign bears the title "Oil Sketches." In fact, however, only some of the paintings are "sketches" - that is, preparatory works intended to guide larger treatments of the same subject. The remaining paintings are what I would term character studies - paintings of men and women meant not to capture a likeness, as a portrait would do, but to convey a quality that is generalizable, not tied to a particular individual. Many works of both types are by well-known artists, including Rubens, Van Dyck, and Tintoretto.

My choice for today, in contrast, is by a Roman painter I'd never heard of, Orazio Borgianni, who se dates are 1578-1616. It's a relatively small (about 20 inches high and 15 inches wide) oil on canvas showing the head of an old woman.  Her forehead is deeply wrinkled; lines, too, surround her cast-down eyes. The skin above her bodice  has a crepe-y consistency I recognize in my own skin.The painting's limited palette of black, white, and flesh tones and the lighting, which illuminates half her face and throws the other half into shadow, adds further strength to the work. (It's not surprising to learn that Borgianni was a student of Caravaggio.) 

Other visitors seeming to wander through the gallery stop to look at this painting. They must find it as arresting as I do.

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