- Painting in layers involves applying paint either from light to dark or dark to light. Monochromatic color schemes create strong moods. - In art, light represents emotion. Paintings use lighting techniques like backlighting, spotlighting, and chiaroscuro to convey emotion and draw attention to certain elements. Dramatic lighting was pioneered by artists like Caravaggio and Rembrandt and later adopted in film. - Artists use value studies in black and white to work out compositions, focusing on the contrast between light and dark areas. Light can have different qualities like directional, glowing, or supernatural depending on the intended effect.

1. Painting in Layers
• Bright underneath
• Dull on top
• (or vice versa)

5. paint on a dark background

6. Dark green on a red background

8. Monochromatic
color schemes
create a strong
mood

11. “Light” Value and Concept

12. In art, light is emotion.
The idea of a ‘spotlight’
is as old as the Romans.
(Pantheon, Rome)

13. Light is emotion - in this painting it comes from the sky and the ground
(John Singer Sargent "Setting Out to Fish" 1888)

14. The color of something
depends on the light.
Elmer Bischoff

15. What captivates us
about the woman? The
backlighting on her hat,
and the veiled shadow
across her eyes.
(Johannes Vermeer, 1665)

16. Vermeer’s cat -
Notice the
backlighting
around the head.

17. Degas' bather - the
light is radiant,
coming in from the
window, and
reflected up from
the pan of water.
Can you imagine
this in black and
white?

18. Here’s the black and
white version.
The feeling comes from
the contrast.
The woman is ‘bathed in
light.’

19. Theatrical light is directional light illuminating darkness (like a theater stage or in a movie). This kind of
chiaroscuro lighting was pioneered by Caravaggio. Caravaggio “The Calling of St Matthew“ 1602

20. Dramatic light used in
art down through the
ages.
“The End” (1897) by
German Expressionist
artist Kathe Kollwitz.

21. Early filmmakers
evolved their vision out
the tradition of painting
- this case creating pools
of light.
German filmmaker
Gerhard Lamprecht,
1921

22. The language of dramatic light developed in Europe first in art and then in film, was transplanted to
America in the 1930’s as these German filmmakers fled Hitler and landed in Hollywood.
("Hands of Orlac” by Robert Weine)

23. The same dramatic feeling with just a man in a room. What if the man wasn't there, would the feeling be the same?
(Richard Diebenkorn, brush and ink on paper)

24. Rembrandt also
pioneered this kind of
dramatic light.
In this painting, it’s a
spiritual light falling
from above, a ‘blessed
light.’ It's directional but
softer. And once again,
light is reflected up from
the water at the same
time it flows down from
the sky.
Rembrandt van Rijn: A
Woman Bathing In A Stream
(Hendrickje Stoffels) 1654

25. Another kind of light.
Glowing, mystical,
supernatural light - the
light isn't falling on the
flower, the light is
coming from it. It is the
source of the light.
Georgia O'Keefe

26. Supernatural light,
glowing from the object
This is also a long
tradition in Western art.
Matthias Grünewald
Isenheim Altarpiece 1615

27. The same kind of light applied to a surrealist fantasy: a glowing egg casts a supernatural glow on
the shapes surrounding it.
Glenn Hirsch, acrylic on canvas, 60x72

28. his same glowing, supernatural light applied to a flying saucer.
"The Day the Earth Stood Still" by Robert Wise

29. Another use for light is
to arrange shapes - in
this case, light against
dark, and dark against
light.
George Seurat, charcoal.

30. Translation of value, light against dark and dark against light. (Georges Seurat, drawing)

31. Translation of value -
light against dark, and
dark against light.

32. Translation of value - white against black, and black against white. (Mo Seder, student work.)

33. When faced with a complex composition, artists do a black and white study.

34. Artists look for the translation of value, light against dark and dark against light, when figuring out a
complex composition.

36. “Self-Portrait in a Dream”

37. The life of dreams is light
Gloria Andrade

38. The life of dreams is
surprise
Franco Mancini

39. The life of dreams is detail
Cotalvi Gonzales

40. Animals can represent the
soul
Jeanine McCallister

41. Animals can represent the
soul
Jane Willson

42. Animals can represent the
soul
Jane Willson

43. Kate Eisenberg

44. Flying dream Allison Goss

45. Falling dream
Brian Labrie

46. Floating dream Jonathon Burstein

47. A dream of sorrow
Linda Norstrom-Jonsson

48. Dream party Michael Rabichev

49. Nightmare
(after Alfred Hitchkock)
Susannah Bayne

50. Nightmare
Caravaggio
(after Caravaggio)
Brian Mellio

52. Dream of ‘Losing Face’
Yoko Mazza

53. Dream of ‘Losing Face’
Yoko Mazza

54. Dream of ‘Losing Face’
Yoko Mazza