Museum Essay #1

Madame X (Madame Pierre Gautreau)                                                         Portrait of a Young Woman

1883-84 oil on canvas                                                                                        1456-59 oil on wood

John Singer Sargent                                                                                                Lorenzo di Credi

  

        Based on our class trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, we were given the privilege to explore the many exquisite pieces of art and able to choose two pieces to our satisfaction. I decided to focus on paintings made with oil, preferably oil on canvas. The piece titled "Madame X" was painted in 1883 and the medium used was oil on canvas. The second piece I chose is titled Portrait of a Young Woman painted in 1456 and the medium used was oil on wood. It was a bit difficult to try and find two pieces of art at least 500 years apart, but these two pieces are 427 years apart and still manage to share some similarities and some differences.
       The many simple similarities between these two pieces is they're both within the same medium of 2D oil painting, both are portraits of women who are also dressed in black dresses. Both of these woman look to be privileged and taken care of considering the jewelry and the gown. Both paintings mainly contain organic shapes with a few exceptions of some geometric shapes found in the backgrounds. These two pieces share almost the same colors of browns, black, and the same hues of white/cream to make their skin color. These paintings also show us direction found in the angle these women are positioned. Even though the oil paint used in the Portrait of a young woman is crackled I was amazed at how beautiful the texture of their skin seemed, very fine and smooth. The colors used in both of this paintings are in the variation of cool colors.
      The slim differences between these two pieces is of course the time frame of 427 years apart.  Also what I found interesting was the much earlier paintings were oil on wood much like the Portrait of the young woman. While the later pieces like Madame X was oil on canvas. One of the major differences I noticed between these pieces was the use of shading in the painting of Madame X. The shading found behind her to show her shadow and the shading technique used to paint her hair in such a realistic way. Also the details found in Madame's gown that makes it look as if you are looking a photograph instead. There isn't much shading found in the earlier piece of the young woman except for the veil she seems to be wearing over her head. I did find that the Madame piece had more fine details that made the piece seem more realistic than the Young woman which seems like a drawing but not so real like a photograph.
      My experience in viewing two different works of art from different eras was a little tedious trying to find two portraits that really captured my eye and attention. Two pieces that shared somewhat of a similarity but yet were different. I enjoyed my experience in the museum alone wondering through the million and one rooms displayed with centuries of art and sculptures from all over the world. I look forward to our other class trips soon to come.