Color in Painting
Cosimo Tura
A Muse (Calliope?)
Probably 1455–60
Oil over egg tempera on wood (poplar), 116.2 × 71.1 cm. The National Gallery, London
A crimson mantle, a dark blue dress, a green skirt and red sleeves shot with gold glow from layered paint. Oil was still uncommon in Italy in the 1450s, and here it carries the final layers of color.
- Under the oil lies an earlier, partly finished design in egg tempera.
- The richest passages are built up in translucent oil layers over more solid paint, an effect beyond egg tempera.
- For pale colors he chose walnut oil, the less yellow of the two oils he used, to keep them bright.
Concepts
Image: Wikimedia Commons (PD-Art; original in The National Gallery, London, NG3070) · Public domain