Angels in art

Introduction

The angel in the art will identify the origins and different variants of the use of the representation of the father figure of the angel in the figurative arts in particular the Christian art in its different forms of expression: the table's altarpieces (often polyptychs), the frescoes, the sculptures, the stained glass, and the mosaics.

In the Western painters like Fra Angelico, Giotto, Memling and Van Eyck are famous in this area, as Andrei Rublev and the tradition of icons in Orthodoxy, the series of "Musician Angels" of Melozzo of Forli, or the angel of Transverberation of St. Teresa by Bernini.

Traditionally, especially in painting, angels have been depicted as winged beings (adapted from the iconography of Eros), but may be invisible spirits or even just light rays seen everything that can appear on earth not only as being humans but also animals or even objects. Possibly, for visionary or entranced beings mystic, the "wings" were the faint or energetic movement that envisioned about his appearances and that a translation of something culturally intelligible, was equated with "wings".

Although it should be added the desire of man to fly, and the Angels being a perfect human beings, God gave the gift to fly through the skies.

Discussion

The angel is a spiritual being, mentioned in texts as an immaterial substance, without body, so that its representation varied traditions and eras. Until the Middle Ages, it is the philosophical and theological speculations that prevail on the representations: most of the time the angel is represented with a human face, sometimes wingless appears, that is to say, wingless (a horse or a scale then allows it to move), sometimes provided with wings indicating its ability to move through the worlds. Christian iconography found inspiration in the statuary of winged spirits of Greek or Roman world, with no reference in the text. The angel takes the masculine features, is dressed in a gown or drape a white to evoke the light (blue in Byzantine). It will have later another attribute: the halo. It is rarely seen stealing in the vastness of the heavens. His posture is rather that of waiting, standing or levitation, or close to God that he has to help. Throughout the Middle Ages the tradition remains: the thin body, modesty looks.

The angel then takes on the appearance of a beautiful teenager, ready to be confused with Eros. The angel has the beauty of the "devil", to be quite an earthly and sensual. This is also the time of interior architectural decoration with great prospects. The heavens, constructions against dive-decorate the palace. To "angel-youths" vertigo seized full weightlessness combine playful putti and plump staged. The artists are largely based putti of antiquity.

Gradually, as the angel of the representations abound, it becomes a purely ornamental motif, devoid of thought and sacred meaning. The Baroque XVII and XVIII centuries gives prominence to the little angel baby-faced, chubby, winged cherubs multiply in painting as a trick to make the best perspective. The angel ornament is at its peak ...