Historical Art Periods



Rococo Art

The Rococo was an artistic movement born in France, which develops gradually between 1720 and 1740. The Rococo art is defined as an individualist, anti-formalist and courteous. It is characterized by a taste for bright colors that are soft and clear. It entails the predominate forms inspired by nature, mythology, the beauty of the naked bodies, the Eastern art and especially topics gallant and loving. It is an art that is basically mundane without religious influences, which addresses issues of daily life and human relationships, a style that seeks to reflect what is pleasing, refined, exotic and sensual.

It developed from 1730 to 1770, mainly in the Holy Roman Empire (Germany, Austria, Bohemia), Southern Europe (Italy, Spain, Portugal), following the movement baroque, creating a style of great extravagance, especially in churches and sacred places. This style culminated in the work of the architect and designer of Flemish origin Bavarian Cuvilliés Francis, whose flag Amalienburg (1734-1739) at Nymphenburg near Munich remains an unsurpassed example perfect fusion of architecture and decoration. It has been regarded as the culmination of the Baroque, however, is an independent style that is a reaction to classical baroque imposed by the court of Louis XIV (Greer, 1995). The Baroque Rococo unlike, is characterized by opulence, elegance and the use of bright colors that contrast with the gloom and darkness of the baroque.



Decorative painting style in the eighteenth century was characterized by elaborate ornamentation, delicate and ornate. Rococo was the prelude to a period of regency of Philip of Orleans in France (1715-1723), during which the works were created characterized by greater freedom and decorative. It flourished for Louis XV, in which case a Rococo spread in Europe, especially in Bavaria, Prussia, Austria, the Czech Republic, Saxony, in Silesia, in Poland and Russia (Jailer, 2000). The concept of Rococo (Rococo) was established on the basis of word rocaille , possibly by contamination with the word barocco (Baroque). Rocaille ornament is asymmetric, plastic, made ??of shell-like forms, rooster comb or flames.

The term comes from the French Rococo rocaille, meaning 'pebbles'. The decoration was characterized by arabesques based ornamentation, seashells, sinuous curves and asymmetry, in painting distinguished by the use of rather pale pastel colors. The most representative painters were François Boucher and Jean-Honoré Fragonard, the former is famous for painting scenes of vanity populated by many cherubs, while the second is characterized by the gallant scenes that take place inside the cab or in clear forest. As for the decor, the Rococo reached its peak in the Hôtel de Soubise in Paris, work that began in 1732 and contributed a number of notable artists and designers, among them Gabriel René Germain Boffrand and Alexis Delamaire.

The Rococo style spread quickly to other European countries, particularly Germany and Austria, where they mingled with the baroque style creating a sumptuous and heavy, especially in churches and sacred spaces. Culminated in the work of architect and designer François de Cuvilliés Bavarian in his Amalienburg Pavilion (1734-1739), near Munich, the interior, ...