Romanticism & Realism: Changing Landscapes 

In my essay I will be looking at the contrast between romanticism and photo-realism, how light controls the image and how photographers are able to control how the picture will look like, by the time of day, the angle and being able to change the settings of the camera. I will be looking at the history of romanticism and photo-realism, and how it’s presented now. I will also compare my work with the artists that I’ll be looking at, such as: John Constable, Richard Estes and Ansel Adams mainly, however I’ll also include information on contemporary photographers. So far, in this project I’ve learnt the definitions or photorealism and romanticism, and I was then able to link my practical work with those movements, and to also link how light can affect those movements.

Photorealism is a style of art, sculpture or photography which contains a plentiful amount of detail, which makes the piece of art look very realistic, and photo-like. Photorealism can also be known as ‘super-realism’, which was an American art movement that started in around 1960’s by very few artists who decided to work realistically, under the influence of an image. They would project the image onto the canvas and would paint in a very large scale, including lots of tiny detail.

Romanticism is a movement, not only in art but also in literature, music and many more subjects. Romanticism can define harmony, peace, love and more, therefore I believe its link with landscapes, helps to define them and create a mood.

In the 18th century, painters wouldn’t focus on landscapes, however, they would include landscapes as the background of a prior subject. Also in 1800’s, photography was then known as art, and only very few people who had the opportunity to travel and take a camera with them to explore would be able to catch these moments of landscapes. After the few following years, people started to look at the beauty of naturalism within landscapes, and understand the importance of nature. In landscape photography, lighting is very important, since the times that coloured images were produced, you was able to see the rich colours that nature contains, and create fascinating pictures with light and dark contrast. Landscape photography can also be taken at any time of the day, in any weather conditions, because there’s always something beautiful in landscapes and nature.

Constable was educated in Dedham Grammar School, after finishing education in the school, he started to work in his father’s business. He married Maria Bicknell in 1816, they moved to Suffolk due to the fact that Maria suffered from tuberculosis, and in Suffolk it would be much healthier for her, and it would be easier to live there as they had seven children. They also travelled a lot to Brighton, also for Maria’s health, however soon after, she died. This really affected Constable as before, Constable adored to paint oil sketches of places that were significant to him and places that he knew, mainly in Suffolk, he wanted to make sure to paint them as naturally and realistically as he could, and liked painting skies at different days and different times in order to get different colours, some more beautiful than others, but they were always very natural. Constable wanted to paint places that he’s been to in Suffolk and Essex because they were places that he would spend a lot of time, which made those paintings his main subjects. He met John Thomas Smith, who advised Constable to paint but also stay at his father’s business. He would really enjoy painting, however he didn’t take up the opportunity of becoming a professional artist as his father really wanted him to take over his business at the mill. In 1799, he persuaded his father to let him do what he want to do, which is to be a painter, therefore he then copied and studied old masters. He was inspired by Dutch artists like Jacob van Ruisdael.

The 1800’s were marked as the change from neoclassicism movement, to romanticism, and Constable’s work has a link to the times in which romanticism was the main movement. Therefore, I believe that Constable was influenced by the change in art movement, or he was the one that influenced artists to paint realistically and romantically.

'When I sit down to make a sketch from nature, the first thing I try to do is to forget that I have ever seen a picture' This is what Constable told Leslie, as he silently rebelled about the way that artists were taught to use their imagination.

The reason for which I’ve chosen Constable’s work, is because his work really relates to romanticism and realism, therefore, and this is the type of work that I would like to photograph, instead of painting. As Constable would continuously travel due to his wife, he would paint the places that had some sort of significance to him. The colours, the contrast and the light and shades he used really express the romantic side of his work. In my opinion, his work is very romantic due to the colours and realistic due to the brush marks and the detail which he includes.

In my work, I look at the way that lighting and colours can change the mood of a photograph, and that is exactly what I am trying to present in my photo.

In the painting I see a man riding a horse who’s drinking from the blue fairly small lake, bumpy land and a sky with soft clouds and sunlight breaking through the clouds. The painting is coloured as he tries to make it look very romantic and delicate with realistic colours. My eye is mainly drawn to the sunlight breaking through the clouds and the lake that’s in the middle, although, after a second the whole painting is very spacious with little details that makes you wonder what they are and how what they could represent in the painting. The painting also makes you wonder, ‘what was the meaning behind it?’ And ‘why did Constable present it that way?’ The lighting is natural and draws your attention to the whole painting overall, but mainly the land and the lake, which is very delicate, but you can clearly see the brush marks that were made. Looking at the painting it makes me feel free due to the large amount of space and because a lot of the sky is shown.

Richard Estes moved over to Chicago at an early age, with his family. Estes has started educating at The School of The Art Institute Of Chicago, there he studied fine art. Most of the time he studied realist artists and they really inspired him. After completing his courses he moved over to New York City and began working as a graphic designer for magazine and advertising agencies, which turned out to be a longer job as it lasted for 10 years. He worked for New York and Spain, also painting in spare time and ever since 1962 he moved to Spain and started to live and grow his career as a full time painter.

Estes’ building photographs were always taken during day time, and would include a lot of detail such as stickers and signs on windows that were set for display, however, his work didn’t include things such as snow during winter times or litter, because they would distract the paintings from focusing on the buildings. He would paint the photographs he took on large scale, and created beautiful three dimensional pieces on two dimensional canvases. Estes’ work has been marked as photo-realistic, as his paintings included lots of detail and looked very realistic, which made people think that they were photographs. He really loves to focus on buildings, and reflections but sometimes has a one off painting which may include the sea or a river.

Estes liked to avoid famous places of New York, and wanted to focus more on places that contained less people but more detail on each building. “Depth and intensity of vision that only artistic transformations can achieve.” It was also really important for Estes to be able to recognise the main subject of the painting even if the images were slightly distorted due to reflections.