What Is a Painting?
Episodes
28 episodes
Episode 28 - The Tears of Trees
How did painters use natural resins to varnish their paintings?
Episode 27 - Higher Ground
How did 16th century Venetian painters vary their ground layers to create different effects?
Episode 26 - Particular Magic
How did Venetian painters of the 16th century use canvas supports and oil medium to create a new kind of painting?
Episode 25 - A Big Cloth
How have natural aqueous media been used over the centuries, including by one of the most famous artists of the 20th century?
Episode 24 - Reinforcements
What can be done to reinforce a degraded canvas support of a painting, and how can that change that painting's look?
Episode 23 - Glue and Blues
How does paint made from animal glue and different blue pigments work, look, and age?
Episode 22 - A Little Cloth
What is the canvas of a canvas painting, and why and how was it used?
Episode 21 - A Copy of a Copy: The Ghent Altarpiece, Part 4
What's the story of the painting of the Just Judges panel now on display in Ghent?
Episode 20 - A Missing Piece: The Ghent Altarpiece, Part 3
Where is the Just Judges panel of the Ghent Altarpiece?
Episode 19 - The Sum of Many Parts: The Ghent Altarpiece, Part 2
What happened to the Ghent Altarpiece between 1566 and 1934?
Episode 18 - A Complex Whole: The Ghent Altarpiece, Part 1
What is the Ghent Altarpiece, how was it created, and what changes did it undergo in the first 125 years of its existence?
Episode 17 - A Changing Landscape
How did Early Netherlandish painters use different materials to create different kinds of landscapes, and how have those paintings changed over time?
Episode 16 - Translucent Color
How does the use of different media affect the look of paint?
Episode 15 - An Elaborated Sketch
How were the underdrawings of Early Netherlandish paintings made and how can we see them?
Episode 14 - More Memories of the Forest
Why are the oak panels of Early Netherlandish paintings good supports, and what can they tell us?
Episode 13 - A Dark Mirror
How do Early Netherlandish paintings differ from Early Italian paintings - in how they look, what they mean, and what they are?
Episode 12 - A Survivor of the Flood, Part 2
What's the story of the Cimabue Crucifix at Santa Croce, Florence? From 1966 until now.
Episode 11 - A Survivor of the Flood, Part 1
What's the story of the Cimabue Crucifix at Santa Croce, Florence? From the thirteenth century until 1966.
Episode 10 - New Again
How do modern and contemporary paintings reflect some of the physical aspects of Early Italian paintings? Some thoughts about engaged frames and the use of gold leaf.
Episode 9 - An Imitation of Luxury
How did Early Italian painters combine gold and paint to imitate luxury textiles?
Episode 8 - Egg and Bright Earth
What are the components of the paint used by Early Italian painters, how did they use it, and how has it changed over the centuries?
Episode 7 - Half-Solidified Sunlight
How were the gold backgrounds of Early Italian paintings created, and how have they changed over time?
Episode 6 - Sinew and Stone
Episode 6 - How did painters turn natural materials from animal and mineral sources into the perfect preparation for their panel paintings? A look at Early Italian gesso grounds.