Pentimento

For other uses, seePentimento (disambiguation).

The Arnolfini PortraitbyJan van Eyck(1434). Among other changes made, the husband's face was higher by about the height of his eye, the wife's was higher, and her eyes looked more to the front. Each of the husband's feet wasunderdrawnin one position, painted in another, and thenoverpaintedin a third. These alterations can be seen in infra-red reflectograms.

In painting, apentimento(Italianfor 'repentance'; from the verbpentirsi,meaning 'to repent'; pluralpentimenti) is "the presence or emergence of earlier images, forms, or strokes that have been changed and painted over".Sometimes the English form "pentiment" is used, especially in older sources.

Significance

Pentimentimay show that a composition originally had an element, for example, a head or a hand, in a slightly different place, or that an element no longer in the final painting was originally planned. The changes may have been done in theunderdrawingof the painting, or by the visible layers of paint differing from the underdrawing, or by the first painted treatment of the element having been over-painted.

Somepentimentihave always been visible on the final painting with careful inspection; others are revealed by the increasing transparency that some paint acquires after several centuries. Others, especially in the underdrawing, can only be seen with modern methods such asX-raysandinfrared reflectographyand photographs. These are able to record photographically somepigments,depending on their chemical composition, which remain covered by later paint layers. For example,white lead,a common pigment, will be detected by X-ray, andcarbon blackunderdrawings can often be seen with great clarity in infra-red reflectograms.These methods have greatly expanded the number ofpentimentiart historians are aware of, and confirmed that they are very common in the works of manyold masters,fromJan van Eyckonwards.

The face of the woman in the imageThe Old Guitaristis painted over. These marks would not usually be described aspentimentias the subjects are totally different

Pentimenti are considered especially important when considering whether a particular painting is the first version by the original artist, or a second version by the artist himself, or his workshop, or a later copyist. Normally, secondary versions or copies will have few if any pentimenti, although this will not always be the case, as inThe Lute PlayerbyCaravaggio.LikeRembrandt,Titianand many other masters, Caravaggio seems rarely to have made preliminary drawings but to have composed straight onto the canvas. The number ofpentimentifound in the work of such masters naturally tends to be higher.

Marks revealing a totally different subject, for example inThe Old GuitaristbyPicasso,are not usually described aspentimenti– the artist has abandoned his "earlier composition" to begin a new one. In cases where a composition has been changed by a later painter or restorer, marks showing the original composition would not be described aspentimentieither; it must be the original painter who has changed his mind.

Evidence ofpentimentimay also help experts determine that the work was not created by a copier or forger since they are more likely to reproduce the original without making changes.

Usage in English

Jacques de NorvinsbyIngres

The term is usually treated as an Italian word and therefore written in italics, depending on the style used in the individual context. The fully anglicised wordpentiment(pluralpentiments) is much rarer, though included in theGrove Dictionary of Art.The distinction between singular and plural is also rather flexible; some writers refer to a change of just one outline aspentimenti,whilst others treat each area that has been changed as a singlepentimento.The wordpentimentois occasionally used synonymously withpalimpsest,but strictly the latter is used for documents and parchments which, due to fading, have been reused.

Examples

A portrait ofJacques de Norvinswas painted byIngresin 1811–12, when the sitter wasNapoleon's Chief of Police in Rome. Originally, instead of the curtain at the left, there was a fully painted bust of a boy's head on top of a small column. Probably this was a bust ofNapoleon II,Napoleon's son, who was known as theKing of Rome.The presumption is that this was overpainted with the curtain after the fall of Napoleon, either by Ingres himself, or another artist.The bust can just be made out in the enlarged online photo, with its chin level with the sitter's hair-line; the top of the column was level with the middle of the sitter's ear. These may always have been (just) visible, or have become so by the paint becoming transparent with age. Few viewers of the painting would notice the bust without it being pointed out. Strictly speaking, these alterations might not be described aspentimenti,because of the presumed lapse of time, and because another artist may have made the change.

Several examples byLeonardo da Vincican be found in hisSalvator Mundi,which was sold to a private collector for more than $450 million atChristie's.In particular the pose of Christ's right thumb was altered.

Caravaggio'sThe Cardsharps

A work byCaravaggio,The Cardsharpshas a number of typical minorpentimenti,altering the position of the figure on the right, which are revealed by infra-red reflectograms. These are used in discussing the painting and comparing it to another version of the subject inBari.

Christ and the Virgin in the House at NazarethbyZurbarán

Zurbarán's "Christ and the Virgin in the House at Nazareth" shows that the size of a white cloth was expanded after the dark backgroundunderpaintinghad been applied; the expanded area is a darker white.

An example byRembrandtcan be found in his 1654 portraitFlora.The painting depicts theRoman goddess of spring,thought to be modelled on his deceased wifeSaskia,and has elements ofpentimento,in a doublehat brimwhere the artist overpainted.

In 2016, as a result of the discovery ofpentimentiafter conservation and cleaning, theCourtauld Institutechanged its opinion on its version ofManet’sLe déjeuner sur l'herbefrom that of it being a copy to it being a preparatory painting that predates the version in the Louvre.Pentimentiwere visible once the old varnish was removed, including alterations to the curve of the back of the female nude and one of the male figures' cap, suggesting that the Courtauld picture is a preparatory work.

Other uses

The term has sometimes been used in a modern sense to describe the appearance of the sides of buildings with painted advertising. Often old ads are painted over with newer ads and the paint wears away to reveal the older layers. Examples inAmsterdam,New York Cityand elsewhere have been photographed.

Sources

• National Gallery Catalogues: The Fifteenth Century Netherlandish Paintings by Lorne Campbell, 1998,ISBN1-85709-171-X

External links

• National Gallery Glossary
• On-line feature onThe Feast of the GodsbyGiovanni Bellini,later changed byTitian.not strictly pentimenti, therefore, but shows x-rays etc.
• Infrared reflectograms from the Getty
• Street art example - theCoca-Cola-Mecca Smokes Pentimento
• Video regarding pentimento discovery in Jean-Honoré Fragonard'sFountain of Love