CategoriesMedium and Techniques
Large-Scale Painting
Paintings big enough to fill a wall or surround the viewer, used to glorify, overwhelm or change how a picture is experienced.
No works indexed yet · 10 related artists
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About
Size changes how a painting acts on the body. A very large canvas can overwhelm, surround or pull the viewer in, and has long signalled the ambition of churches, rulers and artists.
Venice set early records: Paolo Veronese's The Wedding at Cana (1563) seats well over a hundred figures across nearly ten metres, and Tintoretto's Paradise (about 1588–92) for the Doge's Palace is wider still. Gustave Courbet caused outrage with A Burial at Ornans (1849–50) by giving ordinary villagers heroic scale. In the 20th century size became a way to alter perception. Barnett Newman wanted Vir Heroicus Sublimis (1950–51) seen from close up, so its red field fills the eye, and James Rosenquist's F-111 (1964–65) wrapped a room in Pop images of a warplane and consumer goods. Muralists such as Blu now paint whole building façades. Look from far away, then close enough to lose the edges.
Related artists
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Large-Scale Photography
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Long Distance and Deep Distance
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Manuscript
Maquette
Mediated View
Miniature and Small-Scale Paintings
Mixed-Media
Monochrome Painting
Multiple Exposure
Multiple Screens
Multiple Styles
Murals and Wall Drawings
Negative Image
Oil on Copper
