What time Is It?

          Here are two maternity paintings, two Madonnas, each reflects their time and each reflects some shared symbolism, in terms of color, subject, posture and design.  In Gerard David’s Maternity painting, painted around 1500, Mary wears blue, ultramarine blue. She wears the ancient color symbol for sky, or the cosmos. She has been elevated to celestial status by virtue of her expensive ulatramarine blue clothing. Ultramarine, by the way, does not mean “the color of the sea.” Instead it refers to the lapis lazuli semi-precious stone which was ground into powder then mixed with oil to form paint. Since the time of ancient Rome lapis lazuli has come from across the sea ( ultra marine) from Afghanistan. This made the pigment terribly expensive. Therefore, it was suited only for valuable subjects like Mary, the virgin queen of heaven ( of the blue infinity). She is also wearing a white blouse; white symbolizes chastity, purity and perfection. You recall that brides wear white as a symbol of their purity, their virginity.  She also has a bit of red peeking out in several spots, ankles and wrists. Red ( Carmine or Vermilion) was made from different sources and both were expensive( the Kermes insect for the carmine and, cinnabar and mercury sulfide for vermilion), again the valuable subject is designated as valuable by the use of expensive pigments.  Red, a hierarchical  color of the highest rank (with gold) denoted status and privilege and, was therefore the color choice for dressing popes and cardinals.  Bishops and priests wore varying qualities of black and, the lowly friar was left with brown, the cheapest and commonest color. In the contemporary  maternity painting by Gerhard Richter you can find the same symbolism, white for purity, blue for heavenly as well as the modern gender-designating color for boys. ( I have male relatives who still shudder at the thought of wearing pink but, red, no problem).  In Richter’s work, I see  other indications of  its contemporary  identity.  The maternal figure is cropped; only her upper body  can be seen in the painting.  This form of cropping developed with the use of the camera obscura and, later with the film camera.  Use of the camera obscura in painting doesn’t start until later in the 1500s. Gerard  David’s painting has the subject centered and completely presented  from head to toe.  David’s painting is static with edges tightly defined.  This is not how our biological vision works but, it’s how we think it works. David presents a traditional idea of color recession, fading quickly from a yellow and brown foreground to blue green and finally, to blue distance. The grainy blurring of Richter’s work reminds us of a photograph snapped during excessive motion.    In Richter’s  example he shows us how a camera captures color and edge acuity differently, uniformly degraded, granular and blurred like a flawed photograph.  Two artists separated by 500 years yet, still borrowing from the same traditions, traditions with roots reaching deep into antiquity.