Fresco

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For other uses, see Fresco (disambiguation).

Image:Ferapontov.jpg Image:Indischer version3.jpg A fresco (plural frescoes) is a term for several related painting types. The word comes from the Italian phrase buon fresco ("really fresh") a technical term in opposition to in secco ("on dry surface").

True fresco (buon fresco) technique consists of painting in pigment in a water medium on wet or fresh lime mortar or plaster. In secco painting is done on dry plaster and with the pigments in a binding medium, like egg. The difference between the two techniques is that as it dries the wet plaster absorbs the pigment and the painting becomes part of the wall surface rather than resting on top of it. This makes a durable work of art; if the wall is destroyed the painting can often be reassembled because of the size of the plaster parts.

Because of the need to work on freshly-laid plaster, careful study of the wall surface can reveal the area worked on in one day. In Renaissance Italy this was commonly called a giornata ("daily amount"). These divisions are perceptible with some magnification and even the naked eye if the plastering technique was not good.

Painters in fresco often add details later in secco. These details are not part of the wall and so they are much less durable. Egyptian wall paintings in tombs are usually in secco, while the Roman wall paintings at Pompeii and Herculaneum are in fresco.

Andrea Palladio, the famous Italian architect of the 16th century, built many mansions with plain exteriors and stunning interiors filled with frescoes.

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Selected examples of Italian frescoes

Italian Late Medieval-Quattrocento

Panels (including Giotto, Lorenzetti, Martini and others) in upper and lower Basilica of San Francesco d'Assisi
Giotto, Cappella degli Scrovegni (Arena Chapel), Padua
Camposanto, Pisa
Masaccio, Brancacci Chapel, Santa Maria del Carmine di Firenze, Florence
Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Palazzo Pubblico, Siena
Piero della Francesca, Chiesa de San Francesco, Arezzo
Ghirlandaio, Cappella Tornabuoni, Santa Maria Novella, Florence
The Last Supper, Leonardo Da Vinci, Milan
Sistine Chapel Wall series: Botticelli, Perugino, Rossellini, Signorelli, and Ghirlandaio
Luca Signorelli, Chapel of San Brizio, Duomo, Orvieto