Art Shorts: The White Dot.

Certain themes are ever-present throughout the history of art. The human form, for example, is seen as a source of inspiration in cave paintings, renaissance frescoes as well as contemporary photography. Likewise, the details of the landscapes around us and their natural forms run through the world of art like lead through a pencil. However, these are well-recognised, well-known and well-reported and as such, rather dry.

In this edition of Art Shorts, we’ll be looking at another, all the more interesting, all the less reported theme in art. The little white dot.

In the 15th-century, when oil painting’s popularity was growing at a rate of knots, colourists began to add Lead White, a pigment used as far back as 4000 BCE, to an oil binder. This created an oil paint which was fast-drying, easy-to-use and, importantly for what we’re looking at today, opaque.

Now, why are little white dots important? Well, you see, a white dot is a lot more than a white dot. In painting, a white dot can be a glimmer, a sheen, a reflection, a droplet of water, a jewel; it can be life.

Portrait of a Girl - Nicolaes Maes c.1664

Take this painting for example, Maes was wanting to paint a portrait of a small girl cleansing her hands in a spring. But there’s a problem, water’s very hard to paint. What colour is it? What shape does it take? How does the light hit it?

All of these would be viable questions were it not for one fact. Painting is about illusion. Just like a street magician performing a coin trick, an oil painter is trying to trick your brain into seeing, or not seeing, what is, or isn’t, there.

The solution? Rather than toil over the intricacies of running water, Maes simply paints a few white dots. Genius.

Now another…

Jeunesse Dorée - Gerald Leslie Brockhurst 1934

In Gerald Leslie Brockhurst’s 1934 painting of his model, turned muse, turned wife, he wanted to capture not only her beauty, but her vitality. With the eyes supposedly being the portals to the soul, painters have long placed focus here when creating portraits, the hope being that you, as the viewer, are able to connect with a portrait on a human level.

So how does Brockhurst achieve this? White dots. Two in one eye, one in the other. The moisture that these tiny optical illusions create is what makes the Jeunesse Dorée appear all the more human, all the more beautiful.

Now let’s say you aren’t in love with your subject and that rather than show beauty, you’re trying to convey sadness, solemnity and melancholy.

Anxiety - Hannah Höch 1936

Well, simple enough, as in Hannah Höch’s Anxiety… just leave off the white dots. A human eye without the glinting highlights of life suggest a sadness, a lack of vitality, a death.

I task you the next time you visit an art gallery or look at a painting, to keep an eye out for the white dots. From a distance, they can be difficult to spot, your brain filling in the gaps, but get close and see that what turns yellow into glittering gold is no more than a little white dot.

Next
Next

Showcase: Tom Sachs - Space Programme: Infinity