In my painting class our next painting has to incorporate elements from 16th century Italian paintings. I need some reference material. I’m specifically hoping to find paintings of outdoor scenes at night, but also just any good examples.
Yes, I’m going to the library, and yes, I’m doing my own Googling as well, I just figured that there were enough art aficionados here that it would be worth asking in case anyone knew of anything specific or had any favorites 
Only one Italian name springs immediately to mind for that period, but he’s a doozy.
Caravaggio
Oh. . . SIXteenth century? Start with Giorgione’s Tempest? Adam Elsheimer also does a few night scenes (he’s German but working in Italy).I suspect this is a trick question as there are very few night scenes of that era (or you’re simply looking for something uncommon on your own). Also, look at the ‘nativity’ predella from Gentile da Fabriano’s Strozzi altar-- a bit earlier but very much before its time (as it, come to mention it, is Taddeo Gaddi’s annunciation to the shepherds in Santa Croce). Earlier than you’re looking for, though.
What sort of thing are you shooting for, other than night scene? Whatever you can name, I can probably think of some good examples (not being a snooty prick, but I’ve taught some Italian Renaissance) Cats? Plants? The color blue?
Ah, if you don’t mind going north, you might want to look at Tintoretto.
Because he was quite different (and one of his most famous paintings is Il Bibliotecario (The Librarian), check out Giuseppe Arcimboldo.
Here are the bizarre criteria for the assignment:
The reason I want a night scene is that the main part of the picture is me and Dominic inside in front of the fireplace. I want the view out the window (this is why it should be an outdoor picture) to be 16th century Italy even though the interior is modern. The main light source in the painting is the fireplace, which is why I can’t have the scene out the window be in daylight. Depending on what I can come up with the scene outside could be a street/sidewalk, in which case I could have two other people out there, or it could be more of a landscape/architecture thing in which case the other people would be in a painting over the fireplace.
Do you know of any outdoor night paintings of his?
Wife was, once upon a time, an expert on 15th century Italian altarpieces–she could actually tell them apart, even when painted by the same guy or family–but she’d be little help here.
Wow those are remarkably “modern” conceptually, for when they were painted! Neat stuff. (It’s always nice to have proof that there were weirdos back then, too.)
Glad you like them- some of his lesser known works:
Why they say redheads have “flaming hair”
The only work safe picture of a guy with a cock in his mouth you’re ever likely to see
What you see when you eat too many mushrooms
16th century lawyer joke
oops- (double post)
Perhaps the most obvious would be The Taking of Christ (which is on the Wiki page), but, as with the rest of Caravaggio’s output, it hardly provides you with a landscape to work with.
Other paintings of the arrest of Christ, as well as those of the Nativity, the adoration of the shepherds, the agony in the garden and the liberation of St. Peter, were often shown at night. But not with much in the way of background landscapes.
There is Paolo Uccello’s Hunt in the forest, but that’s actually too early.
An Italian nocturnal streetscene or townscape from the right period will be extraordinarily rare.
Those were fantastic, thanks for sharing.
Tintoretto’s Mark? http://mockingbird.creighton.edu/english/ALA2003/04.jpg
Getting close? A strange style, though. As for ‘treasure hunt’. . eek.
Thinking, actually-- it’s a Dutch concept but makes it south over time-- but you could set things up like Pieter Aertsen or Joachim Beuckelaer do, with an interior scene in front and then an outdoor scene through a background threshold; basic concept thus:
http://www.historisch-toerisme-bureau.nl/images/chrismarmar.jpg
or
and insert a background vignette with your outdoorscape.
And have your ‘phrase’ as a nice Roman-letter inscription on a bit of stonework or something.
I’m not asking for help with the treasure hunt or the phrase or any of that. I already know how I’m doing those so you don’t need to worry about them (and they don’t need to be 16th century Italian). I just need to get the Italian stuff. That one has some possibilities with the building on the left…I’d have to make it darker…
