THELEPHANES ( Ve siècle av. J.-C. )

BELL, Henry, The Perfect Painter : or, a Compleat History of the Original, Progress and Improvement of Painting. Shewing, I. The Antiquity, Excellency and Usefulness of that Divine Art, to Those who are desirous of being Acquainted with the true Knowledge and Secrets therein contain'd. II. Plain Instructions to form a right Judgment of the real Value of good Pictures, and how to distinguish Originals from Copies. III. A Chronological Account of the most celebrated Painters, from their Rise, to the Present Time, London, s.n., 1730.

Chap. V, Of the Progress of Painting among the Græcians, […], p. 48-49

Quotation

Our poor and needy Life perceiving some casual Things to fall out prosperously, whilst it doth mistake and try, whilst it doth slip, reform and change ; hath out of this same assiduous Reprehension made up small Sciences of ARTS, the which it hath afterwards, by a continual Study, brought to some considerable Degree of Perfection. And therefore Ælian says, so Rude and Imperfect were the first Attemps of this ART, that to avoid the Danger of a Mistake, they were wont constantly to affix to their Works such a clear and discerning Character of distinction, as this is a Horse, an Ox, or a Tree, &c. And what higher Expectations can we derive from a Portrait, or Profile of a Face drawn from the Shadow upon a Wall ; or when we find Gyges, whom Pliny sometime calls the first Painter, born in Lydia, which, as he says, was Tuscania, went into Egypt, found out the ART there, and all his Skill arrived only to some competency of Design, probably with a Coal, or some such coarse Material. From which Sort of Picture they advanced not much further, ‘till some competent Time after, came Polignotus, the first that painted Encaustice, or by Fire ; which was not enameling on Gold, but with hot glowing Irons, to draw, or cast their Design into Wood, or Ivory, and possibly to finish with some slight Shadowing within ; for before that, as Carel van Mander, in his Lives of the Painters observes, the First Pictures were only drawn, and consisted of Out-Lines only, and therefore called Linearis Pictura.
THE next Step they advanced was by the Invention of Cleanthes and Thelephanes, who super-added some Finishing within, and filled their Out-Lines with one Colour, which was only a Piece of Red Potsheard, pounded and fine ground ; First found out, and, as some affirm, us’d by Callias the Athenian.
AND thence, […], they were called Monocromata ; and to the Assistance of these came Higienontes, Dinias and Charmas, who also made Faces with one Colour only.

BELL, Henry, The Perfect Painter : or, a Compleat History of the Original, Progress and Improvement of Painting. Shewing, I. The Antiquity, Excellency and Usefulness of that Divine Art, to Those who are desirous of being Acquainted with the true Knowledge and Secrets therein contain'd. II. Plain Instructions to form a right Judgment of the real Value of good Pictures, and how to distinguish Originals from Copies. III. A Chronological Account of the most celebrated Painters, from their Rise, to the Present Time, London, s.n., 1730.

Chap. V, Of the Progress of Painting among the Græcians, […], p. 49

Quotation

THE next Step they advanced was by the Invention of Cleanthes and Thelephanes, who super-added some Finishing within, and filled their Out-Lines with one Colour, which was only a Piece of Red Potsheard, pounded and fine ground ; First found out, and, as some affirm, us’d by Callias the Athenian.

BELL, Henry, The Perfect Painter : or, a Compleat History of the Original, Progress and Improvement of Painting. Shewing, I. The Antiquity, Excellency and Usefulness of that Divine Art, to Those who are desirous of being Acquainted with the true Knowledge and Secrets therein contain'd. II. Plain Instructions to form a right Judgment of the real Value of good Pictures, and how to distinguish Originals from Copies. III. A Chronological Account of the most celebrated Painters, from their Rise, to the Present Time, London, s.n., 1730.

Chap. V, Of the Progress of Painting among the Græcians, […], p. 48-49

Quotation

Our poor and needy Life perceiving some casual Things to fall out prosperously, whilst it doth mistake and try, whilst it doth slip, reform and change ; hath out of this same assiduous Reprehension made up small Sciences of ARTS, the which it hath afterwards, by a continual Study, brought to some considerable Degree of Perfection. And therefore Ælian says, so Rude and Imperfect were the first Attemps of this ART, that to avoid the Danger of a Mistake, they were wont constantly to affix to their Works such a clear and discerning Character of distinction, as this is a Horse, an Ox, or a Tree, &c. And what higher Expectations can we derive from a Portrait, or Profile of a Face drawn from the Shadow upon a Wall ; or when we find Gyges, whom Pliny sometime calls the first Painter, born in Lydia, which, as he says, was Tuscania, went into Egypt, found out the ART there, and all his Skill arrived only to some competency of Design, probably with a Coal, or some such coarse Material. From which Sort of Picture they advanced not much further, ‘till some competent Time after, came Polignotus, the first that painted Encaustice, or by Fire ; which was not enameling on Gold, but with hot glowing Irons, to draw, or cast their Design into Wood, or Ivory, and possibly to finish with some slight Shadowing within ; for before that, as Carel van Mander, in his Lives of the Painters observes, the First Pictures were only drawn, and consisted of Out-Lines only, and therefore called Linearis Pictura.
THE next Step they advanced was by the Invention of Cleanthes and Thelephanes, who super-added some Finishing within, and filled their Out-Lines with one Colour, which was only a Piece of Red Potsheard, pounded and fine ground ; First found out, and, as some affirm, us’d by Callias the Athenian.
AND thence, […], they were called Monocromata ; and to the Assistance of these came Higienontes, Dinias and Charmas, who also made Faces with one Colour only.