The Flight Into Egypt Murillo Analysis

While at the Detroit Institute of Arts, I came a crossed a painting in the European Medieval to Renaissance Art section of the museum. The painting was The Flight into Egypt by Bartolome Esteban Murillo. Murillo used oil in 1647-50 to paint this piece. This piece stuck out to me because I saw many other paintings about josephs and Mary’s flight into Egypt. It made me wonder if Murillo had a reason for the colors and other details. Looking at this painting there is a man, a woman and a baby. The women and the baby are on a donkey, while the man walks besides them. This artwork is representational art. This piece is mostly dark, dull colors, such as brown, black, tan; expect the woman who is dressed in pink. The woman and the baby are lighter then the rest of the painting, indicating that she or the baby is most likely the focal point. Like many of his other paintings, Murillo used chiaroscuro to emphasis drama, and focal points (Gillet). According to “A Masterpiece Revealed”, a documentary on another artwork done by Murillo, Murillo also has done multiple pieces of work representing religious stories. He commonly included the Virgin Mary or the holy child in his artwork (Addison 225). In his art, Murillo has expressed three styles during his …show more content…
He was born to a family of many painters, particularly his uncle, whom he learned many art skills from. At the age of 12, Murillo apprenticed to Juan de Castello (Gillet). Murillo was apart of the Baroque art movement. The Baroque movement was spiritual, resulting in many religious paintings. Some qualities of paintings from the Baroque movement were drama, and tension (The Editors). When he was young, Murillo was influenced by Caravaggio, often used chiaroscuro to add drama to his art (Gillet), but later on in his life began to create lighter and softer artworks. Murillo was big on realistic details in his pieces, resulting in him mostly creating representational