A visible trace of earlier painting beneath a layer or layers of paint on a canvas.
‘scientific examination of his drawings has revealed pentimenti’
‘is it chiaroscuro or pentimento?’
‘The rapid delineation of muscles and sinews, the visible pentimenti and the variable thickness of the chalk lines indicate a purposeful exploration of the physical possibilities of the medium in accurately depicting the human body.’
‘In fact, drawing is prominent in the paintings, whether jerkily outlining colored patches or visible as the pentimenti of earlier, barely erased marks.’
‘She does not follow the design by rote, as revealed by the pentimenti of alterations made during the painting process.’
‘Technical investigations often reveal pentimento - a painting beneath another one - adding further grist to the academic mill.’
‘He made an effort to tone down the swagger yet allowed pentimenti on the canvas to draw even more attention to his beard.’
‘Ghost images from the backs of the canvases pop up like pentimenti or nebular dust.’
‘The pentimenti, the multiple corrections, are evidence that an image which appears spontaneous was achieved via a series of minor and major adjustments.’
‘Some pentimenti are also evident in the underdrawn outlines.’
‘The slightly blurred images reveal her intentionally rough-hewn pentimenti and, ultimately, create a softened, classicized balance.’
‘The astonishing series of pentimenti which were revealed made me change my mind entirely.’
‘The myth becomes a dim pentimento, looming under a series of visuals painted one over the other.’
‘Hence the importance in these works of traces of successive compositional stages, pentimenti deliberately retained rather than obliterated in a final synthesis.’
‘His surfaces are extravagantly scumbled and full of ragged pentimenti; the boats look like they are embedded in the water rather than floating on it.’
‘The drawing measures 36.8 x 41.3 cm and is executed in pen and ink over black chalk, with some additions in brush and wash, and with one pentimento executed onto a separate piece of paper, which has been glued to the principal folio.’
‘The way that they narrow and bulge, and the smudges of pale blue pentimenti in the lemon yellow ground, create a circuitous momentum within the work.’
‘He acknowledged the existence of pentimenti.’
‘For the careful observer, they offer a whole world of pentimenti.’
‘There are panels explaining pentimenti and underpainting, why paintings look the way they do, all using actual objects from the collection.’
‘Their imagery of the painter's canvas implies an alternative, that of pentimento, or the eventual emergence of an underlying image in a painting that grows transparent with age.’
‘The way I'm painting now has a connection with an Italian expression, pentimento, which means ‘ghost image.’’
Origin
Early 19th century (originally in sense ‘sign of an alteration in a literary work’): from Italian, literally ‘repentance’.
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