Recognising styles

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Hard to confuse with the other styles in the game: the archaic look (rigid frontality, no perspective, heavy monumentality) gives it away.
• · The usual doubt is inside the style: Egypt (hieroglyphs, stiff profile, pyramids) vs Mesopotamia (cuneiform, blue glazed brick, stepped ziggurats) vs Prehistory (cave art, megaliths).

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Renaissance: it picks up the same classical language (columns, pediments, domes), but with a warmer palette and Christian subjects next to the mythological ones.
• · Neoclassical: copies it centuries later, stiffer and with civic severity. Tell them apart by context: if it looks new or very well preserved and it is a parliament, a museum or a capitol, it is Neoclassical.
• · Ancient: earlier. Ancient art uses neither the Greco-Roman orders nor the idealised body.

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Gothic: the style that follows. The arch is the clue: round (Romanesque) vs pointed (Gothic). Romanesque is low and solid; Gothic is tall and full of light.
• · Ancient: ancient art uses neither systematic round arches nor Christian imagery. If there is Christian symbolism, it is not Ancient any more.
• · Renaissance: it also goes back to the round arch, but with mathematical symmetry and classical columns. Romanesque is rougher and more military.

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Romanticism: the 19th century revived Gothic (the neo-Gothic revivals). Tell them apart by context and symmetry: Romantic neo-Gothic tends to be VERY symmetrical, repetitive and well kept; real Gothic is asymmetrical, worn and built in stages over centuries.
• · Romanesque: the style before. The arch is the clue: pointed (Gothic) vs round (Romanesque). Gothic is tall, bright and full of stained glass; Romanesque is low, dark and solid.
• · Renaissance: later. Some late Gothic panels announce the change. If the composition is mathematical, symmetrical and has a clear vanishing point, it is Renaissance already.

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Classical: its model. Both use columns and pediments, but the Renaissance combines the Christian (domes, altarpieces) with the pagan (Greco-Roman mythology) from the humanist point of view of the 15th and 16th centuries; in painting you recognise it by the mathematical perspective. Classical means real Greece or Rome (ruined temples, ancient mosaics).
• · Baroque: the style that follows. The Renaissance is calm, symmetrical and mathematical; Baroque is dramatic, asymmetrical and exuberant. If there are diagonals, strong chiaroscuro or twisted columns, it is Baroque.
• · Neoclassical: later. It also imitates the classical, but colder and stiffer, with civic subjects. The Renaissance has Italian warmth, detailed landscapes and intimate religious themes.
• · Gothic: earlier. Gothic is vertical and elongated; the Renaissance is balanced, horizontal and well proportioned.

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Renaissance: earlier. The Renaissance is calm, symmetrical and mathematical; Baroque is dramatic, asymmetrical and exuberant. If there are strong diagonals, chiaroscuro or loaded interiors, it is Baroque.
• · Gothic, late civic: exchange halls like the one in Valencia have very thin, very tall helical columns with no added decoration. They are NOT Solomonic: the Baroque ones are thick, gilded and always inside a loaded interior.
• · Romanticism: it also goes for drama, but some 200 years later. Baroque is religious or palatial with theatrical light; Romanticism paints sublime nature, shipwrecks and emotion in front of the landscape.
• · Neoclassical: later. It is the reaction against Baroque: back to sobriety, rigid symmetry and heroic civic subjects. If there is calm, clean outlines and serious columns, it is not Baroque any more. Watch the dark background: a Neoclassical picture can have one too; if the figure is still and the outline is clean, it is not Baroque.
• · Art Nouveau: also curves and ornament everywhere, but some 150 years later. Baroque carves stone or alabaster with saints, rivers and drapery; Art Nouveau uses iron, ceramics and stylised plants on houses and shops.

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Classical: an ancient ruin or a genuinely Greco-Roman building (aqueducts, amphitheatres, temples worn down over 2,000 years or more). Neoclassical: a modern building imitating Greece or Rome, a museum, a parliament, a monumental gateway, a temple-shaped church, all of it new and symmetrical.
• · Renaissance: it also goes back to the classical, but with more Italian warmth, detailed landscapes and religious or mythological subjects. Neoclassical is colder, civic and Roman-heroic.
• · Baroque: earlier. Neoclassical is the reaction against it: everything Baroque does with exuberance and drama, Neoclassical does plainly and symmetrically. A dark background is not enough to call it Baroque: if nobody moves and the drawing is clean, it is Neoclassical.
• · Romanticism: later, and partly at the same time. Neoclassical is reason, calm and sharp drawing; Romanticism is emotion, drama and looser brushwork.

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Neoclassical: earlier, and partly at the same time. Neoclassical is reason, sobriety and sharp drawing; Romanticism is emotion, drama and looser brushwork. If the scene moves you and colour takes over, it is Romanticism.
• · Baroque: it also goes for drama, but some 200 years earlier. Baroque is religious or palatial with theatrical light indoors; Romanticism paints nature in the open air and emotion in front of the landscape.
• · Gothic: in architecture Romanticism IMITATES Gothic (the neo-Gothic revivals). Tell them apart by symmetry and condition: Romantic neo-Gothic tends to be VERY symmetrical, repetitive and well preserved; real Gothic is asymmetrical and built in stages over centuries.
• · Impressionism: later. Impressionism also paints landscape, but with everyday scenes (cafés, parks, bathing spots) and shifting light; Romanticism picks sublime, dramatic landscapes. In architecture, if the iron and glass are on show it is iron architecture; if the iron is dressed up as a castle, it is Romanticism.

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Within the step: Impressionism (Monet, Renoir, Morisot, Sorolla) and Post-Impressionism (Van Gogh, Seurat) share step 9. The Post-Impressionist gives itself away by the thick stroke or the dot and by exaggerated colour, but for the stairway it is the same step.
• · Art Nouveau: the same years in Europe, both from the turn of the century. Step 9 catches light and the moment with visible brushwork, whether patch, stroke or dot; Art Nouveau is decorative, with plant curves, gilding and poster art, and no brushwork. If the image is ornamental and flat, it is Art Nouveau; if it is built from touches of colour, it is step 9.
• · Romanticism: earlier. It also paints landscape, but Romanticism looks for the sublime and the dramatic with careful brushwork; Impressionism looks for the everyday and the shifting light with visible brushwork. In architecture, here the iron and glass are on show; if the iron hides under castle towers, it is Romanticism.
• · Neoclassical: much earlier. Neoclassical has clean outlines and heroic subjects; Impressionism does the opposite: no outlines, no heroism, everything in the open air.

⚠ Careful, you may mistake it for

• · Impressionism: the same years, both from the turn of the century. Art Nouveau is ornamental and flat (curves, gilding, mosaics); Impressionism works in patches of colour, with visible brushwork and shifting light. If decoration takes over, it is Art Nouveau.
• · Baroque: also very ornamental, but some 200 years earlier. Baroque uses Solomonic columns, religious drama and classical gilding. Art Nouveau is vegetal, sinuous and decorative in civic settings (houses, shops, posters), not religious.
• · Gothic: in architecture both use stained glass and verticality, but Gothic is austere and religious with pointed arches; Art Nouveau is decorative and civic with organic curves.