White

In physics, white is the sum of all the colours. To the human eye, white appears to be the total absence of colour. Amongst artists, white and its many uses in art are continuously evolving and challenging those who would embrace them. Is white, then, a non-colour, or an enhancer of colours? Intangible or material? Absence or excess?

Since Antiquity, white has been appreciated for its symbolic value. In Ancient Greece, where they would paint their statues, it was a sign of incompletion, whereas the Romans believed it showed pomp and imperialist virtue. With the rise of Christianity, white was used in opposition to black in order to emphasise moral dichotomies: the pure, divine white against the darkness. In some cases, however, white was used to show sickness or death, most notably in the pallid representations of the skeletal, crucified Christ.

In the Renaissance white was used to sublimate faces and backgrounds. Da Vinci even based his sfumato technique on the soft transition from light into darkness. Throughout the history of painting, white was considered precious for its ability to reflect light. It attracts the gaze even when used in the tiniest quantities, and illuminates the subject, drawing out stunning contrasts as seen in the works of Rembrandt, or in Vermeer's famous Girl with the Pearl Earring.

With the rise of Impressionism, white was used as the brightest tone amongst shades of grey. While Manet produced canvases which were forerunners to monochromes, including The Reader, which was almost pure white, Monet delivered a stunning gradient of whites whilst recreating the snow at his home in Giverny. The first true white monochrome appeared with the arrival of Malevitch's White Square on a White Background. The artist said 'I have broken the blue boundary of colour limits, and come out into the white'.

Modernists were equally passionate about white and valued it incredibly highly. Miro in particular questioned the status of white on canvases. In his painting Woman, Bird and Star white is in parts boldly painted, but is also distinctive for its absence around the star. Picasso, on the other hand, explored white in conjunction with his famous coloured periods. Piero Manzoni became famous thanks to his 'achromatic' paintings, a series of canvases produced exclusively in shades of white. Moving into the 20th century, white became synonymous with minimalist abstraction. For artists like Kandinsky, white was a cosmic colour, associated with a spiritual search for the absolute, guiding the artists as he seek to express his emotions.

Today, white remains an ever popular subject. Roman Opalka made his name creating a series of white numbers of a white background, while Daniel Arsham reinvents white walls in galleries by letting his artwork drip down onto them. White is a colour with multiple symbolic interpretations. The colour of divinity or humility; of purity and immaculate, of emptiness and absence, but always colour. If blue has Klein and red has Rothko, it appears that no artist has yet succeeded in fully mastering white – but maybe you'll find them in our selection!

Search by Image

Save your search and find it in your favorites

20/100 1 10 18 19 20 21 22 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Categories

Subcategories

White

Seul dans la savane. Parc du Ngorongoro. Tanzanie

Girafe et girafon. Tanzanie

Nancy

La passionnée

Plein les yeux

Le grand soir

Etude 120

Nice warm day

In the Yard

Contemplation

Nailed it series no. 166

Northen wind

Danse d'un Faune

Paris, La Défense

L'homme blanc qui vole

Cherry Blossom No. 36

Joan prats

Xiprers en el paisatge

El Mago, and Náufragos inminentes Diptych. Textile Art

Umbilical, El Mago and Naufragos inminentes, Triptych

Undercover Bear Companion White

Holiday Shanghai Big Moon

Louis Vuitton Superflat Monogram (Lemon)

Houses on the hill

Sunny Marina of Kotor

BW210710

Dark Vador loves Andy Warhol's flowers

Guilty of Fun

Paradis

Desert signe LVIII (SG249)

Paysages 656

Paysages 604

Paysages 601

Composition 113

Composition 112

Composition 111

Winter sunny day

Slim: Black And White 2

You are what Dreams are made of

Life Paths XL 1

Nature adventure XL 22

Awesome Dreamworld XL 1

Thunder And Lightning M 1/Oil

Breathe On Me

Involvement

Mickey loves Dom Pérignon soup

Woman with orange flowers

Dark Vador is a Jack Daniel's fan

Stormtrooper, welcome to the dark side

Medusa out of this world

Pand'ours pop art Dior red

Coque noir et Blanc

Belgique

L'essentiel

Boom star

Le Réconfort d'un Ami

Le Confident Gonflable

This Rain Will Pass

The first white snow

Les dunes chutent

AC2

AC13

Process no. 6

Scratch on the Wire

Escapade

The woods are lovely, dark and deep…