design can be drawn and the pigments applied to the final layer of plaster, a whole series of preparatory operations must be carried out: snapping the cords (establishing a center line or a grid by means of a taut cord dipped in paint and snapped across the surface), applying the rough plaster undercoat or arriccio, incising ines, drawing the design with sinopia red. To get an idea of how long it takes to produce a fresco, you have also to take into account all the preliminary work, which in the fourteenth century included the preparation of much of the materials and of drawings to be transferred to the wall. Even if we consider only the application of water-based pigments on the freshly laid plaster, all that can confidently be said is that it is possible to paint more than a single giornata in one day, if small areas of plaster are used, but that it is not usually possible to paint less than one giornata, because of the risk of imperfect carbonation of the area painted later.
Michelangelo, a sculptor, learned the art of painting frescos "on the job" while working on the Sistine Chapel. He hired experienced fresco artists to teach him how to paint, but was unhappy with their work, sent them away and taught himself. The entire first section of the Sistine Chapel was painted during this learning process, hidden by scaffolding so that Michelangelo was not able to view the work in progress as a whole until the scaffolding came down for that section. Once the scaffolding came down, and he was able to view the whole work, he broadened his approach, became much more fluid and bold in his work, creating the work that we think of when we remember the Sistine Chapel.
LEONARDO'S EXPERIMENTAL "FRESCO" The Last Supper: Leonardo was unwilling to work within the confines of the "giornato", his style was spontaneous and contemplative, not compatible with the orderly process of the fresco that required the artist to arrange his work in a series of days, with the activities of each day reserved to a single section of the coposition that has been established beforehand.
As an inventor, he naturally tried to make his own personal medium, that he himself compounded. From the beginning of his career, he had favored the use of an oil mixture because it permitted him to attain atmospheric effects and veiled, sensuous surfaces. Used on the scale of the Last Supper and on dry plaster, the mixture could not withstand the build-up of humidity, nor could it adhere to the wall. Therefore, the mural began to fade and flake even in Leonardo's lifetime; half a century after the painting was completed it was described by Vasari as a "muddle of blots".
Klimt's Beethoven: On a framework of wood covered with stucco, Klimt did not use fresco painting, but casein colors (in other words: tempera on dry ground, even if it was slightly moistened at the moment of painting); "inlaid stucco and gilding" is all Klimt says, but he also added various inlays and made extensive use of charcoal, graphite and pastel which sometimes give the ensemble the air of a monumental design. Tackling this combination of unusual materials was an experiment typical of Art Nouveau.
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