Fresco art dates back to antiquity and is often linked with the Italian Renaissance era. Fresco techniques were utilized to create many of the masterpieces we can still view today in public buildings, churches, and palaces.
Color pigments are blended with water and applied to the intonaco (a thin layer of fresh, wet plaster). Before painting a buon fresco, a coarse underlayer known as the arriccio is applied across the entire surface and left to set for several days.
Because fresco secco paintings are painted on dry plaster, the pigments necessitate a binding agent, such as tempera, oil, or glue, to adhere to the wall.
A mezzo-fresco is produced on almost dried intonaco – firm enough not to leave a thumbprint – so that the color only slightly permeates the plaster. By the end of the 16th century, this had fully superseded buon fresco.
The first Egyptian fresco ever found was discovered at Hierakonpolis and dated to around 3500 BCE. Some of the topics and designs displayed in the fresco are also seen in other Naqada II artifacts, such as the Gebel el-Arak Knife (3300 BCE).
The earliest buon frescoes originate from the Bronze Age and are found throughout Aegean civilizations, including Minoan artwork from the island of Crete.
In ancient Greece, fresco artworks were also created, but few of these have remained. In June 1968, near Paestum, a Greek colony in southern Italy, a tomb featuring fresco paintings dating back to 470 BCE.
Magnificent ancient and early medieval paintings have survived in more than 20 sites across India thanks to a huge number of old rock-cut cave temples.
The Sigiriya Fresco paintings are located at Sigiriya, Sri Lanka, and were produced during King Kashyapa I’s reign. The widely held view is that they portray women from the king’s royal court as heavenly nymphs raining flowers on the humans.
The late Medieval and Renaissance periods witnessed the most significant utilization of frescoes, especially in Italy, where many government buildings and churches still have fresco decoration.
Northern Romania has around a dozen decorated monasteries dating from the last years of the 15th century to the early 16th century, with fresco paintings on the inside and outside.
Throughout the 20th century, Mexican artists such as Fernando Leal, José Clemente Orozco, Diego Rivera, and David Siqueiros revitalized the discipline of fresco art.