CANTILENA

Visitors of the current exhibition of Adrian Bayreuther and Friends

(3rd Paradigm, http://3rdparadigm.net/Events.html) in Frankfurt asked several times, what does it mean, cantilena. Here is my answer:

"In late medieval and early Renaissance music, term for certain vocal forms as they were known in the 15th century; also a musical texture used widely in both secular and sacred compositions of that century. Cantilena style is characterized by a predominant vocal top line supported by less complex and usually instrumental tenor and countertenor lines; it occurred both in homophonic, or chordal, music and inpolyphonic music having a contrapuntal (interwoven melody) texture."

"Cantilena was defined by the Flemish music theorist Johannes Tinctoris (1436–1511) as one of the smaller forms that usually treated love, although any subject was suitable. .."

In my Cantilena, you can find a "predominant top", white islands of oil paint, that are supported by less complex blue background. In terms of music described above, the focus of this painting is a visual expression of love feeling via cantilena style.