<P> The more technical use of the term chiaroscuro is the effect of light modelling in painting, drawing, or printmaking, where three - dimensional volume is suggested by the value gradation of colour and the analytical division of light and shadow shapes--often called "shading". The invention of these effects in the West, "skiagraphia" or "shadow - painting" to the Ancient Greeks, traditionally was ascribed to the famous Athenian painter of the fifth century BC, Apollodoros . Although few Ancient Greek paintings survive, their understanding of the effect of light modelling still may be seen in the late - fourth - century BC mosaics of Pella, Macedonia, in particular the Stag Hunt Mosaic, in the House of the Abduction of Helen, inscribed gnosis epoesen, or' knowledge did it' . </P> <P> The technique also survived in rather crude standardized form in Byzantine art and was refined again in the Middle Ages to become standard by the early fifteenth - century in painting and manuscript illumination in Italy and Flanders, and then spread to all Western art . </P> <P> The Raphael painting illustrated, with light coming from the left, demonstrates both delicate modelling chiaroscuro to give volume to the body of the model, and strong chiaroscuro in the more common sense, in the contrast between the well - lit model and the very dark background of foliage . To further complicate matters, however, the compositional chiaroscuro of the contrast between model and background probably would not be described using this term, as the two elements are almost completely separated . The term is mostly used to describe compositions where at least some principal elements of the main composition show the transition between light and dark, as in the Baglioni and Geertgen tot Sint Jans paintings illustrated above and below . </P> <P> Chiaroscuro modelling now is taken for granted, but had some opponents; the English portrait miniaturist Nicholas Hilliard cautioned in his treatise on painting against all but the minimal use we see in his works, reflecting the views of his patron Queen Elizabeth I of England: "seeing that best to show oneself needeth no shadow of place but rather the open light...Her Majesty...chose her place to sit for that purpose in the open alley of a goodly garden, where no tree was near, nor any shadow at all ..." </P>

Extreme use of chiaroscuro in the presentation of 2d art