Fresco
Fresco is the Italian word for "fresh", and that's because fresco painting is done on fresh, wet plaster walls. That way the colors really sink in to the plaster, and you get a glowing kind of color that is very different from if you just painted on top of the dry plaster.
Fresco painting from Thera, Greece (about 1600 BC)
People have been doing fresco painting for a long time. The earliest frescoes we know of come from Bronze Age Greece, about 1600 BC.
The Etruscans and the Romans also did fresco painting.
Villa of the Mysteries, Pompeii, Italy (about 50 AD)
By the time of the Han Dynasty (100 BC), people were doing frescoes in China, and there are famous frescoes from Ajanta, India, dating to about 500 AD in the Guptan period.
In the Middle Ages, frescoes were very popular in Italy. Some famous artists who worked in fresco are Cimabue, Giotto, and Fra Angelico.
Fresco by Giotto, Church of St. Francis of Assisi (about 1275 AD)
To find out more about fresco painting, check out these books from Amazon.com or from your library:
Ancient Greek Art, by Susie Hodge (1998)- for kids ages 9-12.
Minoan and Mycenaean Art, by Reynold Higgins (2nd revised edition 1997). The standard book for college students.
Roman Painting, by Roger Ling (1991). This is a detailed account of the different styles of Roman fresco painting.
The Art of Fresco Painting in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, by Mary P. Merrifield (2004).
