HOW TO PRONOUNCE
chiaroscuro
/ˌkjɑɹəˈsk(j)ʊɹoʊ/
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American Pronunciation Guide · 0:47
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LISTEN FOR THIS
kyar-uh-SKYOOR-oh: listen for the consonant clusters.
Begin with k followed by a brief y glide. The stressed syllable can be SKYOOR or SKOOR; keep the strongest beat there, with or without the y.
TRY SAYING
“The portrait uses chiaroscuro to draw attention to the face.”
APG practice sentence · CC BY-SA 4.0
Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 ↗What does chiaroscuro mean?
noun
- An artistic technique developed during the Renaissance, referring to the use of strong contrasts between light and dark in order to create the illusion of volume.
- A monochrome picture made by using several different shades of the same color.
- A woodcut technique in which several woodcut blocks are used to print different shades of a color, or a woodcut print made by this technique.
More meanings (2)
noun
- A photographic technique in which one side of the subject, for example a face, is well lit and the other is in shadow.
adjective
- (figuratively) Possessing the qualities of a work of chiaroscuro.
Definitions regrouped for readability · CC BY-SA 4.0
IPA pronunciation
/ˌkjɑɹəˈsk(j)ʊɹoʊ/
Pronunciation used in the listening tip.
Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0 ↗Pronunciation varies by speaker and region. About these dictionary pronunciations.
In the pages of books
See this word in context.
Our mind is the canvas on which the artists lay their colour; their pigments are our emotions; their chiaroscuro the light of joy, the shadow of sadness.
He had rambled about among the unvisited villages of the Apennines, pencil in hand and knapsack on back, sleeping on straw and eating black bread and beans, but feasting on local color, rioting, as it were, on chiaroscuro, and laying up a treasure of pictorial observations.
More book examples (1)
Out of this closet is the room where we always live, hung with a blue and white paper in stripes adorned with festoons, and a thousand plump chairs, couches, and luxurious settees covered with linen of the same pattern, and with a bow-window commanding the prospect, and gloomed with limes that shade half each window, already darkened with painted glass in chiaroscuro, set in deep blue glass.