ELI5: What Is Sfumato?

Sfumato is a painting trick where colors and edges are blended together so softly that they fade into each other like smoke, with no sharp lines.

The word comes from an Italian word for "smoke." Think about a coloring book: normally, there are thick, dark lines, and you fill in the colors inside those lines. Sfumato is the exact opposite—it is like painting with no outlines at all, gently smudging everything so you cannot tell where one color stops and another begins.

You can see this happening naturally in everyday life all the time:

• Looking through a steamy bathroom mirror: When you take a warm shower, the steam blurs your reflection. Your nose and cheeks do not have sharp edges anymore; they just softly melt into your face.
• A foggy morning in the park: If you look at a tree up close, you see crisp leaves and sharp branches. But on a misty day, trees in the distance look fuzzy, soft, and gentle against the gray sky.
• Sunsets: When the sky changes in the evening, there is no hard line between yellow, orange, and purple. The colors melt into each other like watercolor paints mixed in water.
• Smudging with your fingers: If you draw a dark circle on paper with a pencil and rub the edge with your thumb, the sharp line turns into a soft, fuzzy shadow.