With the development of humanism and art, the content of oil painting gradually got rid of the shackles of religious thought and began to depict the real Italian Renaissance. Oil painting materials and techniques have matured and become independent paintings. The well-known Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Raphael all appeared in this era.

In the following three or four hundred years, oil painting has been further developed. Some achievements have been made in subjects related to painting, such as human body structure, perspective and color. The Academy of Fine Arts, the cradle of cultivating painters, was also established at this time. At the same time, a large number of talented artists have emerged in European countries, and the language of oil painting has been fully played in their hands. Although the painters in this period were different in content and style, they all adopted realistic expressions, so people used to call the period from the Middle Ages to 17 and 18 centuries as the period of classical realism.

18, 19 century later, with the development of science, social changes and the emergence of new artistic trends, painting styles and forms have diversified and presented a complex face. Impressionism, post-impressionism, expressionism, cubism, abstraction and other styles have appeared one after another. These schools are different from traditional European oil paintings in aesthetics and aesthetic taste, and even rebellious. By the end of 19, world art has entered the post-modern stage, and the variation of painting characteristics is faster, more frequent and more elusive.