Art history - Study Notes

Art History 1
Study Notes
Feldman’s Model of Art Criticism
From the work of Edmund Burke Feldman, available in many of his books from the
late 1060’s and early 70’s
Description: Make a list of the visual qualities of the work that are obvious and
immediately perceived. “What do you see in the artwork”? and “What else”? Includes
content and subject matter in representational works, includes abstract elements in
nonrepresentational pieces.
Analysis: Focus on the formal aspects of elements of art, principles of design,
and other formal considerations: exaggeration, composition etc. “How does the artist
create a center of interest?” How does the use of color impact the painting?”
Interpretation: Propose ideas for possible meaning based on evidence. Viewers
project their emotions/feelings/intentions onto the work. “What do you think it
means”? “What was the artist trying to communicate”? “What clues do you see that
support your ideas”?
Judgment: Discuss the overall strengths/success/merit of the work. This step is
usually used with mature audiences.
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Baroque (c. 1600–1750)
- Probably derived from the Italian word barocco, which means an obstacle in
schematic logic. Subsequently, this became a description for any very
complicated or detailed idea or process of thought
- Communicate religious themes / faith in church and power in state
- Direct emotional involvement
- Narrative (narrate a story in one dramatic/imaginative scene)
- Artists: Caravaggio, Rubens and Bernini
1- The Calling of Saint Matthew
By: Caravaggio Date: 1599 - 1600 at: Contarelli Chapel
- Narrate the story of Christ calling St. Matthew to follow him.
- Matthew the tax collector sitting at a table with four other men.
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- Jesus Christ and Saint Peter have entered the room, and Jesus is pointing at
Matthew.
- A beam of light illuminates the faces of the men at the table who are looking at
Jesus Christ.
- Very contrasting use of lights and shadows coming from a spotlight
(Chiaroscuro/Tenebrism).
2- Samson and Delilah
By: Rubens Date 1609 - 1610 (Oil on Wood)
- Presents a moment filled with tension (a calm before a storm).
- A sleeping Samson lying in the arms of Delilah, the woman he loves, having his
hair cut by a servant in order to drain his strength.
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- In the background, Philistine soldiers are waiting to pounce as soon as their target
has been weakened.
- Chiaroscuro/Tenebrism.
- Showed a fascination with textures and textiles.
3- Apollo and Daphne Sculpture
By: Bernini Date: 1622 - 1625
(Stone/Marble)
- After Apollo (God of music and poetry) insulted
Eros/Cupid (God of love), Eros decided to take
revenge by throwing 2 arrows (one made of gold and
one made of lead)
- Apollo pierced by the golden arrow, which makes
him fall in love with Daphne.
- Daphne pierced by the lead arrow, which makes
her repulse men.
- Daphne asked her father (The river God) to help
her to avoid Apollo, so, she turned to a laurel tree
when Apollo touched her.
- Sculpture shows a sense of change/motion and
has a lot of arcs and curves, unlike the Renaissance
style which focuses on Stability.
Rococo
● Late Baroque (c. 1715-1789).
● Name origin: the French word rocaille: for shells and pebbles in decorations.
● Rocaille style / exceptionally ornamental (French style of exuberant
decoration, with an abundance of curves, counter-curves, undulations and
elements modeled on nature).
● Illusion of motion and drama.
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● Emphasizes goals of knowledge, freedom and happiness.
● Pastel, light, soft colors - Scattered light.
● Turned away from Baroque’s religious themes / Focus on aristocracy.
● Artists: Fragonard, Watteau, Boucher.
1- Young Girl Reading
By: Fragonard Date: 1770 ➹
- It is linked to a series of Fragonard paintings known
as portraits de fantaisie (imaginary portraits).
- Executed very quickly, purportedly in an hour.
- Symbolize the cultured lifestyle of high society in
pre-Revolutionary France.
- Simple, contrasting colors, mysterious mood (no
clear clues about the girl identity or what she reads).
- Good use of space.
- Soft details and fluid brushwork (characteristic to
Rococo).
- The background is simplistic which gives greater
emphasis to the girl's appearance.
2- L'Enseigne de Gersaint (The interior of Gersaint’s shop)
By: Watteau Date: 1720 - 1721
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- About Watteau's stay in the home of friend Edme-Francois Gersaint
- Its theme very much centers on the sale of art.
- Finished it faster than usual (In 8 days).
- This piece illustrates the grandness and excitement of buying art.
3- The Triumph of Venus
By: Boucher Date: 1740
- Portrays the myth of the Birth of Venus.
- Venus (the goddess of love) emerges from the sea, surrounded by admirers.
Naiads, nymphs, and gods float among dolphins and doves, winged cupids floating
above them.
- Dynamic, pyramidal composition
- Painting is a celebration of love, lust and sensual life.
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Neoclassicism
- In opposition to the purposeless sensuality of Rococo, Neo Classicals
believed that art should be cerebral, not sensual.
- Style characteristics: well-described form, clear drawing and modeling
(shading), shallow space, strong horizontals and verticals; and Classical
subject matter.
- Drawing was considered more important than painting.
- The Neoclassical surface had to look perfectly smooth. No evidence of
brush-strokes should be perceivable by the naked eye.
- Neoclassicism was a child of the Age of Reason (the Enlightenment). It
continued the connection to the Classical tradition and signified rational
thinking but in a new and more politically-charged spirit.
Artists: Jacques-Louis David, Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres
1. Oath of the Horatii
By: Jacques-Louis David Date: 1784
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- A large painting that is considered as a perfect example of Neoclassical art.
- It depicts three men, Horatii brothers, saluting toward three swords held up by
their father as the women behind him grieve and weep.
- The story of Oath of the Horatii came from a Roman legend involving a conflict
between the Romans and a nearby Albans. Instead of a full-scale war, they
decided to elect representative warriors to settle the dispute. The Romans select
the three Horatii brothers and the Albans choose another trio of brothers, the Curiatii.
- One of the wives in the painting is a daughter of the Curiatii and the other, Camilla,
is engaged to one of the Curiatii brothers.
- It represents the moment which must have preceded the battle, when the elder
Horatius, gathering his sons, makes them swear to conquer or die.
- The male figures create tense, geometric forms that contrast markedly with the
softly curved, flowing poses of the women seated behind the father.
- Light contrasts sharply with the heightened drama of the scene.
- The painting is typically interpreted in the context of the French Revolution as an
example of loyalty and sacrifice.
- Dull colors are used to show the importance of the story behind the painting
over the painting itself.
- The brushstrokes are invisible, The focus on clear, hard details.
- The background is de-emphasized, while the figures in the foreground are
emphasized
2. The Death of Marat
By: Jacques-Louis David Date: 1793
- By 1793, the violence of the Revolution dramatically
increased until the beheadings at the Place de la
Concorde in Paris became usual.
- David painted a memorial to his great friend, the
murdered publisher, Jean Marat.
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- Marat suffered from a skin condition that caused him to spend much of his time in
his bathtub; he would often work there.
- Shows an idealized image of Marat (for example, the painting contains no sign of
his skin problems) holding his murderess's (Charlotte Corday) letter of introduction.
- Corday fatally stabbed Marat (knife on the ground, blood from upper chest), but she
did not attempt to flee. She was later tried and executed for the murder.
- Special interest in body anatomy and contours.
- Simplicity and undecorated background in opposition to the complex luxurious style
of Rococo artworks (which promoted aristocracy).
Romanticism
- Early 19th century (1800 - 1850)
- The movement was a reaction to the Industrial Revolution which occurred during
the same time period.
- The movement affected philosophical thinking, literature, music, and art.
Characteristics:
● Romantic artists were concerned with the spectrum and intensity of human
emotions and feelings.
● "Romanticism lies neither in the subjects that an artist chooses nor in his
exact copying of truth, but in the way he feels"
● Power of Nature was Another Romanticism Characteristic
● Current Event was a Typical Distinct Feature
● Lack of Unifying Style, Technique, or Subject Matter was peculiar
● The brushwork for romantic art became looser and less precise.
● Energized composition.
● Emphasis on diagonals and movement.
Artists: Theodore Gericault, Caspar David Friedrich, Johan Christian Dahl
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1- The Raft of the Medusa
By: Gericault Date: 1819 At: Louvre Museum, Paris
- Large size painting
- The Medusa was a french ship that drowned in the ocean without enough lifeboats.
- Its captain ordered building a raft to hold the people who couldn't fit into lifeboats.
- The raft was abandoned later from the captain and from the people on lifeboats and
left behind with a 150 people aboard.
- Starvation, murder, cannibalism happened on the raft.
- The artist did his research first, by interviewing survivors, creating models for the
human figures, retrieved body parts from the morgue and did many sketches.
- Figure bodies anatomy based on old roman figures (not realistic) and their
arrangement on the raft in a pyramidal shape is not realistic also.
- Gericault was making a political statement that he is anti-king.
- Demonstrated human emotions, bodies and movement; and the power of nature in
a fluid brushwork's painting with diagonal compositions.
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2. Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog
By: Friedrich Date: 1818
At: Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany
- Some believe that it is a self reflection of Friedrich
himself.
- Friedrich painted this scene in his studio but he
sketched it at the place of inspiration,
Elbsandsteingebirge, in Germany.
- Ruckenfugen technique in which he paints the
figure with his back towards the viewer.
- By separating the figure and the viewer, the latter
focuses more on the beauty of the surroundings
rather than the man's role in nature.
- He made a political statement, as the figure's worn costume was prohibited by
German government, by the time of the painting.
3- View from Stalheim
By: Johan Christian Dahl At: Norway
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- Dahl began work on the painting in 1836 and completed it in 1842 (around 6 years)
- Based on two pencil and watercolour sketches he had made
- The painting is regarded as one of Dahl's best
- The rainbow: a symbol of reconciliation, peace, and in Christianity of God's grace
Realism
- Originated from France around the 1850s (the middle of the nineteenth century)
-The young artists decided that Art couldn’t and shouldn’t be about classical
gods and biblical stories.
- Gustave Courbet believed that if he could not see something, he should not paint it.
- Modernity reduced the differences between social classes.
- Modern artists prefer painting from real-life experiences.
Characteristics:
- A general move away from the 'ideal' towards the ordinary.
- Composition constructed as plainly and without interpretation as possible.
- Common Subjects are: political issues and problems, the working class, rural
and urban life and portraits dealing with the naked body.
- Completely opposite of the soft look of romantic Impressionism, Realist painters
include as much detail as possible in their work (to create a work that looks like a
viewer could reach out and touch it).
- Incorporate warmer hues and color palettes in their works.
Artists: Gustave Courbet, Jean Francois Millet, Honore Daumier
1. A Burial At Ornans
By: Courbet Date: 1849
- Large scale painting
- Historical, heroic, religious, a painting of everyday life
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- Courbet submitted this painting to the Royal Fine Art Academy as an important
History painting despite that it depicts an ordinary funeral and ordinary figures
at ordinary place. He considered it as representation of the history of his own time
at his world.
- Courbet heroicized the ordinary in this painting: gives more dignity to simple
persons in the funeral like the grave digger for example.
- He divided the painting into 3 different but equal groups: the clergy persons
holding the coffin, the town officials in the middle and the mourning women on the
right. The grave is the center of the painting.
- No focal point: many people seems distracted - alone with their thoughts.
- Lack of interactions between the figures in the painting.
2. The Stone Breakers
- Shows two figures labor to break and remove stone from a road that is being built.
- Courbet depicts figures who wear ripped and tattered clothing (not idealized).
- He wants to show what is "real," and so he has depicted a man that seems too old
and a boy that seems still too young for such back-breaking labor.
- This is not meant to be heroic: it is meant to be an accurate representation of the
mid-century French rural life.
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- The Stonebreakers seems to lack the basics of art (things like a composition that
selects and organizes, aerial perspective and finish) and as a result, it feels more
"real."
3. The Artist's Studio
- Large Canvas.
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- Courbe named it “The artist’s studio: a real allegory summing up seven years of my
artistic and moral life”.
- The naming of the painting cause a contradiction, as it means that it is a
symbolic painting despite that it should be a real painting as Courbet is a realist.
- The painting was rejected by the juries of the Royal Fine Art Academy, but Courbet
made a special exhibition for it and called it “The Pavilion of Realism”
- The painter in the center is Courbet himself.
- Figures on the right are described by Courbet as: Shareholders (friends, workers
and art lovers).
- The left side of the painting is described by Courbet as: “The other world of ordinary
life, the people, misery, poverty, riches, the exploited, the exploiters, those who live
on death”.
4. The Potato Harvest
By: Millet Date: 1855
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5. Third Class Carriage
By: Daumier Date: 1862
Impressionism
● The Impressionists' completed works looked like sketches, fast and
preliminary “impressions” that artists would dash off to preserve an idea of
what to paint more carefully at a later date.
● Normally, an artist’s “impressions” were not meant to be sold, but were meant
to be aids for the memory to take these ideas back to the studio for the
masterpiece on canvas.
● The young Realists and Impressionists questioned the long established
hierarchy of subject matter. They believed that landscapes scenes (scenes of
contemporary life) were worthy and important.
● The Impressionist tried to arrest a particular moment in time by pinpointing
specific atmospheric conditions; light flickering on water, moving clouds, a
burst of rain, their technique tried to capture what they saw.
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● The Impressionists wanted to create an art that was modern by capturing the
rapid pace of contemporary life and the fleeting conditions of light. They
painted outdoors (en plein air) to capture the appearance of the light as it
flickered and faded while they worked.
● The Impressionists tended to use what are called “complementary colors”
next to one another, rather than mixing them. By doing that, the colors would
have the effect of intensifying one another: next to orange, blue appears
brighter and more intense, and vice-versa.
Artists: Claude Monet, Pierre Auguste Renior
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1. The Water Lily pond
By: Claude Monet Date: 1899
- The water lilies series were painted after the death of monet’s wife and son.
- During the last thirty years of his life, Monet devoted himself to a series of famous
landscape paintings of his water gardens at Giverny.
- With its dappled sunlight, and its orchestration of colour, tone and texture, it
exemplifies Monet's en-plein-air approach to painting, in which he expresses his
sensations as well as his observations.
- There are numerous short rapid brushstrokes and touches or dabs of pure paint
(known as 'taches') have been used to create the water's flower-laden surface, a
technique made easier by the invention of the flat, square, ferrule paint brush, as
opposed to the round brush.
- In order to indicate the textures and shapes of the foliage, paint has been applied
layer on layer with a palette knife, until a thick crust is formed.
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- The graceful curve of the Japanese footbridge bisects the painting, its mauve lines
-tracked by green- harmonizing easily with the pond surface below and the green
foliage above right.
- Monet visited his garden at least three times a day to study the changing light,
recording the details in his notebooks. He continued to paint his lily pond until he
died, his compositions growing ever larger and more abstract. In his last series, he
ignores the banks and bridge entirely, and focuses exclusively on the surface of the
water, creating a number of abstract paintings filled with watery colours and light.
2. Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette
By: Pierre Auguste Renior Date: 1876
- The painting was done entirely outdoors.
- Pleasurable scene where people are socializing, flirting and dancing. It features the
main characteristics of impressionism movement which are sense of momentary and
leisure.
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- Renoir seems to be drawn to representing intimacy and interaction in his paintings;
in the center foreground of the painting, we can see two female figures, one leaning
towards the other putting her hand around the other one’s shoulder. There are also
pairs of dancers.
- There is a sense of “all-overness”, our eyes aren’t drawn to any single angle of the
painting, all of the figures are spread across.
- The painting is a kaleidoscope of pinks, yellows, blues and greens.
- There are loose brushworks “visible strokes of paint that don’t create clear
contours”, this concept was violating the rules of the academic paintings which
stated that paintings must have perfect finish “Brush Strokes aren’t visible”.
- There is an asymmetric composition where the bulk of the figures are on the lower
right while there is some empty space to the left with a single couple dancing.
- There is an interest in capturing the fleeting effects of light, this is obvious in the
dappled sunlight on the faces of some of the figures particularly the figure on the
right who is smoking a pipe, the leaning woman in the centre, and on the back of the
figure in the right foreground where his jacket almost looks polka-dotted because of
the filtered sunlight coming through the trees.
3. Luncheon of the Boating Party
By: Pierre Auguste Renior Date: 1881
- This painting is different from “Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette”, here there are
forms that seem much more three dimentional, have contours and real sense of
mass to the figures.
- The man standing on the left side of the painting is the son of the proprietor of the
restaurant “Alphonse Fournaise Jr.”, the other man in the straw hat is the artist
“Gustave Caillebotte” one of the greatest impressionists.
- The young woman who is playing with the little dog is Renoir’s girlfriend, who he
married later.
- There is a sense of sociability, flirting, delicious food and wine, enjoying pipe
smoking, summer, the breeze, the outdoors and the water.
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- The figures are leaning around each other, some are leaning back and some are
leaning forward, there is weight and counter-weight throughout the painting.
- There is also a glancing and counter-glancing, the male figure in the upper right
corner wearing striped jacket leaning forward and looking down at the young woman
but she looks at the man across the table from her, and he looks at the young
woman playing with the dog.
- The painting is wildly colorful, there are rich greens and blues, the white color of the
tablecloth, a brilliant orange across the surface which appears in a ribbon and
flowers on a hat.
- There is a constant gentle movements and change, the man in the straw hat is
leaning back towards us and pokes his elbow into our space, and opposite him the
figure leans back on his arms.
- There is a sketchy greenery around the river and some boats in the background.
- The composition is a pyramidal structure, following the railing from the lower left
towards the centre of the painting we will have one side of that pyramid, and
following the hand of the woman in blue past her shoulder we get the other edge of
that pyramid. The railing acts like an orthogonal that creates space.
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Post-impressionism
Post-Impressionists both extended Impressionism while rejecting its limitations: the
artists continued using vivid colors, a thick application of paint and real-life subject
matter, but were more inclined to emphasize geometric forms, distorted forms for an
expressive effect and use unnatural and seemingly random colors.
Artists: Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, Georges Seurat.
1. The Starry Night
By: Vincent Van Gogh Date: 1889
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- The curving, swirling lines of hills, mountains, and sky, the brilliantly contrasting
blues and yellows, the large, flame-like cypress trees, and the thickly layered
brushstrokes of Vincent van Gogh’s The Starry Night are ingrained in the minds of
many as an expression of the artist’s turbulent state-of-mind.
- He mentioned it briefly in his letters as a simple “study of night” or ”night effect.”
- Van Gogh had had the subject of a blue night sky dotted with yellow stars in mind
for many months before he painted The Starry Night in late June or early July of
1889. It presented a few technical challenges he wished to confront—namely the use
of contrasting color and the complications of painting en plein air (outdoors) at night.
- Following the dramatic end to his short-lived collaboration with the painter Paul
Gauguin in Arles in 1888 and the infamous breakdown during which he mutilated
part of his own ear, Van Gogh was ultimately hospitalized at Saint-Paul-de-Mausole,
an asylum and clinic for the mentally ill near the village of Saint-Rémy. During his
convalescence, Van Gogh was encouraged to paint, though he rarely ventured more
than a few hundred yards from the asylum’s walls.
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- It is assumed that Van Gogh composed The Starry Night using elements of a few
previously completed works still stored in his studio, as well as aspects from
imagination and memory.
- Van Gogh understood the painting to be an exercise in deliberate stylization, telling
his brother, “These are exaggerations from the point of view of arrangement, their
lines are contorted like those of ancient woodcuts”, Van Gogh was experimenting
with a style inspired in part by medieval woodcuts, with their thick outlines and
simplified forms.
- The Starry Night evidences Van Gogh’s extended observation of the night sky.
After leaving Paris for more rural areas in southern France, Van Gogh was able to
spend hours contemplating the stars without interference from gas or electric city
street lights, which were increasingly in use by the late nineteenth century.
- The painting is the result of a mixture of invention, remembrance, and observation
combined with Van Gogh’s use of simplified forms, thick impasto, and boldly
contrasting colors.
2. Self Portrait-Saint-Rémy
- The Van Gogh’s self portrait paintings were not
only recording the changes in his painting
technique, but also revealing his psychological
decline with a humility and honesty not seen since
the self portraits of Rembrandt. In the last five
years of his life he painted over thirty self portraits.
- This self portrait painting from the Musée d'Orsay,
brings together all the elements of Van Gogh's later
work: a choice of color that reflects his emotional
state and a style of drawing that pulsates with
energy.
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- It was painted shortly after he left the St. Remy asylum in July 1889 and shows that
he was still fighting his demons.
- It is arguably the most intense self portrait in the history of art.
- This painting is a portrait of Van Gogh's internal crisis. His piercing eyes hold you
transfixed but their focus is not on what is happening outside, but inside his head.
- The energy of the painting builds from the eyes which are the most tightly drawn
feature.
- The rhythms of his brushstrokes spread across the planes of his face, gaining
energy as they ripple through his jacket and hair, and finally burst into the churning
turbulence of the ice-blue background.
- The cool blues and greens that he uses are normally calm colors, but when they
are contrasted with his vivid red hair and beard they strike a jarring note which
perfectly sets the psychological tone of the portrait.
- This is a very courageous image of a man trying to hold himself together as he
wrestles with his inner fears.
3. Self Portrait
- In Paris, Van Gogh was influenced by the artist
Georges Seurat who devised a painting technique
called Pointillism.
- Van Gogh's pointillism attempt revealed the main
element of his his true genius; a natural instinct for the
expressive and emotional power of color.
4. Self Portrait with bandaged ear and pipe
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- The relationship between van Gogh and Gauguin at the time was very tense.
Despite the fact that cohabitation has become for them very productive in terms of
creativity, they were always fighting and arguing.
- On Christmas day they had a big fight because Gauguin said that he wanted to
leave, Vincent during this quarrel tried to attack him with a razor, but he stopped.
After a while, Vincent took a razor and cut off a portion of his left ear.
- More than anything Vincent wanted the situation to work. He wanted a place where
artists lived together, painted, talked about painting, and learned from each other.
- Van Gogh cut off the lobe of his left ear, but on the canvas bandaged right. This is
because he painted the painting, looking in the mirror. In the portrait, he looks
unnatural and detached: his eyes are too close to each other, and he seems to be
tens of years older than the age in which he painted the painting.
5. Mont sainte victoire seen from bellevue
By: Paul Cézanne Date: 1895
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- Cézanne gradually lost his interest in reproducing momentary observations and
began to focus on what is called a type of 'abbreviated Impressionism'. In this more
formal and constructive approach, he simplified and concentrated colours, and
standardized his brushstrokes so as to turn them into units in a pictorial structure. He
also relied more upon the use of geometric motifs.
- Cézanne tried to bring a certain order and clarity to nature by using simplified
shapes; triangles, flat planes, cylinders, rhomboids and the like.
- Cezanne preferred blocks of strong colour, outlining forms such as tree trunks and
fields in dark blue, he used horizontal lines to create breadth and vertical ones to
suggest depth.
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6. Nafea Faa Ipoipo (When will you
marry?)
By: Paul Gauguin Date: 1892
- Gauguin travelled to Tahiti for the first time in
1891, he painted many pictures of native women:
nude, dressed in traditional Tahitian clothes, and
dressed in Western-style dresses.
- The front and middle ground are built up in areas
of green, yellow and blue.
- A traditionally dressed young woman has settled
on the threshold between the front and middle
ground.
- It was suggested that the white tiare flower behind
her left ear indicates she is seeking a husband.
- Behind her a second figure in a high-necked Western-style dress sits erectly. It was
presumed that her gesture derives from Buddhist art.
7. A Sunday on La Grande Jatte
By: Georges Seurat Date: 1884-1886
“Some say they see poetry in my paintings, I see only science” Seurat.
- Seurat has ambitions to bring science to the methods of impressionism.
- The science that he was referring to had to do with ways of making the paintings
seem more luminous or brighter.
- He was interested in the idea of dividing color into its components. So instead of
mixing red and blue on the palette and getting a muddy purple -as the red and blue
aren’t pure themselves, they got lots of other things in them- Seurat’s solution in
order to get a pure purple like the one seen in nature is to take the red and the blue
and put them next to each other, so that the eye receives the light as the light
waves do the mixing themselves, and this is called “Optical Mixture”.
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“employing tiny juxtaposed dots of multi-colored paint can allow the viewer’s eye to
blend colors optically.”
- He had the conviction that painting in dots was able to produce a brighter color
than painting in strokes.
- Seurat’s technique was subsequently called Pointillism and it’s known by that
name to this day. However, the painter himself preferred to call his method
chromo-luminarism, a term he felt better stressed the focus on color and light.
- Seurat said that he wanted his figures to have a kind of solemnity -the state or
quality of being serious and dignified- that was found in the sculptures of the friars of
the parthenon.
- In the painting, there is apparent lack of narrative, Seurat decided to completely
dedicate his efforts to the people’s shapes, and not their personalities. Individuals
never did interest Seurat, only their formal elegance and the way they contributed
to the overall perfect balance of the composition.
- The figures are remarkably structured within the space, and the space itself is
very organized, there is much more of an illusion of space than we could ever get in
an impressionist painting, we have alternating shadows and lights, also there is a
receding diagonal line that creates an illusion of space.
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- Looking at the lower left corner of the painting, there is a man who is smoking a
pipe leaning on his back, the figure has really clear contours, which is something
that isn’t usually seen in impressionism paintings.
Expressionism
● Artistic tendency that became popular throughout Europe in the early 20th
century (originating in Germany, emerged around 1910).
● Its style emphasizes emotional impact over descriptive accuracy.
● Aims to present the world completely from a subjective perspective,
distorting it radically for emotional effect in order to evoke moods or ideas.
● Artists moved further away from the idealized figures and smooth surface of
19th century academic painting.
● Instead of depicting the visible exterior of their subjects, they sought to
express profound emotional experience through their art.
Artists: Edvard Munch, Franz Marc, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
1. The Scream
By: Edvard Munch
- The Scream exists in four versions: two pastels
(1893 and 1895) and two paintings (1893 and 1910)
- It is Munch's most famous work. It has been widely
interpreted as representing the universal anxiety of
modern man.
- Based on a personal experience first recorded in
an 1892 diary: “I was walking down the road with
two friends when the sun set; suddenly, the sky
turned as red as blood. I stopped and leaned against
the fence, feeling unspeakably tired. Tongues of fire
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and blood stretched over the bluish black fjord. My friends went on walking, while I
lagged behind, shivering with fear. Then I heard the enormous infinite scream of nature”
- The artist utilized a minimum of forms to achieve maximum expressiveness.
- It consists of three main areas: the bridge, which extends at a steep angle from
the middle distance at the left to fill the foreground; a landscape of shoreline, lake or
fjord, and hills; and the sky.
- The sky is activated with curving lines in tones of orange, yellow, red, and
blue-green.
- Foreground and background blend into one another, and the lyrical lines of the
hills ripple through the sky as well.
- Dramatic display of swirling lines, distorted forms and exaggerated colors.
- Edvard Munch reveals an honest and perhaps even ugly glimpse of his inner
troubles and feelings of anxiety.
- The two figures on the left-hand side are simple and abstract, but not really
distorted like the main figure.
- The painting was stolen two times (In 1994 and another time on 2004)
2. The Red Horses (Grazing Horses IV)
By: Franz Marc Date: 1911
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Cubism
● Cubism ➹ was a revolutionary new approach to representing reality
● Invented in around 1907–08 by artists Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque.
● They brought different views of subjects (objects or figures) together in the
same picture, resulting in paintings that appear fragmented and abstracted.
● Reducing everything to ‘geometric outlines, to cubes’.
● By breaking objects and figures down into distinct areas – or planes – the
artists aimed to show different viewpoints at the same time and within the
same space and so suggest their three dimensional form.
● They also emphasized the two-dimensional flatness of the canvas instead of
creating the illusion of depth (abandoned perspective).
● Cubism has developed in two distinct phases: the initial and more strict
analytical cubism, and a later phase of cubism known as synthetic cubism.
● Analytical cubism ran from 1908–12. Its artworks look more severe and are
made up of an interweaving of planes and lines in muted tones.
● Synthetic cubism is the later phase of cubism, 1912 to 1914, and
characterised by simpler shapes and brighter colours, often include
collaged real elements such as newspapers.
Artists: Pablo Picasso, Georges Braque
1. Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (The
Young Ladies of Avignon)
By: Pablo Picasso Date: 1907
- Picasso's painting was shocking even to his
closest artist friends both for its content and for its
formal experimentation.
- Les Demoiselles would not be exhibited until
1916, and not widely recognized as a
revolutionary achievement until early 1920s.
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- He abandoned the Renaissance illusion of three-dimensionality, presenting a
radically flattened picture plane that is broken up into geometric shards.
- The subject matter of nude women was not in itself unusual, but the fact that
Picasso painted them as prostitutes in aggressively sexual non-emotional
postures was new.
- The three figures on the left exhibit facial features in the Iberian style of Picasso's
native Spain, while the two on the right are shown with African mask-like features.
2. Bowl of Fruit, Violin and Bottle
- It is a typical of Synthetic Cubism, in which he
uses various means - painted dots, silhouettes,
grains of sand - to call attention to the depicted
objects.
- A still life painting of a table-top scene, with its
fruit-bowl, violin, bottle and (painted) newspaper,
is constructed from areas of colour that resemble
cut-out pieces of paper.
- The background has been left white.
3. Bottle and Fishes
By: Georges Braque Date: c.1910–12
- The painting is an example of Analytic Cubism.
- Georges Braque used the subjects of fish and bottles in many of his paintings
throughout his career.
- It has the restricted characteristic earth tone color palette.
- Ordinary objects, a bottle and fishes on a plate, laid on a table with a drawer,
(horizontal plane) have been dramatically fragmented to form a grid-like structure of
interpenetrating planes.
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- The items in Bottle and Fishes are made to appear so unlike their usual form. It is
like the observer is looking at them through a prism, as they are distorted and
fragmented.
Futurism
● Artistic and social movement that originated in Italy in the early 20th century.
● Focusing on progress and modernity, the Futurists sought to sweep away
traditional artistic notions and replace them with an energetic celebration of
the machine age.
● Depiction of urban landscapes as well as new technologies such as trains,
cars, and airplanes, speed and youth were emphasised.
● A key focus of the Futurists was the depiction of movement/speed or
dynamism through new techniques to express speed and motion, like:
blurring, repetition, and the use of lines of force, fracturing of the image,
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energetic brushstrokes or compositional turbulence (some inspired by
Cubism)
● Many Italian Futurists supported Fascism. Like them, the Futurists were
strongly patriotic, excited by violence, wars and opposed to parliamentary
democracy.
Artists: Gino Severini, Giacomo Balla, Umberto Boccioni, Fortunato Depero.
1. Dynamic Hieroglyph of the Bal Tabarin
By: Gino Severini Date: 1912
- Severini was fascinated by the dance hall as a
subject for the opportunity it offered for the
depiction of multisensory experience.
- Here he pictures ➹ a woman with brown curls
and a white, blue, and pink flounced dress as she
dances to music in the Paris nightclub Bal
Tabarin.
- Different elements ➹ of the work point to current
events—the Arab riding a camel refers to the
Turco-Italian War of 1911, and flags convey
sentiments of nationalism.
- Capturing the dynamism of motion with the integration of text and collage
elements, such as sequins, influenced by his study of French Cubism.
2. The Hand of the Violinist (Rhythm of the Violinist)
By: Giacomo Balla Date: 1912
- Depicting a musician's hand and the neck of a violin "made to look like it's
vibrating through space".
- Blurred and duplicated to suggest the motion of frenetic playing.
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- Inspired by some modern photographic techniques and by Cubism's methods of
capturing multiple perspectives.
- His objective in painting Rhythm of the Violinist was to explore “movement in both
its physical reality and optical appearance.”
3. Unique Forms of Continuity in Space
By: Umberto Boccioni Date: 1913
- It is seen as an expression of movement and
fluidity of a human-like figure.
- The figure is also armless and without a real face.
- The form was originally inspired by the sight of a
football player.
- The face of the sculpture is abstracted into a cross,
suggesting a helmet, an appropriate reference for the
war-hungry Futurists.
- The curly parts represent the air displacement by
the sculpture form.
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3. Grattacieli e tunnel (Skyscrapers and Tunnel)
By: Fortunato Depero Date: 1930
- The vibrant, brilliant colors effectively render the chaotic vibe of the city that
never sleeps.
- This energetic and mechanical movement of the metropolis is suggested by the
contrast between the diagonal lines of the skyscrapers and the rounded shape
of the tunnel and the gearing wheels.
- The sign that says “Roxy Teatro” on one of the buildings, indicates Depero’s
engagement with the costume and stage design for the Roxy Theater in New York.
Dadaism (Dada)
● Dadaism is an artistic movement in modern art that started around World War
I. Its peak was 1916 to 1922.
● Developed in reaction to World War I, consisted of artists who rejected the
logic, reason, and aestheticism of modern capitalist society.
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● Instead, they expressed nonsense, irrationality, and anti-bourgeois
(opposed to or hostile toward people or things) in their works.
● A common story is that the German artist Richard Huelsenbeck slid a paper
knife (letter-opener) at random into a dictionary, where it landed on "dada", a
French term for a hobby horse.
● Dadaist artists expressed their disagreement with violence, war, and
nationalism, and maintained political affinities with the radical far-left.
● Many Dadaists believed that the 'reason' and 'logic' of bourgeois capitalist
society had led people into war. They expressed their rejection of that
ideology by rejecting logic, embracing chaos and irrationality in their art.
● Dada represented the opposite of everything which art stood for (Anti-art).
● Zurich Dada (Switzerland) centered around the Cabaret Voltaire, which
provided a creative haven for exiled artists and others to explore new media
and performance.
● Art techniques developed: Collage, Cut-up technique, Photomontage,
Assemblage (3D collage), Readymades.
Artists: Marcel Duchamp, Paul Klee, Raoul Hausmann, Man Ray.
1. Fountain
By: Marcel Duchamp Date: 1917
- Duchamp was the first artist to use a readymade
and his choice of a urinal was guaranteed to
challenge and offend even his fellow artists.
- It is a factory-produced urinal he submitted as a
sculpture to the 1917 exhibition of the Society of
Independent Artists in New York.
- Duchamp purchased the urinal, flipped it on its side,
signed it with a pseudonym (the false name of R.
Mutt), and attempted to display it as art.
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- By removing the urinal from its everyday environment and placing it in an art
context, Duchamp was questioning basic definitions of art as well as the role of
the artist in creating it.
- The work has become iconic of the irreverence of the Dada movement towards
both traditional artistic values and production techniques.
2. LHOOQ
By: Marcel Duchamp Date: 1919
- The work is one of what Duchamp referred to as
readymades.
- The readymade/found object here is a cheap postcard
reproduction of Leonardo da Vinci's early 16th-century
painting Mona Lisa.
- Duchamp drew a moustache and beard in pencil and
appended the title.
- If the title letters are pronounced as they would be by a
native French speaker, it would sound as "Elle a chaud
au cul," which loosely translates as "there is fire down
below”, which is a vulgar expression implying that a
woman has sexual restlessness.
- Duchamp made multiple versions of L.H.O.O.Q. of
differing sizes and in different media throughout his
career.
3. The Spirit of our Time (The Mechanical
Head)
By: Raoul Hausmann Date: 1920
- The only surviving assemblage that Hausmann
produced.
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- This assemblage represents Hausmann's disappointment with the German
government and their inability to create a better nation.
- Constructed from a hat maker's dummy to represent a stupid person who can
only experience that which can be measured with the mechanical tools attached to
its head - a ruler, a tape measure, a pocket watch, a jewelry box containing a
typewriter wheel, brass knobs from a camera, a leaky telescopic beaker of the sort
used by soldiers during the war, and an old purse.
- Showing that there is no ability for critical thinking or subtlety. With its blank
eyes, the dummy is a narrow-minded, blind automaton.
4. Le Cadeau (The Gift)
By: Man Ray Date: 1921
- An early readymade by Man Ray (with the
assistance of Erik Satie).
- This piece was made in the afternoon on the
opening day of Man Ray's first solo show in Paris. It
was intended as a gift to the gallery owner.
- It was stolen the same day.
- Consisting of a usual iron that has been
transformed here into a non-functional, disturbing
object by the addition of a single row of fourteen
nails.
- Escapes the rule of logic and the conventional
identification of words and objects.
- In 1974, Ray made 5,000 replicas of Gift as a limited edition.
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Surrealism
- A 20th-century avant-garde movement in art and literature which aimed to release
the creative potential of the unconscious mind by liberating thought, language,
and human experience from the oppressive boundaries of rationalism.
- Surrealism developed out of the Dada activities during World War I and the
most important center of the movement was Paris.
- Surrealist practices included “waking dream” seances and automatism. During
waking dream seances, group members placed themselves into a trance state and
recited visions and poetic passages. This practice ended abruptly when one of the
“dreamers” attempted to stab another group member with a kitchen knife.
- Surrealist artist André Masson began creating automatic drawings, essentially
applying the same unfettered, unplanned process used by Surrealist writers, but to
create visual images. In Automatic Drawing (left), the hands, torsos, and genitalia
seen within the mass of swirling lines suggest that, as the artist dives deeper into his
own subconscious, recognizable forms appear on the page.
- Another technique, the exquisite corpse (The name derives from the French term
cadavre exquis and means rotating body), developed from a writing game the
Surrealists created. First, a piece of paper is folded as many times as there are
players. Each player takes one side of the folded sheet and, starting from the top,
draws the head of a body, continuing the lines at the bottom of their fold to the other
side of the fold, then handing that blank folded side to the next person to continue
drawing the figure. Once everyone has drawn her or his “part” of the body, the last
person unfolds the sheet to reveal a strange composite creature.
Features of Surrealistic Art
● Dream-like scenes and symbolic images.
● Unexpected, illogical juxtapositions.
● Bizarre assemblages of ordinary objects.
● Automatism and a spirit of spontaneity.
● Games and techniques to create random effects.
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● Personal iconography.
● Distorted figures and biomorphic shapes.
● Uninhibited sexuality and taboo subjects.
● Primitive or child-like designs.
Artists: Salvador Dali, Max Ernst, René Magritte
1. The Persistence of Memory
By: Salvador Dali Date: 1931
- In The Persistence of Memory, one of Dali’s earlier Surrealist works, he was
influenced by Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights, which he combined with a Catalan
background, a feature of much of his early work.
- This painting was one of the first Dali executed using his 'paranoid-critical'
approach in which he depicts his own psychological conflicts and phobias.
- Dali had studied psycho-analysis and the works of Sigmund Freud before joining
the Surrealists. The faithful transcription of dreams has always played a major role
in Dali's paintings.
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- Dali's painting combines three art genres: the still life, the landscape and the
self-portrait.
- The painting contains a self-portrait over which is draped a 'soft watch'. For Dali,
these 'soft watches' represent what he called the 'camembert of time', suggesting
that the concept of time had lost all meaning in the unconscious world.
- The pocket watches are not the only references to time in the painting. The sand
refers to the sands of time and sand in the hourglass. The ants have
hourglass-shaped bodies.
- The shadow that looms over the scene suggests the passing of the sun overhead,
and the distant ocean may suggest timelessness or eternity.
- Three of the clocks in the painting may symbolize the past, present and future,
which are all subjective and open to interpretation, while the fourth clock, which lies
face-down and undistorted, may symbolize objective time.
- The ants crawling over the pocket watch suggest decoy/trap, an absurd notion
given that the watch is metallic.
- He created unity in the canvas by the juxtaposition of objects bearing no relation
in an environment where they did not belong.
- The most confusing element of the scene is an anthropomorphic object laid on the
ground. Many art historians emphasize that the central figure in the painting is a
self-portrait of Dali. However, the figure, which has human characteristics such
as eyelashes as well as a free-form shape signifies metamorphosis, as do the
clocks that are morphing from solid to liquid.
- Metamorphosis is a key concept in the Surrealist movement, reflecting the
transformative power of dreams.
- The egg that lays on the distant shore is symbolic of life, which, like memory, has
the potential to persist despite the breakdown or distortion of time.
- The egg also epitomizes the artist's obsession with the juxtaposition of hard and
soft during his Surrealist period.
- The broken branch in the painting, which art experts identify as an olive tree in the
context of other Dali artworks, represents the demise of ancient wisdom as well as
the death of peace, reflecting the political climate between the two World Wars
as well as the unrest leading to the Spanish Civil War in Dali's native country.
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2. Le Sommeil (Sleep)
- Dali describes his painting as "The act of sleeping was a monster sustained on the
crutches of reality”
- The huge balloon-like head stretched across the width of the canvas
- The heavy form held up by a handful of fragile crutches – recalls the famous
“great masturbator” head form seen in countless Dalí paintings of this period.
- That strange head originated out of a now-famous rock at Cape Creus in Spain,
which Dalí had long imagined to be an agonized human head with its long nose
pressed to the ground.
- Crutches/long sticks were a present-everywhere symbolic element in Dalí’s
surrealism, and their meaning has been variously explained.
- In the present Dalí painting, it might be indicating that sleep itself is a fragile
state, easily disturbed sometimes by the slightest action, in this case by even one of
those precarious crutches falling away.
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3. The Burning Giraffe
- Dalí described the giraffe as “the masculine
cosmic apocalyptic monster.” Later he believed it
to be a premonition/suspicion of the II World War.
- The opened drawers in the blue female figure,
was according to Dali, a “tail bone woman” and they
refer to the inner, subconscious within man. In
Dalí’s own words his paintings form “a kind of
allegory which serves to illustrate a certain insight,
to follow the numerous narcissistic smells which
ascend from each of our drawers.”.
- Both female figures have undefined phallic shapes
protruding from their backs which are supported
by crutch-like objects.
- The hands, forearms and face of the nearest figure are stripped down to the
muscular tissue beneath the skin. The smaller figure holds what appears to be a
piece of flesh in her hand.
- Raw meat is seen as the call for a return to primitive nature, a rediscovery of the
inner being.
- The Burning Giraffe is like a warning to the world about the possibilities of war.
The only hope is that humanity can be saved through psychoanalysis – by opening
the chest of drawers present in the mind to understand the secrets of the human
body which is the combination of female and male treats.
- The hope is directly connected the number of crutches/sticks found on the two
women like figures.
- The main figure has many chest’s drawers, and has less crutches to hold her still;
while the other figure has many crutches without any drawers making her hopeless.
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4. The Angel of the home (The Triumph of Surrealism)
By: Max Ernst Date: 1937
- The painting's initial name is The Angel of Hearth and Home, and it was retitled by
Ernst in 1938.
- Ernst painted The Triumph of Surrealism shortly after the defeat of the Spanish
Republicans in the Spanish Civil War. In this conflict, Spanish fascist leaders were
supported by Germany and Italy in their victory.
- Ernst's goal was to depict the chaos that he saw spreading over Europe and the
ruin that fascism brings to countries.
- Ernst uses the title of this painting to aid in evoking a sense of chaos and
destruction. The use of the word angel confuses an observer at first due to the
abstract and grotesque/deformed figure that is the painting's subject. He forces the
viewer to think of these elements in a biblical sense.
- Ernst portrays a vivid creature in a moment of joyous expression. Seemingly alive
and grinning, the individual bursts with color, leading with a determined gape of his
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mouth and a pleasant squint of his eyes, and showing no regard for how he may
appear. By human standards, he is, in some ways, terrifying yet ultimately
fascinating. He embodies movement and attention-getting displays, yet cannot
avoid aesthetic imperfections that may be perfect for him, but uncomfortable for
others.
5. The Treachery of Images
By: René Magritte Date: 1929
- The Treachery (betrayal of trust) of Images was painted when Magritte was 30
years old. The picture shows a pipe. Below it, Magritte painted, "Ceci n'est pas une
pipe" French for "This is not a pipe." The painting is not a pipe, but rather an
image of a pipe.
- This masterpiece of Surrealism creates a three-way paradox out of the
conventional notion that objects correspond to words and images.
- Magritte used his artistic skill to challenge conventions using contrasting graphics
and text, misnaming objects, repetition, mirroring and partial concealment to create
baffling illusions.
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- The word, Treachery, as used in the title, might seem a little incongruous; perhaps
Deception would have been a more appropriate noun to use.
- Magritte may used the stronger word to impress the concept that we regularly need
to tell ourselves lies of varying magnitude, to make sense of the world around us.
- He explained it:
“It’s quite simple. Who would dare pretend that the REPRESENTATION of
a pipe IS a pipe? Who could possibly smoke the pipe in my painting? No one.
Therefore it IS NOT A PIPE.”
- The painting is sometimes given as an example of meta message. “The word is not
the thing” and “The map is not the territory”.
Abstract Expressionism
● The abstract expressionists were mostly based in New York City, and also
became known as the New York school. Started following World War II.
● Their aim is to make art that while abstract was also expressive or
emotional in its effect (non-objective imagery that appeared emotionally
charged with personal meaning).
● They were inspired by the surrealist idea that art should come from the
unconscious mind, and by the automatism (creating art without conscious
thought) of artist Joan Miró.
● Within abstract expressionism were two broad groupings: the so-called
action painters, who attacked their canvases with expressive brush strokes;
and the colour field painters who filled their canvases with large areas of a
single colour.
● The U.S. government embraced its distinctive style as a reflection of
American democracy, individualism, and cultural achievement, and actively
promoted international exhibitions of Abstract Expressionism as a form of
political propaganda during the years of the Cold War.
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Artists: Jackson Pollock, Jasper Johns, Pablo Picasso, Willem de Kooning,
Barnett Newman.
1. One: Number 31
By: Jackson Pollock Date: 1950
- An enormous size masterpiece of the 'drip' technique (in which he dropped,
dribbled, or threw paint onto a canvas laid on the floor) and among the largest of
Pollock's paintings.
- The work is evidence of the artist's skill and technical prowers.
- His looping cords of color accordingly register force and speed yet are also
graceful and lyrical, animating every inch of the composition.
- On the floor, Pollock said, “I am more at ease. I feel nearer, more a part of the
painting since this way I can walk around it, work from the four sides and literally be
in the painting.”
- Pollock’s process has been compared to the movements of a dance.
- The canvas pulses with energy: strings of enamel—some matte, some
glossy—weave and run, an intricate web of tans, blues, and grays lashed through
with black and white.
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2. War
By: Jackson Pollock Date: 1947
- Pollock’s ‘War’ was inspired by Pablo Picasso’s interpretations of warfare.
- The artistic execution begins to convey the pain, suffering and death caused by
conflict.
- The composition subtly uses a cream background colour, representing the horror
of suffocating mustard gas in the grim trenches.
- The monstrous destruction of war is conveyed both by the fierceness of the graphic
execution and by the imagery.
- The linear pencil strokes (cleverly highlighted in flashes of red, yellow and black)
focus your eyes on the pile of bodies and limbs that camouflage/hide the
indistinguishable horror and human debris in the centre of the painting.
- At the top of the painting, a bull and human figure are painted as if they are being
thrown onto the burning pyre.
- Standing on the right-hand side of the portrait, a hooded figure is being executed.
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3. 0 Through 9
By: Jasper Johns Date: 1961
- From the beginning of his career, Johns frequently
used numbers as a subject for his painting.
- This painting, rendered in distinct areas of red,
blue and golden yellow, presents the viewer with the
numerical figures 0–9, each scaled to fill the whole
canvas and superimposed over one another, such
that while each number is visible, it is difficult to
discern them individually.
- The application of the paint is characterised by
heavy brush marks and oil films, along with
widespread impasto.
- Areas of colour are highly worked and blended within and across individual spaces
created by the overlapping numbers. This blending is evident throughout the entire
composition, as is the multi-directional nature of the brushstrokes.
- Linear accents have been added in charcoal.
4. False Start
By: Jasper Johns Date: 1959
- By focusing on colors and the words that represent
them, Johns abstracted each, removing the
traditional associations that accompanied them.
- Rather than hand-paint each letter, Johns used a
store-bought stencil - a readymade method by
which he could create an image without revealing
the trace of the artist's hand.
- He stenciled words that denote colors on top and
underneath the various layers of paint as he worked.
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- Johns transformed the words into objects by rendering most in colors unrelated
to those which they verbally represented. Johns revealed the dissonance (lack of
harmony) between words and colors, shifting their function from designation to a
mere assembly of symbols, ripe for reconsideration.
- Johns used a technique he called "brushmarking." He used the gestural technique
of applying small sections of paint to the canvas purely according to arbitrary arm
movements rather than any preconceived placement for each individual brushstroke.
5. Portrait of Ambroise Vollard
- Ambroise Vollard was a well-known collector,
publisher, and art dealer.
- This cubist painting was created in the unique and
remarkable style of analytical cubism.
- The viewer sees Vollard as if reflected in a broken
mirror. Each fragment represents the part of the
whole image, and at the same time shows this image
in a new way. The fragments are separated from each
other and are fancily dispersed over the space of the
whole canvas.
- The whole picture is subject to a strict rhythm. The
color scheme is monochrome. It does not distract
from the model itself, its mood, the internal mood, and energy. Dark tones dominate
the general background. There are merely Contrast. This work is dominated by
structure, which is deliberately complicated.
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6. Ma Jolie “My Pretty Girl”
- Picasso's nickname for Marcelle Humbert, who
was his lover, was also Ma Jolie.
- Ma Jolie's head and torso are subtly indicated by
a central triangular mass in the painting. Picasso
placed six vertical lines in a group at the lower
center to represent a guitar's strings.
- Picasso has made great use of black lines to
really simplify the form.
- Picasso was influenced by African masks that
he saw at the ethnographic museums in Paris,
which uses simplified geometric shapes to
symbolise parts of the human form e.g. two circles
for eyes.
- Picasso uses a muted colour pallet to focus on
the form and shape rather than the personality of her person.
- The composition seems to have the same type of pyramidal format that can be
read as the layout of a human figure, from there different shapes and lines can be
interpreted as limbs and hands.
7. Excavation
By: Willem De Kooning Date: 1950
- De Kooning was inspired by a woman working in the fields for this piece.
- This painting exemplifies the artist's innovative style of expressive brushwork and
distinctive organization of space into loose, sliding planes with open contours.
- The bulk of the surface is covered with dirty white, cream, and yellowish shapes
outlined with black and gray lines.
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- Throughout the canvas, one sees passages of crimson, blue, magenta, gold, and
aqua. The effect is an all-over composition with no single point of entry and which
draws the viewer's eyes across the entirety of the canvas.
- The pictorial space de Kooning depicted on the canvas was closely tied to his own
embodied sense of space in the physical world. In a talk he wrote for the Artists'
Club, de Kooning explained, "If I stretch my arms next to the rest of myself and
wonder where my fingers are - that is all the
space I need as a painter."
8. Rosy Fingered Dawn at Louise Point
By: Willem De Kooning Date: 1963
- The title Rosy-Fingered Dawn at Louse Point
refers to one of Willem de Kooning’s favourite
places in Long Island, New York. During his
period in Long Island De Kooning rode his bike
daily to Louse Point where he observed the
water.
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- The painting is characterized by large expanses of colour, pastel hues and
complex surfaces. Colour accumulates to a thick impasto.
- In this abstract portrayal of a landscape De Kooning was driven by intuition and
memory. The artist’s use of pink is reminiscent of flesh and brings to mind his
statement: “The landscape is in the Woman and there is Woman in the landscape.”
9. Broken Obelisk (Black Needle)
By: Barnett Newman
Date: between 1963 and 1967
- The needle is constituted of three tonnes of steel
and stands 25 feet tall.
- The subject of the artwork clearly refers to many
aspects of Ancient Egyptian monuments.
- The shape of the sculpture's base is a pyramid,
visually similar to the ones in Giza, Egypt.
- Resting on it there's another Egyptian symbol, an
inverted obelisk precariously balancing on the
pyramid's top.
- The base of the inverted obelisk that constitutes
the sculpture's summit looks damaged as if it was roughly extracted from the
ground.
- The two parts of the sculpture connect at a very little space of just two inches and
a quarter. At first sight, this junction point seems to be going against physics' law, but
in reality, the whole sculpture is stabilised by a steel rod hidden in the
monument's trunk.
- According to the artist, this sculpture was designed without thinking about a
particular site and it doesn't commemorate a specific artwork or person in history.
- The artwork is by no means "expressive", but it's the silence that lies inside it that
enables a wider range of possible meanings and interpretations.
- Some interpret Broken Obelisk as a universal monument to all humanity.
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10. Vir Heroicus sublimis
By: Barnett Newman Date:1951
- Barnett Newman was best known for his color-field paintings and use of what he
called “zips,” vertical strips of color placed across the surfaces of his compositions.
- He created the zips by applying masking tape to block off parts of the canvas and
painting the exposed areas.
- This work’s title, which can be translated as “Man, heroic and sublime,” refers to
Newman’s essay “The Sublime is Now,” in which he poses the question, “If we are
living in a time without a legend that can be called sublime, how can we be creating
sublime art?
- When he first exhibited this painting, Newman tacked a sign to the wall instructing
viewers to move up close to the work. His goal was to have viewers engage directly
and intimately with it—to bathe in its color and experience the rhythm and contrast of
its zips.
- He explained: “It’s no different, really, from meeting another person. One has a
reaction to the person physically. Also, there’s a metaphysical thing … and if a
meeting of people is meaningful, it affects both their lives.”
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Pop Art
● Pop art is an art movement that emerged in the 1950s and flourished in the
1960s in America and Britain.
● Pop Art might seem to glorify popular culture by elevating soup cans, comic
strips and hamburgers to the status of fine art on the walls of museums.
● A second look may suggest a critique of the mass marketing practices and
consumer culture that emerged in the United States after World War II.
● Pop artists developed their distinctive style of the early 1960s. Characterized
by clearly rendered images of popular subject matter.
● In contrast to the dripping paint and slashing brushstrokes of Abstract
Expressionism, Pop artists applied their paint to imitate the look of
industrial printing techniques and silkscreens.
● Pop artists believed everything is interconnected, and therefore sought to
make those connections literal in their artwork.
● The majority of Pop artists began their careers in commercial art.
Artists: Andy Warhol, Claes Oldenburg
1. Campbell's Soup Cans
By: Andy Warhol Date: 1962 ➹
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- Includes 32 canvases that measure 20 x 16 inches.
- The individual paintings by Warhol were made by a print-making method with the
use of semi-mechanized tool for screen printing and a non-painterly style.
- Warhol wasn't just emphasizing popular imagery, but rather providing commentary
on how people have come to perceive these things in modern times: as commodities
to be bought and sold, identifiable as such with one glance.
- An early series was hand-painted, but Warhol switched to screenprinting shortly
afterwards, favoring the mechanical technique for his mass culture imagery.
- At a glance, Campbell's Soup Cans looks like a series of repetitions of the same
can, but they have different names on both the cans and the paintings. (Tomato,
Clam Chowder, Black Bean…)
2. Marilyn Diptych
By: Andy Warhol Date: 1962
- Marilyn Monroe died in August 1962, having overdosed on barbiturates.
- In the following four months, Warhol made silkscreen paintings of her, all based on
the same publicity photograph from the 1953 film Niagara.
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- Marilyn Diptych is made of two silver large canvases on which the artist
silkscreened a photograph of Marilyn Monroe fifty times.
- By repeating the image, he evokes her over presence in the media.
- The contrast of vivid colour with black and white, and the effect of fading in the
right panel are suggestive of the star’s mortality.
- It has been suggested that the relation between the left side of the canvas and the
right side of the canvas is evocative of the relation between the celebrity's life and
death.
- The repetition grid is like a program that the artist uses to “automate” the process
of composing the work, instead of relying on subjective thoughts or feelings.
3. Pastry Case
By: Claes Oldenburg Date: 1961-62
- Plaster sculptural objects.
- A plate of frosted cookies, two sundaes, a cake, an oversized rack of ribs, and a
half-eaten caramel apple inside a display case.
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4. Spoonbridge and Cherry
By: Claes Oldenburg and his wife, Coosje van Bruggen Date: 1985
Islamic Architecture Aesthetics
Link:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1gPbLWiTmQohADLTpJVflYNqc_VPaRUPT
0ZpxkoZX318/?usp=sharing
60

Indian Sculptures
- Sculpture was the favored medium of artistic expression on the Indian
subcontinent.
- The subject matter of Indian sculpture was abstracted human forms.
- Sculpture was mostly of religious meanings (Hindu, Buddhist, or Jain religions). Art
was in the service of religion.
- Nude bodies used as: a representation of spirits or of the idealised imagined
shapes of gods or deities.
- Deities: a god or goddess (in a polytheistic religion that has more than one god).
- The Deity has emeralds (precious stones) embedded in its eyes and diamonds on
its forehead and navel.
- The multiple heads and arms of Hindu sculptures were thought necessary to
display the gods’ powers.
- The tradition of Indian sculpture started 2500 to 1800 BCE.
- Started as small terracotta figures.
- By the 9th–10th centuries, Indian sculpture had reached a form that has lasted up
to the present day.
- After 10th century, many sculptures were used as a part of architectural
decoration, with vast numbers of relatively small figures of mediocre quality being
produced for this purpose.
Types of Indian Sculpture
1. Wooden Sculptures
● Every region of India has developed its own unique style of wooden
structures.
● Popular for their complex carving works and meticulous finishing.
● Idols of gods, goddesses and demigods (partial gods).
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2. Bronze Sculptures
● Radiates a sense of immortality.
● Created because they could be carried outside the temple places (easier to
be moved).
3. Marble Sculptures
● The finest marbles used for sculpture does not contain stains (has their own
colors).
● Marble sculpture reached its peak during the Mughal rule.
● By Mughal dynasty, Shah Jahan‘s, marble used in building of monuments or
tombs instead of sandstone.
4. Stone Sculptures
- "Dhamek Stupa" in Sarnath village is one of the important
stone sculptures.
- It is considered as "seat of the holy Buddha". (Video)
- Stupa is a hemispherical mound that represents the
burial mound of the Buddha.
5. Sand Sculptures
- Can be of multiple shapes, sizes or forms.
- Sometimes colored sand is also used to create sculpture.
- Although sand sculptures are comparatively new to the culture of India, they are
widely accepted by the indians.
62

Shiva as Lord of the Dance (Nataraja)
- “Nataraja”—nata meaning dance or performance, and raja meaning king or lord.
- Nataraja is a depiction of the Hindu god Shiva.
- His dance is called Tandavam or Nadanta.
- The early classical form of the depiction appears in stone reliefs.
- Bronze sculptures of Nataraja started to be developed by the 10th Century.
- It typically shows Shiva dancing in one of the religious poses.
- In his upper right hand he holds the "damaru", the drum whose beats for the act
of creation and the passage of time.
- In his upper left hand he holds the "agni", the flame/fire of destruction.
- Shiva’s hair, the long hair of the yogi, streams out across the space within the halo
of fire that constitutes the universe.
- His legs are bent, which suggests an energetic dance.
- The face shows two eyes plus a slightly open third on the forehead.
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- The eyes represent the sun, the moon and the third has been interpreted as the
inner eye, or symbol of knowledge (jnana).
Videos to view:
1- https://youtu.be/o7-i6KLoEkc 2- https://youtu.be/qk-9Ez3xICY
64

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