Art Criticism Paper

The artwork being analyzed is called Nameless and Friendless and it was completed in 1857 by Emily Mary Osborn. The artwork was most likely created in England, where she was from. The media is oil paints on canvas, rather than the wood that was usually used. It is currently on display in Tate, Britain.

The focal point of the painting is the woman with infant. This is shown by the lighting in the painting being directly on her, the bright red that she is wearing, and the circling of the putti around her figure along with the majority of their gazes being directed at her. The bright light directly behind her and the infant could possibly be coming from the sun behind the clouds in the sky, the putti to her upper right holding the torch, or it could be symbolic in that it is the infant’s halo and representative of his divine nature. The overall piece is not overly dark but the lighting seems to be most focused on the woman, infant, her other children, and the flying putti. This is an example of tenebrism.

I chose to write about L’Envouteuse (The Sorceress) by Georges Merle. Merle’s father was also a painter, and since Merle did not sign some of his early work it was often confused to be done by his dad. George himself was known by his talent of painting the body form of women. Merle painted this during the time of 1883. This painting is 57 ½ inches x 45 inches making this a fairly large piece. When painting this he used oil on canvas. I found L’Envouteuse (The Sorceress) while I was browsing through The Birmingham Museum of Art. Above all pieces of art I saw in the museum, this painting seemed to be the most captivating. As soon as I laid eyes on it my attention was immediately taken by this mysterious piece of art. I grabbed a stool and began writing down my observations. Looking at this painting on paper cannot even compare to actually seeing it in person. Pictures I have seen online of L’Envouteuse (The Sorceress) do not justify the great detail and vigorous colors that are more easily seen while actually standing in front of the painting.

This paper is a formal analysis of the Marble grave stele with a family group relief sculpture. It is a pentelic marble style relief standing at 171.1cm tall carved by a master. It is from the Late Classical period of Greek, Attic which was completed around ca.360 B.C. . I chose to analyze this piece as apposed to the others because I’m mainly attracted to art and sculptures from the Greek era. The overall color used in this relief is ivory with a few cracks and pieces broken off. There is some discoloration which causes the color to come off as slightly light brown for most of the relief. The sculpture appears larger compared to the other sculptures in the art room. It represents a family which includes a man, his wife, and their

The painting Udney Maria Blakeley (1830), by Thomas Sully, was the first painting that came to mind when assigned the project: the painting has fascinated me both as a child and an adult due to the beauty of both the woman in the painting, but also from my deeper understanding of art now. Thomas Sully used the wet medium of oil on canvas, and included the woman in the foreground of the painting holding a rose in a vase in her right hand. There is a deep contrast between the women dressed in a white gown, and the darker background of the painting. Due to the highlighting along the left side of her face, and the shadowing on the right, it can be assumed that she is facing, or even looking straight at the

Over the years, I have flirted with visual art. It started with pencil drawing, continued as an affair with marker illustration, then a dalliance with lettering, and I now have a relationship with photography. However, my favorite art will never be displayed in museums or galleries. It is not static and immutable. Rather, my chosen medium is fluid, living, volatile. No matter how well rehearsed, it will never be the same again. That’s the beauty of performance art.

The painting depicts a young woman in a pink dress sitting down. The background is very dark but three things can be made out by the viewer. Starting with the ground plane of the painting, an orange carpet can be seen covering the entire floor. It is patterned and contains yellows, greens and blues. The cool toned colours are darker in hue than the warm toned. Secondly, there appears to be a cabinet or a desk lining the wall behind her. The wood of the cabinetry is carved with detailed designs and is made of a dark stained wood. Despite the dark background a single red rose can be seen on top of the cabinetry. The rose looks freshly picked and shows no signs of withering in its petals. It is painted in a muted red colour that allows it to stand out on

One of the aspects I believe unifies this painting is, as I talked about above, the continuation of the blue of the woman’s clothing continuing up into her hair, which gives the piece a sense of wholeness and relativity. There is also balance in this piece, for while the woman’s head is offset, this is balanced out by the elongation of her shoulder and arm in the right side of the image. Variety is also achieved in this piece through the use of a variation of hues and a lot of tonal difference. Emphasis is placed upon the hair with the use of an unnatural hair colour, as well as the face where light colours are used to highlight and pull the attention. Space is not so much of an active principle in this piece, but is still present nonetheless. Beryl is placed in the middle of the painting, with her taking up roughly 50% of the space, and the rest taken up by background.

There is also a mirror placed on the table allowing the viewers to link with space beyond the frame. Also in the far back right of the painting you can see a young man talking to an elderly. The artist created an very old or old-fashioned look by using opposing colors, red and green. “The second half of the fifteenth century in northern Europe saw an expansion of genre

In the painting, ‘Virgin and Child’, by Rogier van der Weyden, it can be observed that the artist chose to use the medium of oil on wood. Despite the fact that Rogier van der Weyden created this painting in the Netherlands and was born in Tournai, Belgium, their primary influence appeared to stem from the Italian Renaissance, which had begun to use the technique of oil paintings with increasing frequency by turn of the 15th century. The subject of the painting itself, Madonna and her virgin child, were a common theme in the Renaissance, where religious subjects and topics were the primary choice for any prominent artist during this historical artistic period.

One of the most visually intriguing pieces in the exhibit is the Portrait of Père Bouju by Maurice de Vlaminck. It was painted around the year 1900 by the French artist. It is not particularly beautiful by normal standards. At first glance, the texture of the paint stands out more than any other feature. It has very strongly defined brush strokes and thick paint in portions, especially the face of the man and the background. The lines in the paint are mostly straight, short, and wide with some that are thinner and wavy, like the smoke. The man is in the center of the canvas, he is the only discernable image, and he is almost devoid of detail aside from the face and the hat. The colors are almost entirely neutral aside from the red scarf. In this oil on canvas portrait the man is wearing a

Concerning color, there is a stark contrast between the figure on the painting and the background. More specifically, the figure of the woman is predominantly delineated in white color, especially pale, ashen white, as far her apparel and facial complexion are concerned, while there are also various hues of grey, with respect to her hair and accessory feather. These white and grey shades are vividly contrasted with the prevailing red and crimson hues of the background (viz. the drape, armchair, and table). Moreover, one can detect colors of dark green (jewelry), some beige on the left (pillar), and darker or lighter shades of blue on the right side of the canvas (sky), which all in concert and in addition to the subtle purple hue forming the sun or moon exude a certain dramatic sentiment. Also, there is brown, which often easily segues into gold (viz. books and attire details respectively). The main contrast of colors between white and red would be interpreted as serving the purpose of rendering the figure of the woman, and especially her face, the focal point of the work, despite, paradoxically enough, the lush red shades at the background. Bearing that in mind, the significance of the woman’s face will be enlarged upon later, when discussing aspects of her identity.

Next is the use of color, or lack thereof. The colors in the background are very quiet and muted, mostly subdued blues and grays with hints of a deep red and brownish yellow peeking though. The colors used for the figure are browns and tans, almost as if the was painted with mud, like she is all-natural and from the earth. The range of colors would seem to have a cool tone if you were looking at them on a painter’s palette but the arrangement of color on the canvas gives the piece a warm feeling.

The first artwork I chose didn’t have a title with it but it was drawn by Douglas A. Beckett. I went to the Activity Center of San Marcos with Geoff Bretches and Alice Horn (My mom). The painting is a portrait with multiple types of rock looking shapes. You can’t really tell what the time of day was but it looks like it was outside on a mountain or cliff. It is a vertical realistic piece. The artwork was made in the contemporary period because it was drawn just last year. There is just a cluster of a bunch of big rocks surrounding pebbles. The artist must not be that famous currently because I couldn’t find any information on him.

The shapes of the figures are sharply defined and the objects such as the table, book, and string instruments. There are diagonal rhythms throughout the painting in which it creates movement. The light source in the upper left allows the source light to have a more natural appearance throughout the painting. The shadows at the right-hand corner and the men wearing green in the middle contrast the main object with the most sources of lighting. The objects shadows and lighting create dimension and a vivid sense of more contrast. There are areas in the making with more contrast and the sharp contrast that creates movement in the painting. The shadows and the lighting throughout the painting show gradations and the highlights create more depth. Staring from the upper-left hand corner with the first figure of a gentleman wearing a hue of blue and yellow, the left side of his face and garment shows the source light in right above him. The source light above the