Explore American Art History

Native American culture was a great influence on newly introduced western art when settlers first came to North America. Not only did Native Americans have their own style of art, sculpture, basket weaving, and other fine arts. Their artistic styles helped influence some European art and gave them a different outlook on not only art itself, but a brand new culture that they have not seen before. This paper will talk about the different styles of Native American art and compare it to European art styles and artist, as well as going into detail about how their culture influenced artistic styles.

One pleasant afternoon, my classmates and I decided to visit the Houston Museum of Fine Arts to begin on our museum assignment in world literature class. According to Houston Museum of Fine Art’s staff, MFAH considers as one of the largest museums in the nation and it contains many variety forms of art with more than several thousand years of unique history. Also, I have never been in a museum in a very long time especially as big as MFAH, and my experience about the museum was unique and pleasant. Although I have observed many great types and forms of art in the museum, there were few that interested me the most.

regarded as the only art form generated in America, and it has reached a world

During the 1930’s when Fascism was at it height, populist art fought against the domination of fascism by diverting the fashionable ideals of fascism with the ideas of populism. The US was producing popular art in its populous country to share the rest of the world as an attempt to ward off the Fascists. They decided to distract everybody from Fascism by art, film, dance, etc. that appealed to the similar but different enough ideals of populism and democracy.

-In the 1700’s a new middle class emerged. Mass print became a thing as well. Every day people started to purchase art works to display in their homes. It was a way for them to express their status and national patriotism. The diversity in patrons had a great impact on the arts of the 15th – 18th centuries. With new patrons and the demand for art work, artists were able to capture more than just religious scenes. They were able to create landscapes and everyday life in their work. Artists were commissioned by the new middle class to create art work that they were able to hang in their houses. For instance, artist Joseph Wright of Derby’s painting “A Philosopher Giving a Lecture at the Orrey (1765).”

(2005). In D. Bjelajac, American Art: A Cultural History (pp. 37-129). Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, Inc.

This art study will define the important role that Thomas Sully (1783-1872) had in painting portraits for American presidential elites in the 19th century. During early part of the 19th century, Sully was known as the premier portrait painter of John Quincy Adams and President Andrew Jackson as major works of his career. Sully had studied under the famous American portrait painter, Gilbert Stuart, which provided him the techniques and political access to paint presidents as part of a career in the arts. These works defined a high level of sophistication for an American painter, which relied heavily on Sully’s training as a painter in America and in Europe. Sully became the premiere painter of American elites due to an ability to capture the

It is believable that John Vanderlyn, in his painting Landing of Columbus, was trying to portray the success of Columbus and his crew. Columbus heroic stance and elegant expression are made all the more impressive in comparison to the native people who witness the event. The Native Americans are naked, fearful or subservient, bowing down before the explorer in awe and reverence. The symbols of empire are shown in the heroic explorer with his Christian crosses and steel swords symbolizing the significance in the power of civilization. In 1836 of June, Congress had commissioned John Vanderlyn to paint the Landing of Columbus. About eleven years later the painting was

1853 there was eighty-six documented galleries, which had women and children working in them, really changed the times. Around this time, there were document African American operators which seems counterproductive, as acrimonious slaves would be photographing and documenting the slave trade as well as high profile crime trials of relevancy. Post mortem portraits became prevalent as well as the documentation of the different interesting landscapes, for instance Niagara Falls was shown in the chapter with a group of folks standing in the foreground enjoying the view. The American Daguerrotypists made the sites commonly unseen by most, available. Such a Hawaii, Mexico, Philippines and South America. They were also able to introduce Photography as it was then known to the people of

I find interesting it how foreign influences of the English, French, Spanish and Africans contributed to the diverse and fascinating art and architecture of this country. These collective ideas through art make us aware of the intercultural relationship of the colonists and their foreign rulers during the colonial years.

One way Americans show their pride is through their art. The most popular type is

The Ragtime Era contained many old ideals, new inventions and great advances in the art world. The loss of the great American frontier and the growth of an urban population were key factors to the burst of innovation which then facilitated the appearance of modern art in America. One of the largest proliferation of modern artists came out of the renowned Ashcan School. Ashcan, which was created in the early 1900’s, in opposition to rigid idealism, was an institution whose artists focused on the nitty-gritty aspects of American life. Idealists deemed Ashcan art as “too vulgar” as it often focused on the new freedom of Americans, often through the sexual liberation of women and the newfound mixture of the sexes. Due to the flood of immigrants,

Under the guidance of Charles Willson Peale (fig. 1) in 1805, a group of Philadelphian artists and merchants gathered to ratify the charter that formed the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) the oldest art school and museum in the United States. Founded on the dedication and principles of education, collecting, and exhibiting American art. Peale and the other Found Fathers of American art sought “to promote the cultivation of the Fine Arts, in the United States…and exciting the efforts of the artists, gradually to unfold, enlighten and invigorate the talents of our Countrymen.”

Art has evolved and regenerated itself many times during our human existence. These differences are defined through changes in styles under various theories. During the nineteenth and early twentieth century, a style known as Expressionism became popular. During this movement the artists were trying to use their artwork as a tool of expression toward life. It was mainly dominant in the nonrepresentational arts, such as abstract visual arts and music. It also was probably one of the most difficult movements to understand because the whole point of the piece lay within the artist. Not only was it a movement, it defined the act of art as a whole. From the beginning of time, each work of art, excluding replicas, show a way of expressing

In the United States, the Arts and Crafts Movement took on a distinctively more bourgeois flavor. While the European movement tried to recreate the virtuous world of craft labor that was being destroyed by industrialization, Americans tried to establish a new source of virtue to replace heroic craft production: the tasteful middle-class home. They thought that the simple but refined aesthetics of Arts and Crafts decorative arts would ennoble the new experience of industrial consumerism, making individuals more rational and society more harmonious. In short, the American Arts and Crafts Movement was the aesthetic counterpart of its contemporary political movement: Progressivism.