Mt. Kadahdin Analysis

Examining the formal qualities of Thomas Birch’s painting An American Ship in Distress was very interesting. This paper will analyze and illustrate what I saw in this particular piece of artwork. The paper will also discuss the art elements such as line, shape, color, texture, scale, and composition of the artwork.

It is almost a reflection of the man’s trident. That same pitchfork shape also appears in the window of the house that sits in between both figure’s heads. Repetition can also be seen in the dotted pattern of the woman’s outfit, which also appears in the material of the curtain that hangs in the house’s window. The echo of verticals in this painting is also strong. The faces and bodies of the figures seem to be stretched, and narrowed. The pitchfork’s slender prongs and the green stripes on the man’s shirt also add to the elongation of their frame. The copious amounts of vertical wood boards that make up the house and the barn, keep the viewer’s eye moving up and down the picture plane. Wood’s use of verticality in this painting is overwhelming.

On Saturday, January 23rd, 2016, I visited the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, California. I observed several exhibitions on display, and I ultimately decided to write my report on Fannie Eliza Duvall’s Confirmation Class. Confirmation Class is an oil painting on canvas, and measures 20 by 30 inches. The painting with origins in Los Angeles, California, was produced in 1897, and was one of the first paintings done by a local artist to adopt new theories of Impressionism through California themes. What attracted me to this painting was the selection of the warm color scheme used to create a relaxing and pleasant drawing to look at as opposed to the larger selection of abstract and non-representational art on display at the Bowers Museum. Another reason as to why I chose to write my report on this specific drawing was the fact that this drawing was from a small bunch produced in my home state of California on display.

The image I chose for this paper is titled A Rose. The image is a painting painted in oil on a canvas and was painted by Thomas P. Anshutz. The painting was produced in Pennsylvania during 1907. I researched this image on ARTstor by using the term realism and then I narrowed down my search by selecting a filter to return paintings as well as setting the geography filter to North America. The painting belongs to The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s collection and is on display in the American Wing in the gallery of Images of Woman from 1880 to 1910.

Norman Rockwell, a 20th century painter was born in 1894. He depicted many scenes of American culture through his perspective until his death in 1978. I chose to do my looking assignment on his oil and graphite on canvas and wood “Framed”. I traveled to Roanoke to see this fine piece of art in the Tubman Art museum. When I first looked at this piece I was very drawn to the texture. By the looks of the picture I took, you cannot really tell that this piece is textured. This piece depicts a picture of a man who seems to be a museum worker holding a frame and essentially framing himself in it. In this piece you also see other pieces of art hanging on the wall around him giving him a wide variety of very expressive looks. You see in this painting that Rockwell used a picture inside of a picture to tell the story of the museum worker.

-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).”

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

We can also see the use of black shades to create a hole at the bottom part of the rock. With his excellent use of colors, we can identify the good, healthy and green grass from the bad, unhealthy, brown grasses. Looking beyond the main focus of the painting, he uses colors to separate the sky from the land in the background creating a solid form of perspective on the painting. He also uses colors to create water forms as seen behind the young character. Now, for the sky, he uses shades of white to magnificently differentiate the thick clouds from the light ones. He also uses this to create a source to light to the whole area. All these put together creates a splendid, realistic and familiar atmosphere for the viewers to relate with.

The first photos of the gothic transition come from the “Prairie Images of Ground and Sky” collection. The collection shows untouched nature that gives a feeling of the sublime. It shows wide green expanses, bathed in warm light, that shows a raw beauty and goodness created by nature. This feeling of the sublime is a major aspect of the gothic due to its ability to provide

Hill painted a perfect looking scenery which made it realistic as if a real scenery picture was taken with an advanced technology. Hill applied a wide range of vivid colors to help enhance this piece more. If I was to visit a senior citizen home and had to depict this painting to a blind fe/male. I would start off by saying firstly, my attention was drawn towards the upper atmosphere’s bright blue color which reflected from the large body of water underneath it. Which is often associated with feelings of breaths slowing down and when one reaches a certain state of relaxation. Secondly, by imagining one mashing a pillow against their palms I was able to feel the fluffiness of what floats in the sky. In order to picture, the way the sizes and shapes change I would compare it to when one

The revisited image is successful in terms of its use of the pitchfork and utilizing that as the focal point that connects the two couples in each image. However, more could have been done to communicate the same message of how times have changed for farmers in the 1930s, as the original did. Since this image's main purpose is to revisit the original image, the creators behind this photograph should have only made minor modernizing changes to the clothing and materials to ensure that viewers understand what piece is being referenced. It should be realized that some artist's take shortcuts, putting the main focus on the pitchfork being the main component that brings the two images together, and do not convey the idea of culture present in the original. Furthermore, the revisited image that features the two young famous female figures is only successful if the viewer knows to make the connection that both of the couples represented as farmers in the original and reproduction, are not actual farmers. It is important when referencing an image such as American Gothic, that enough elements are incorporated in the revisited image, so it does not seem as though the newer artist is stealing or plagiarizing the original in terms of its overall

What I see when I look at this large piece of work is the different painted scenes telling the accounts of Missouri’s history and along with a few images depicting popular folklore of the state above each door leading into the lounge. Benton brilliantly divided the mural into three different intervals along each wall, each representing a distinct time period between the years of 1730 to 1930s. Each

When entering the room, people crowded around Monet’s pieces, which felt like an honor to see the type and techniques his work has. The colors describe the feeling of an early morning. The painting has a muted palette of blues, greens, and grays. The sunrise is orange and yellow which are surrounded by the clouds and smoke from steamboats. Three boats are shapes and visible while the rest fade into the distance. This painting is an example of plein air or outdoor painting. I also notice that Monet layered the colors so that when I viewed the painting from a far distance I knew what the painting was about however when I looked at it up close I saw brush strokes and

When I first saw Grant Wood’s painting of the American Gothic, I was very young, somewhere in the age range of 9 years old. The elderly couple whom both had emotional faces and the elderly gentleman had a pitchfork in his hand. At the time this scared me as I often felt that this piece was awful displaying nothing more than two people on a farm Now that I am older I enjoy this art piece immensely.

Albert Bierstadt was a painter most remembered for his dramatic and large masterpieces that focused on extreme color and contrast, especially with lighting. However, when it comes to his painting, Mt. Hood, Oregon, he tends to defy those preconceived ideas. Painted in the early 1860’s, this painting is representative of Bierstadt’s earlier artwork. He uses lighter brushstrokes, a brighter and more monochromatic color palette, and is depicting a minimalist scene in its natural state (Figure 1). The painting is currently displayed at the Currier Museum of Art in Manchester, NH, and while it is frequently described as small it is larger than you think. Measuring at fifty-one inches by sixty-one and a quarter inches leaves the Mt. Hood, Oregon painting seeming small compared to his typical artworks.