The Little Fine Arts Library Essay

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.

The library was the crown jewel of the house. It was at the center, and occupied both floors with a cherry wood spiral staircase connecting both the floors. It also had a great balcony off the second floor that overlooked the whole estate, and her parents hosted a multitude of social gatherings with “important, respectable people” whose names Essily couldn’t be bothered to remember. Every wall of the library was covered with bookshelves that were either filled with books, or various souvenirs her parents had acquired through the years, such as a large globe or a painting of some idyllic city. It was all lit by an enormous chandelier.Waiting at one of the tables in the center of the library was her tutor, Mr. Smith, and her

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum publically showcases Mrs. Gardner's collection in the greater Boston area. Each room functions as a chapter of a pilgrimage. When one travels through various countries and time periods, one inevitably ends up in a gallery built in the imitation of a chapel, and subsequently the Gothic room. In this paper, I will examine the Gothic room's theme in relation to the placement of its objects. I will also evaluate the room's strengths and challenges in serving the public, and how the conventions employed in this room contribute to the general accessibility of the museum.

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.

Positioned alongside Central Park in the heart of New York City, The Metropolitan Museum of Art is one of the largest and most influential art museums in the world. The Met houses an extensive collection of curated works that spans throughout various time periods and different cultures. The context of museum, especially one as influential as the Met, inherently predisposes its visitors to a certain set of understandings that subtly influence how they interpret and ultimately construct meanings about each individual object within the museum. Brent Plate in Religion, Art, and Visual Culture argues that “objects obtain different meanings in different locations and historical settings.”An object placed on display behind a glass case inside a museum would hold a vastly different meaning if it was put on sale by a street vendor, like the ones who set up their tables in close proximity to the Met. The different meanings that objects are able to obtain is attributed to the relationships that are established between the object itself and the environment that surrounds it. These relationships often involve the kind of audience that a museum attracts, where the work is exhibited, and how the exhibits within a museum is planned out. Museums subsequently have the ability to control how these relationships are established which influences the way a viewer is able to construct meaning. When a visitor observes an object on display at the Met, they instinctively construct a certain set of

The 1920s were a time of great prosperity and revitalization. This decade gave way to many great social milestones for every class of people. From the limits for immigration to the boom of the auto industry American society was drastically altered. Issues such as foreign immigration,prohibition, the Ku Klux Klan ,evolution, women’s roles, and race were the focus of the populus and drove politics within the nation. Art played a major role in how the black community expressed their new found sense of culture. Painting has always been a way for someone to portrait their ideas.

Leila Aboulela writes “The Museum” in a way that can make the reader feel like they are connected and present with the characters. Held in a prestigious university in Scotland, the University of Aberdeen, “The Museum” highlights many difficult challenges that can be faced in a lifetime, and that makes the story even more relatable. Leila Aboulela really knows how to capture her readers, which makes her story so memorable. Aboulela uses explicit adjectives to describe common things that advance the story even more. For example the reoccuring color blue on page 372 that evokes the sad feeling that Shadia develops throughout the story.

The building at 111 South Michigan Avenue, home of the Art Institute of Chicago, was opened in 1893 as the World’s Congress Auxiliary Building for the World’s Columbian Exposition. The building was passed on to the Art Institute after the end of the exposition. Designed in the Beax-Arts style by Boston firm Shepley, Rutan, and Coolidge, building has become an icon for chicagoans an tourists alike. The Modern Wing, the Art Institute’s latest and largest addition to date, opened on May 16, 2009, and was designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Renzo Piano. The 264,000 square foot addition now houses the museum’s collections of modern European painting and sculpture, contemporary art, architecture and design, and photography. The new

The exhibit that I viewed at the Philadelphia Museum of Art was one about European Art between the years 1100-1500. This was a series of paintings, sculptures, architecture, and tapestry of the Medieval and Early Renaissance as well as objects from the Middle East. This exhibit was an important part of the history of the Philadelphia Museum of Art because for the first time, Italian, Spanish, and Northern European paintings from the John G. Johnson collection were shown. It gave me a good idea of what the paintings were like in these four centuries and reflected ideas of both the east and the west.

The Whitney Museum of American Art has often been referred to a citadel of American Art, partially due to the museums façade, a striking granite building (Figure 1), designed by Bauhaus trained architect Marcel Breuer. The museum perpetuates this reference through its biennial review of contemporary American Art, which the Whitney has become most famous for. The biennial has become since its inception a measure of the state of contemporary art in America today.

Positioned alongside Central Park within the heart of New York City, The Metropolitan Museum of Art is one of the largest and most influential art museums in the world. The Met houses an extensive collection of curated works that spans throughout various time periods and different cultures. The context of museums, especially one as influential as the Met, inherently predisposes its visitors to a set of understandings that subtly influence how they interpret and ultimately construct meanings about each individual object within a museum. By analyzing two separate works on exhibit at the Met, I will pose the argument that museums offer a unique expression of a world view that is dictated through every element of its construction.

A group of us Arts and Music students used the day on Wednesday to go into the city to visit the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. It was a cold, breezy day so we were all bundled up in jackets and hats. As we got off the E train and walked toward the museum, its appearance was not what I expected it to be. The museum was an elegant, beautiful building made of what looked to be marble; not the big, brick monstrosity I had expected. Once we walked into the museum, it was even more elegant on the inside. The marble staircase had sculptures on each side leading up to the rotunda where white Christmas lights were strung around the banister in decoration for the Christmas season.

Schools that offer fine arts classes have lower dropout rates and raised attendance. The fine arts positively impact students of lower socioeconomic status more those of a higher  status. The fine arts have no barriers for race, religion, and culture when it comes to being involved in the arts. Everyone is welcome and encouraged to be involved (Katy Independent School District). Without the arts these students have no outlet for creative capabilities and no way to express their talents. Students who need this way of expressing themselves are overlooked and they are the ones who need it the most (Dickson). When viewing the participation of arts in the eyes of a ten-year old, “It cools kids down after all the other hard stuff they have to think about” (Arts and Smarts: Test Scores and Cognitive Development).

When the new upper class movement, Renaissance, occurred in Italy around the 14th century, a revival of the classical forms originally developed by the ancient Greeks and Romans, an intensified concern with secular life, and interest in humanism and assertion of the importance of the individual began. Thus, artists such as Mosaccio and Giotto depicted art that unlike the Middle Ages, showed emotions, feelings, and bright colors, thus demonstrating the deep concern for naturalism in the society. Other artists during the Italian Renaissance period such as Giovanni Bellini began to express their art through secular and religious themes and ideas that were exhibited through landscapes and portraits. As new styles of

"A picture can paint a thousand words." I found the one picture in my mind that does paint a thousand words and more. It was a couple of weeks ago when I saw this picture in the writing center; the writing center is part of State College. The beautiful colors caught my eye. I was so enchanted by the painting, I lost the group I was with. When I heard about the observation essay, where we have to write about a person or thing in the city that catches your eye. I knew right away that I wanted to write about the painting. I don’t know why, but I felt that the painting was describing the way I felt at that moment.