What A Strange Genre Of Painting Still Life

It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words, but maybe they are worth far more than that. Pictures, although seemingly simple in nature, are extremely complex. Far too often, people overlook what a picture truly is. When a person looks at an image, they most likely see only the image, nothing else. Many people do not look deep enough into an image to fully comprehend the true meaning of it. However, when an individual begins to truly study an image in an attempt to understand the true complexity of it, they will be surprised at what they overlooked before. As stated by French Realist Painter, Gustave Courbet, “Fine art is knowledge made visible.”

Post-Impressionism came about later in 19th century (1880-1890's) France. During that time, Edouard Vuillard, Pierre Bonnard, and Maurice Denis, members of a group of experimental artists known as the Nabis, played a significant role in the revival of decorative painting. Their experimentation with the arrangement of line and color was meant to function as a visual equivalent of nature without replicating its appearance. They also hoped to reassert the role of paint in decorating interior living spaces. Influenced by Impressionists use of color, yet pushing the appearance of nature, especially stressing high-keyed color, they developed bold new styles using innovative brushwork and emphasizing geometric shapes and figures. These techniques are known as Divisionism or Pointillism and they contrast significantly with the short, spontaneous canvases of Impressionism. Contributing to these developments were the likes of Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Gaugin, and George Seurat. These techniques later influenced many abstract painters of the early 20th

For example, the first painting that stood out to me was, “The Earth Matters”, by Lisa Jennings. The woman in the painting is holding the world in her hand, as she’s stands in a field of tall grass. There is filled space in the field from the tall grass, and empty space in the sky, because of it being clear and blue. The woman has no face, therefore she cannot see her future, but as she gazes down the earth must be important, as she holds it in the palms of her hands. Another painting that stood out to me

Cliché is often used as a pejorative term. Sometimes clichés can be the way a major breakthrough of understanding can occur. As I embark into the world of art, this cliché was a good thing. It was positive because as I studied paintings for the first time. I realized that as I was the beholder and the observer of the painting, I was responsible for making the effort of finding the beauty beyond a simple statement. The purpose of assignment was to observe and take note on pieces of art at a prominent museum. I was fortunate enough to visit the Museum of Modern art in New York City and I hoped to critique very famous paintings like Pollock 's drip paintings and The Persistence of Memory. However, it was a Saturday afternoon in the middle of July in New York City. I wasn 't afforded the luxury of being able to observe famous paintings such as those without a large crowd forming around it. In order to complete my assignment I went to the Getty. I found that finding a painting to study was harder than it seemed. I made a return trip to the Getty after brushing up on Art and Physics. The Getty is home to a variety of artwork dating as far back as the 1300s. I focused on art that was featured in different galleries of the museum including Italian Renaissance era and early Christian work. The paintings that I finally decided to write about were The Portal of Rouen Cathedral in Morning

     Art, in each and every form that it comes in, shows us who we are. Our

Art by its nature is a subject of the philosophical, social, economic, political or religious context surrounding its creator. More often than not, a work of art addresses a specific topic or somewhat revolves around a particular person. Therefore, it is impossible to separate the context of a piece of painting, either historical or cultural, to its intrinsic value or the artwork's meaning. On the other hand, different cultures and time utilized specific conventions that govern the representation of objects of creativity. This essay highlights various pieces of art and their relationship to particular cultural, political, economic, or social settings. Moreover, it pinpoints how different times influence art presentation.

The thematic categories of portraiture, genre, landscape, and history paintings initially appear to have nothing in common. Upon further analyzation, however, they share some significant, underlying principles. These include an influence from the Italians, attributing characteristics to the figures so that the viewers can connect to them, and focusing on the humble. History, genre with landscape, and portraiture paintings all referenced back to older Italian artworks, while at the same time, genre and other portrait pieces attempt to achieve relatability. Furthermore, history and landscape art focus on the simple, plain, and humble through the

In the late 1900’s the art world became even more evolved from Impressionism, Fauvism, Futurism, and Abstract styles of art. Neo-Expressionism, a style of painting, and some sculpture, which emerged in the early 1980s, usually characterized by a return to figuration in expressive, gestural, and sometimes brashly aggressive works. This art movement was mostly associated with artist from New York like Julian Schnabel, David Salle, and Eric Fischl (Artsy.com). Of these artist there was one African-American, by the name of Jean-Michel Basquiat, genius of his time, and currently one of the world’s most renounced artist. His shaky upbringing along with his feelings towards situations in his personal life and cultural issues during is time,

The Flower Still life painting is a two-dimensional piece. There are no dominant shapes; instead each one has different shape creating more of a realistic flower. The reason for this was because; flower painting in the 17th century was almost never a depiction of actual fresh flowers. Each flower has its unique shape that exemplifies a life of a flower. Some are still blooming and the others are in the process of dying, the circle of life. This painting has no geometric form but more of a naturalistic view.

Intro Text: Society, As Told Through Still Life is an exhibit of works that aim to portray different facets of life through the use of objects. Since the conception of photography in the 1830s, the use of people and the landscapes in which people reside are often used to depict human life. However, the use of found objects in still life are seen in certain themes, such as the vanitas, a Dutch genre of painting that embodies the use of objects to showcase death and the inevitability of change. This exhibit features work that uses still life to convey motifs ever-present in human existence. These motifs range from ideas that mimic the familiar and perennial vanitas genre, to ideas of contemporary phantoms that plague people today. Objects that

In this portrait, he created an everyday life painting which is called still life. The textures in the couples faces are very “meticulously rendered”. The wrinkles in their faces are very detailed and the lighting of the outside from the window hitting the room depicts a real representation of real life experiences. He used horizontal and vertical lines to create “architectural elements in the room.” To add harmony he used the basic colors like red, blue, yellow and gray. I believe this painting is a representational painting because it looks so real and can relate to everyday life. It’s a husband and wife, excited and proud to see that their son survived and finally got a letter to see how he’s been doing. It’s a very true and emotional

Lastly, the works of Mary Cassatt and Auguste Renoir are typical examples of the artistic movement known as Impressionism. In the 1870’s Impressionism

Many types of art stood specifically produced for their feasting and amusement. Baroque paintings convoluted theatrical color and light. Rembrandt is well-thought-out to be one of the best painters of time. Rembrandt transformed the crowd portrait by assigning his groups in accurate sceneries. Rembrandt’s use of color and shadow in his art works are different from anyone else’s. He reformed the way we uses light and darkness to give his topics a bodily presence. He took his topics out of a contour so to say and provided them each their own location of space. Paintings such as The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolas Tulp and The Company of Captain Fran’s Banning Cocq are painted as if they were taken in time, like a photo. Those paintings are a sample of his cautious and well planned out composition. Rembrandt’s paintings have unrealistic and realistic modules to it. In his piece, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolas Tulp, in reality a lesson would be a big mess and it would be done in a crowded anatomy cinema. In its place, he focused on the surgeons. Making it much more

After the Renaissance, artists became more interested in the natural world. The result in still life paintings was the inclusion of objects like shells and insects. Still life paintings became less religiously inclined, especially as Protestantism grew in Europe. By the 18th century, still life’s were almost entirely devoid of symbolism

     Impressionism began during the 19th century. An example of an artist’s beliefs influencing his art can be seen in the works of Pierre Auguste Renoir. It is documented that he felt that art should be different from the real world, which can be cold and harsh. He said, “Why shouldn’t art be pretty?” and “There are enough unpleasant things in the world.” An example of his attitude towards art can be seen in ‘A Girl with a Watering Can’ from 1876. This picture can easily be interpreted as being beautiful and therefore it proves that his belief of art is true. ‘Dance at Bougival’ from 1883, is yet another example of the artist and the inspiration for the art. By painting an attractive scene with two people dancing accompanied by laughing faces in the background we see a correlation between his quotes above and this piece. Therefore, one can conclude that Renoir painted mostly beautiful and attractive art.