Abstract_Expressionism Abstract Expressionism From John A. Walker, Glossary of Art, Architecture, and Design Since 1945, third edition (Boston, Massachusetts: G.K. Hall, 1992). A major movement in American painting dating from the 1940s and '50s, the first to be acclaimed and imitated throughout the world. The term "Abstract Expressionism" was first used in the 1920s to refer to the work of [Wassily] Kandinsky; Robert Coates of the New Yorker applied it to American painting in 1945. . . . The movement's name suggested it was a synthesis of two earlier idioms--abstraction (Hans Hofmann's work derived ultimately from Cubism) and expressionism--but this was an over-simplification because several other influences were also crucial to its formation: surrealism, Oriental calligraphy, Mexican and Works Progress Administration mural paintings, and "primitive" art. The principal Abstract Expressionists were Arshile Gorky (regarded as a transitional figure), Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Franz Kline, Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman, Clyfford Still, Philip Guston, Robert Motherwell, Mark Tobey, Theodore Stamos, and Adolph Gottlieb. They did not subscribe to a single style but did fall into two main camps: the gestural or action painters (Pollock, de Kooning, Kline) and the color-field painters (Rothko, Newman, Still). They also tended to work in an all-over manner on large canvases (reflecting the influence of mural painting) and to stress the creative act or process of painting. Their paintings often appeared to be completely abstract, but this was a misleading impression because most of the Abstract Expressionists did not seek total abstraction: de Kooning painted women and landscapes; even late Pollock drip paintings included figuration, and the majority of the artists laid great stress on "subject matter," i.e., tragic and timeless themes represented via a type of indirect symbolism called "ideographs" (defined by Newman in 1947 as characters, symbols, or figures suggesting the idea of an object without expressing its name). An art school Newman, Rothko and Still established in 1948 was called, significantly, "Subjects of the Artist." Although Mark Tobey worked on the West Coast, Abstract Expressionism was primarily a New York phenomenon--consequently in the '40s the term "New York School" was synonymous with the movement. 1980.5.1 1980.6.1 1967.121
Abstraction Abstraction Art that is not a direct depiction of external reality. Elements of form rather than surface appearance are emphasized in rendering the subject matter. Since the development of Cubism in the early twentieth century, a significant amount of modern painting and sculpture has been abstract, although this encompasses many different styles of abstraction.In early Cubist paintings the original source or subject is recognizable. Geometric abstraction, which gained popularity in the 1930s, is grounded in a rigorously analytical approach, with no direct reference to reality. In the first wave of Abstract Expressionism, which emerged in the United States in the 1940s and 1950s, fluid brushstrokes, color, and texture were dominant concerns of artists. By the late 1950s and 1960s, post-painterly abstraction was emphasizing extreme simplification and the isolation of flatly painted color areas and a predilection for the hard edge. 1986.53 1977.48.5 1989.83.3
Action_painting Action painting From John A. Walker, Glossary of Art, Architecture, and Design Since 1945, third edition (Boston, Massachusetts: G.K. Hall, 1992). (Also Gestural Painting). Harold Rosenberg, a critic writing for Art News, invented this term in 1952 to describe works by certain members of the Abstract Expressionist movement: Jackson Pollock, Franz Kline, Willem de Kooning, and Jack Tworkov. The painting of these artists was improvisational in character and depended upon the unconscious as a source of inspiration: it extended into oil painting the automatic drawing/writing technique favored by the surrealists. Paintings were gestural in the sense that they consisted of a loose structure of brushmarks or dripped skeins of pigment reflecting emphatic movements of the painter's hand, arm, and indeed the whole body. The term also referred to the existential act of painting; the process of making became as important as the end result. (The question "when can a painting be regarded as finished?" was a major talking point at the time.) Rosenberg considered the canvas an arena within which the painter could perform, the result being not so much a picture as an event, to which [the writer] Mary MacCarthy riposted: "You cannot hang an event on a wall, only a picture." Rosenberg's conception of Abstract Expressionism was contested by his main critical rival, Clement Greenberg, who proposed a different account of the movement. 1980.5.1
African-American_Art African American Art From AFRAMART.txt: <P>Black artists have consistently contributed to the history of American art. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries they adapted European styles and subjects, as did most of America's artists, reflecting their nation's struggle for equality with the continent. From the ambitious aspirations of landscape painter <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::001406">Robert Scott Duncanson</persname> to the determined social commentary of neoclassical sculptor <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::003001">Edmonia Lewis</persname>, it is clear, however, that early African-American artists inflected foreign artistic traditions with their own voices and special concerns for racial equality. <P>While participating in mainstream traditions, twentieth-century black artists have also proclaimed their dual heritage in their art. They have done so despite discrimination, which has limited their opportunities for training, patronage, and exhibitions, just as it had in previous eras. <P>Early in the century <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::004877">Henry Ossawa Tanner</persname>'s international success encouraged African-American artists. Many—<persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::002200">Palmer Hayden</persname> and <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::002914">Jacob Lawrence</persname> among them—responded in the 1930s to Alain Locke's call for an art of the <q>New Negro</q> and explored the social and narrative aspects of black subject matter. Others, like <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::002563">William H. Johnson</persname>, <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::005745">Lois Mailou Jones</persname>, <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::000813">Elizabeth Catlett</persname>, <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::001255">Beauford Delaney</persname>, and <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::006471">Hughie Lee Smith</persname>, embraced broader themes or focused on the challenges of color and form. <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::003008">Norman Lewis</persname>, <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::001876">Sam Gilliam</persname>, and <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::004916">Alma Thomas</persname> helped to carry these concerns into the realm of abstract art. Contemporary artists such as <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::005793">Keith Morrison</persname> have mined both multicultural and autobiographical resources to develop expressive statements about the persistence of tradition and the evolution of a new world culture. Self-taught artists like <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::001461">William Edmondson</persname>, <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::002122">James Hampton</persname>, and <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::006281">Thornton Dial, Sr.</persname>, have tapped the spiritual and social underpinnings of African-American life in works of great emotional power. First active before 1850, black photographers have decisively extended the medium's documentary and aesthetic potential in the twentieth century, as the unerring and humanistic images of <persname>James VanDerZee</persname> reveal. From RBN5.txt: <p>In the early decades of this century, many southern African Americans migrated to the industrial north in search of social and economic advancement. During the era commonly referred to as the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s, the Harlem section of New York City was <quote>the cultural capital of black America.</quote> It was home to innovations in literature, philosophy, music, theater, art, and dance that represented a new sense of African-American identity and culture. These developments were actually national in scope. Cities such as Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, and Washington, D.C., experienced a similar rebirth of black intellectual and creative life. <p>In his 1925 pioneering book, <title type=m>The New Negro</title>, the philosopher Alain Locke wrote of the imperative for an art based on Africa's ancestral legacy and African-American themes. Many artists in the following decades answered his call, turning to their heritage in Africa, the Caribbean, and other parts of the African Diaspora for inspiration. Other African-American artists crossed the Atlantic, attracted by the freedom they associated with Europe's artistic, social, and educational opportunities. Returning home, they often created images of African-American life using an artistic vocabulary based on European aesthetics. <p>Believing that art could help erase racial barriers, the white philanthropist William E. Harmon established the Harmon Foundation in 1922 to encourage and support black artists. The circulating exhibitions organized by the New York-based foundation, primarily between 1928 and 1935 and occasionally thereafter, introduced the accomplishments of African-American artists to communities across the country. <p>In 1929 the Great Depression interrupted the optimism and creativity so evident during the <emph rend=quoted>Jazz Age</emph> and the Harlem Renaissance. Nonetheless, President Franklin Roosevelt's innovative New Deal programs, especially the Works Progress Administration (WPA) from 1935 to 1943, allowed thousands of American artists to remain productive. For the first time, many black artists were able to devote themselves fully to their art because of the modest but crucial support of these federal programs. During this period, historically black schools and universities such as Atlanta, Fisk, and Howard, as well as numerous community art centers, also worked tirelessly to sustain African-American artists and to cultivate audiences for their work. 1991.40 1983.95.179 1967.59.669 1986.65.187
American_Abstract_Artists American Abstract Artists 1986.92.31 1986.92.72 1986.92.59
American_Gothic American Gothic The nineteenth century witnessed a renewed interest in medieval Gothic art. Largely evident in neo-Gothic architecture and the decorative arts, notably stained glass, it became an important element of Victorian taste.
American_Pre-Raphaelite American Pre-Raphaelite A movement that emerged in the 1860s, influenced by the art and writings of John Ruskin and the English Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Artists Thomas C. Farrer, C. H. Moore, and Henry Roderick Newman were among the founding members of the Association for the Advancement of Truth in Art, whose publication, The New Path, advocated reform in landscape art. Later members of the group included William Trost Richards and John Henry Hill. Dedicated to a detailed, naturalistic style of painting, the American Pre-Raphaelites were particularly fond of watercolor. Although the movement was short-lived, ending by 1870, its emphasis on outdoor nature study and a true rendering of natural form had a significant impact on American landscape painting. GL2
American_Renaissance American Renaissance In the years between 1876 and 1917, many artists turned to the art of the past to provide sources for the development of a national American art. This effort came at a time of unprecedented growth and imperialistic ambitions in the United States. Images and symbols from the classical and Renaissance periods gave visual expression to this new spirit of nationalism. 1910.9.8 1953.10.5 1929.6.112
American_Scene_painting American Scene painting A movement that became dominant in American art in the 1920s and '30s. Rejecting the abstract and lyrical styles introduced to Americans in the Armory Show of 1913, these artists sought to depict urban and rural areas of the country. Artists such as John Marin and Joseph Stella celebrated the dynamic, changing landscape of New York City, while midwestern painters such as Thomas Hart Benton, John Steuart Curry, and Grant Wood (also called Regionalists) focused on the fertile heartland of America and the lives of its people. Providing a more disquieting view of the American scene, Edward Hopper often conveyed in his work the sense of isolation and loneliness of people in urban places. 1986.6.92 1979.127.1 1986.6.60
American_studio_glass_movement American studio glass movement 1985.70 1991.67 1989.44
Armory_Show Armory Show In 1913 an international exhibition was held in New York City that presented the work of more than eleven hundred modern artists. For most Americans, it was their first opportunity to see the work of Paris-based artists allied to such modernist movements as Cubism and Fauvism. Organized by the Association of American Painters and Sculptors and the group known as The Eight, the show had a profound influence on American art and criticism. 1983.84
Art_Deco Art Deco A style of decorative art that became popular in the 1920s and 1930s and gained renewed favor in the 1960s. The style is characterized by geometric motifs, bold outlines, curvilinear forms, and the use of synthetic materials such as plastic. The term is derived from the title of an exhibition of modern decorative and industrial arts held in Paris in 1925 titled "Exposition Internationale des Arts DÇcoratifs et Industriels Modernes." 1967.6.19 1993.69 1966.47.34 GL5
Art_Students_League Art Students League A school in New York City that has educated many of the most prominent American artists of the twentieth century. It was established in 1875 as a drawing and sketching class by members of the National Academy of Design's art school, which had closed temporarily. When that institution reopened, the League continued to offer classes because of dissatisfaction with the academy among younger artists. In 1892 the Art Students League moved into a new building on West 57th Street, and by the end of that decade had nearly a thousand students. Among the distinguished artists who have taught at the League were William Merritt Chase, Robert Henri, and John Sloan.
Ashcan_School Ashcan School Six artists who lived in New York City at the turn of the century--George Bellows, William Glackens, Robert Henri, George Luks, Everett Shinn, and John Sloan--depicted the human drama of the city and its inhabitants at a time of great change. The earthy, urban subjects they chose to paint led critics to call them the "Ashcan School." 1992.91
Barbizon Barbizon A group of mid-nineteenth-century French landscape painters who settled in the village of Barbizon on the outskirts of the forest of Fontainebleau. Chief among them were ThÇodore Rousseau and Jean-Franáois Millet. Opposed to the conventions of academic art, they chose to portray the French countryside and peasant life. Their approach was a forerunner of Impressionism. 1983.95.62 1909.7.81 1909.7.34 1987.63 GL8
Baroque Baroque Style of art that first appeared in Italy, especially Rome, and was popular in Western Europe from ca. 1600 to 1720. Inspired by the Counter-Reformation, the style, as applied to art and architecture, was characterized by elaborate ornamentation, dynamic movement, and highly dramatic effects. The term has been used to describe work of later periods that displays these characteristics. GL9
Bauhaus Bauhaus Established in Weimar, Germany, in 1919 by the architect Walter Gropius, the Bauhaus was a renowned center for teaching and research in architecture, industrial design, and the visual arts. Its guiding principle was the integration of art and technology in these fields, which has had a significant influence on later developments in architecture and the fine arts. Among the noted Bauhaus teachers were artists Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Oskar Schlemmer, and architect Marcel Breuer. In 1925 the Bauhaus moved to Dessau, Germany, and in 1933 it was closed by the Nazi government. Four years later, a new Bauhaus was established in Chicago under the direction of L²szl¢ Moholy-Nagy. Beat Generation. Members of the generation that came of age in the 1950s whose disillusionment with the postwar world led them to challenge conventional social and sexual mores and to become interested in forms of mysticism. 1984.124.2 1969.21.18 GL10
Beat_generation Beat generation new acquisition
Beaux-Arts Beaux-Arts GL11
Belter Belter
Blaue_Reiter_group Blaue Reiter group (German, The Blue Rider) A group of German Expressionists and abstract painters who joined together in 1911 under the leadership of Franz Marc, Wassily Kandinsky, and August Macke. The group's exhibitions and publishing activity sought to heighten an awareness of the vitality and diversity of modern art. The Blaue Reiter disbanded in 1914. GL13
Chicago_Imagism Chicago Imagism <p>Two generations of artists working in Chicago— from the <emph rend=quoted>Monster Roster</emph> of the 1950s to the Chicago Imagism of the <emph rend=quoted>Hairy Who,</emph> the <emph rend=quoted>Nonplussed Some,</emph> and the <emph rend=quoted>Marriage Chicago Style</emph> artists of the 1960s and early 1970s—represented attitudes and styles that made the city's art of this perioc distinctive and original. Artists belonging to the latter groups—including <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::000644">Roger Brown</persname>, Art Green, <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::002134">Philip Hanson</persname>, <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::003659">Gladys Nilsson</persname>, <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::003694">Jim Nutt</persname>, <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::003803">Ed Paschke</persname>, Barbara Rossi, and <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::005680">Ray Yoshida</persname>—came to critical attention in exhibitions at Chicago's Hyde Park Art Center. <p>The artists of both generations are linked by their training at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and an irreverent and independent attitude in relation to the East Coast canons of contemporary art. Like their later counterparts, the earlier generation— including George Cohen, Dominick DiMeo, <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::001920">Leon Golub</persname> and Theodore Halkin—preferred a figurative style, even at the height of Abstract Expressionism's popularity. Both generations drew upon sources such as the ethnographic collections at the Field Museum, self-taught artists, and the popular culture of film and comics. In most cases, the works are also characterized by a rigorous standard of craftsmanship that often makes an ironic contrast with the idiosyncratic nature of their format and subject matter. From John A. Walker, Glossary of Art, Architecture, and Design Since 1945, third edition Chicago art tended to be viewed as deliberately anti-New York art. According to J. Allen and D. Guthrie, it lay "somewhere in the overlap between the primitive, the naive, and popular kitsch," while [critic] Max Kozloff maintained that it was characterized by a "chronic quoting of motifs, unwitting or conscious parodies of styles, and various uncertainties of tone." Often works were concerned with personal fantasies of sex and aggression towards authority figures. They borrowed images from juvenilia, comic strips and "trash treasures," hence the terms "Imagist Art" and "Chicago Imagists." 1979.53.24 1979.53.34
Classicism Classicism Art that is based on the study of classical models, emphasizing those qualities regarded as characteristic of ancient Greek and Roman art in terms of style and spirit: simplicity, restraint, harmonious proportions, and order. Many nineteenth-century American artists, influenced by trends in Europe, turned to classical subjects and decoration in a stylistic revival known as Neoclassicism. 1969.33 1968.155.126 1965.16.33 GL20
Color_Field_Painting Color Field Painting In Glossary of Art, Architecture, and Design A label that was applied to paintings by a generation of American artists--Morris Louis, Kenneth Noland, Jules Olitski and Gene Davis--exhibiting in the late 1950s and early '60s. Exponents of hard-edge painting, e.g., Ellsworth Kelly, were sometimes included in the category, and the term was also applied retrospectively to the abstract expressionist paintings of Barnett Newman, Clyfford Still and Mark Rothko. Newman was considered the originator and chief exponent of Color Field. The meaning of the term was complicated by the fact that critics also spoke of "color painting" or "chromatic abstraction" and "field painting." "Color Field" was clearly a combination of the two. Field painting began with Jackson Pollock's all-over drip paintings in which the canvas was treated as a continuous or extended plane, as a single unit so that figure and ground carried equal value. Color-Field painters replaced tonal contrasts and brushwork by solid areas of color or, in the case of the acrylic stain painting of Louis, with thin washes of pigment. These tended to extend across the canvas from edge to edge with the implication that they extended into the space beyond the painting's framing edge. In no longer treating the picture space as a box or window-like cavity, Color-Field Painting departed radically from the depth/illusionistic tradition of Western oil painting. According to [art critic] Peter Plagens, a field of color did have a shallow depth (in contrast to a spot of color which appeared to sit on the surface of the canvas). However, what Color-Field Painting lacked in depth, it made up for in breadth: most exponents favored large, long canvases that were intended (in the case of Newman) to be viewed at close quarters so that they would engulf the spectator's whole field of vision. In these circumstances the fields of brilliant, saturated color had a dramatic optical and emotional impact. Because this kind of painting "enveloped" the spectator, it was also described as "environmental." 1993.55 1971.77 1980.6.2
Conceptual_Art Conceptual Art In Glossary of Art, Architecture. . . . An international avant-garde tendency fashionable in the West during the late 1960s and early '70s. It emerged as a result of a younger generation of artists sensing a crisis in the traditional art forms of painting and sculpture and being influenced by the emphasis placed on decision making--the conceptual phase--in minimal and process art (i.e. rules for the generation of works of art). It also reflected the influence of Marcel Duchamp (his writings and ready-mades), Yves Klein, Piero Manzoni, and Jasper Johns, all of whom raised questions about the ontological status of the art object. Conceptual Art was in part a critique of earlier forms of art and the art market, in part an inquiry into the nature of art, and in part the forwarding of concepts or propositions as art. . . . The term "Conceptual Art" derived from Sol Lewitt's 1967 "Paragraphs on Conceptual Art." [L]anguage was all-important as a medium of expression but above all it was concepts or ideas that counted. As Lewitt observed, "an idea is a machine that makes art." Conceptual artists talked and wrote rather than painted or carved; they displayed texts in galleries and published articles and magazines. Imagery took a back seat though some diagrams, maps, videos, and photographs were employed. Since Conceptual artists used language to speak about art and as art, their discourse tended to blur with that of critics, historians, theorists and aestheticians. . . . Conceptual artists tended to despise the art object and the craft skills associated with it. This gave rise to such expressions as "anti-object art," "post-object art," and "the dematerialization of the art object." Initially, in pursuit of the latter, works were devised that employed inert gases or electromagnetic waves whose existence was only detectable via readings on instruments. The lack of conventional art objects mounted a challenge to the commercial art system but it was not long before collectors began to purchase the texts and visual displays Conceptual artists used to communicate. Even so, the emphasis on texts increased the power of the art magazine at the expense of the gallery. Conceptual Art aroused negative reactions because it lacked the sensory and sensual appeal of paintings and sculptures. It was called '"verbiage," "gibberish," "cerebral wanking." Even its advocates admitted it was intellectually difficult and demanding. Nevertheless, it did perform a useful service in drawing attention to the conceptual dimension of all art, and during its Left-wing political phase (mid 1970s) it provided an illuminating critique of the art world. By the mid '70s the term "post-conceptual" made an appearance, indicating that the movement was past its peak. For more than a decade Conceptual Art was neglected, as a return to painting and sculpture occurred and the vogue for neo-expressionism carried all before it. However, Conceptualism had made a difference and, with the advent of neo-geo in the mid 1980s, its influence was felt again and the term "neo-conceptual" began to be applied to the work of younger painters and sculptors.
Constructivism Constructivism Art historians generally locate the origins of Constructivism in the work and writings produced by certain Soviet artists in the 1920s (e.g., Naum Gabo, Antoine Pevsner, Vladimir Tatlin, El Lissitzky, and others). Yet in spite of its historical, geographical and cultural specificity, writers such as George Rickey, Willy Rotzler and Stephen Bann have extended the label to encompass later movements in Europe and North America. . . .Historians found it necessary therefore to distinguish between Soviet Constructivism and the later developments of European and International Constructivism. It is impossible here to clarify all the shades of meaning of "Constructivism." Crudely, Constructive art is generally abstract, three dimensional and based on the principle that art is a new, human product--a construction made from real materials --that adds to reality instead of imitating it. 1986.92.108 1994.85A-Z 1968.50
Cubism Cubism Originated by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque in Paris in 1907 and influenced by the paintings of Paul CÇzanne, who had sought to represent the basic geometric elements in nature. In its early phase, known as Analytical Cubism, objects, people, and forms of nature are taken apart and represented as multifaceted solids. In its final phase, a flatter type of abstraction called Synthetic Cubism, the objects represented are largely unrecognizable, reorganized in an allover pattern. Twentieth-century art has been deeply influenced by Cubist innovations, notably the collage.
Dada Dada An international movement that originated in 1916 in Zurich, Switzerland, where many artists and poets sought refuge from World War I. Reflecting the cynicism generated by the war, the Dada artists and writers challenged conventional beliefs by means of nihilistic improvisations and expressions of irrationality. The movement spread from Zurich to New York, Germany, and Paris. Among the leading Dada artists were Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Francis Picabia, Jean Arp, and Kurt Schwitters. Dada was a precursor of Surrealism. GL25
De_Stijl De Stijl A group of artists, notably the Dutch artist Piet Mondrian, who advocated abstraction using basic forms such as cubes, verticals, and horizontals. Only primary colors, plus white, black, and gray, were to be used. The name of the group was derived from the title of a journal launched in 1917 by the Dutch artist Theo van Doesburg, which played an important role in disseminating Mondrian's theories and supporting Bauhaus principles of design. De Stijl is now synonymous with the term Neoplasticism. 1986.92.4 GL27
Ecole_des_Beaux-Arts Ecole des Beaux-Arts A school of art in Paris that was a bastion of the Establishment in the nineteenth century, exercising control over official commissions. Many of the French Impressionist painters attended the school but rebelled against its traditional instruction, which the more progressive artists deemed reactionary. 1993.14 1985.28 1909.7.9 GL30
Eight,_The Eight, The In 1907 eight American painters--Robert Henri, George Luks, John Sloan, William Glackens, and Everett Shinn, Maurice Prendergast, Arthur Davies, and Ernest Lawson--joined forces to protest against the National Academy of Design in New York City, which was failing to support progressive developments in art. Despite significant stylistic differences in their work, they held a joint exhibition in New York in 1908 and later helped to organize the Armory Show in 1913. 1992.91 1972.149 1963.11.2
Environmental_Art Environmental Art The word "environment" is ambiguous: it can mean a small interior space, or the urban context, or the whole ecosphere of the planet Earth. One can also speak of "social" and "media environments." In the discourse of art criticism, "environment" normally signifies works involving interior spaces (for art dealing with the ecosphere the term "ecological" is used; public art and community art are two kinds of practice intended to change the external, urban environment). Such art is deemed "environmental" when the construction the artist provides is large enough to enclose the spectator so that he or she can move about within it or through it. When artists create environments they are, of course, competing with architects, interior designers, museum and display designers and the creators of booths at funfairs. Artists' environments cannot be characterized according to a common aesthetic or style because they have been generated by artists loyal to very different movements, from dada to minimalism. Environmental Art can be very crowded, cluttered and messy or extremely sparse and abstract. Key precedents before 1945 were Kurt Schwitters' "Merzbauten" and the major surrealist exhibitions with their elaborate decor. Even some painters had environmental ambitions: witness the huge color-field canvases of Barnett Newman intended to overwhelm the spectator's field of vision. The growing popularity of Environmental Art in the post-1945 era reflected the desire on the part of many artists to escape the limitations of the single art object and to resist the commodification associated with such objects. By designing a whole space, or series of spaces, artists could provide a much more intense and comprehensive sensory experience for visitors. Not only could light levels, sounds and movement be controlled but space itself could be literally articulated by means of screens, passageways, tunnels and so forth. Later on, artists discovered that Environmental Art did not need to rely upon solid materials because spatial experience could be modulated by means of light beams and sound waves. 1980.137.91
Expressionism Abstract Expressionism Art in which an artist's emotions or inner vision are the greatest priority, taking precedence over a realistic depiction of the subject. Bold colors, exaggeration and distortion of forms are frequent devices used to heighten the emotional intensity of a work.
Fauve Fauve The term (meaning "wild beasts" in French) originated as a scornful description of the work of a group of artists, led by Henri Matisse, who exhibited their paintings at the Salon d'Automne in Paris in 1905. Traditionalists were unsettled by the Fauves' use of intense colors, extreme distortion, and bold brushwork (influenced by the work of Vincent van Gogh). 1990.47 1967.6.6 GL31
Fluxus Fluxus An international avant-garde movement born officially in 1962 and active throughout the '60s and early '70s. The word "fluxus" is Latin for "flowing"; in English "flux" means a "gushing forth, an abnormal discharge, a fusion, a state of continuous change"; all these shades of meaning applied to the art or anti-art tendency Fluxus. According to a Fluxus manifesto, its aim was to "purge the world of bourgeois sickness, 'intellectual,' professional and commercialized culture, purge the world of dead art," to generate "a revolutionary flood and tide in art, promote living art, anti-art, promote non-art reality. . ." and to fuse "the cadres of cultural, social and political revolutionaries into united front and action." Fluxus spanned the Atlantic: activities took place primarily in Germany and New York, but Fluxus "festivals" were also held in Paris, London, Amsterdam and Copenhagen. Fluxus artists delighted in organizing entertaining events, concerts of electronic music, anti-theater and street art, which were similar in some respects to the happenings of the 1950s and the actions of European artists and also to amateur theatricals. One of the most striking features of Fluxus was its multi-media/ intermedia character: works in several media were often presented during the same evening and Fluxus artists mingled media with no regard for the purity of medium aesthetic. They tended to despise the professional art world and avoided producing paintings and sculptures for the art market, though they did generate an enormous number of visual and literary products: books, pamphlets, posters, diagrams, musical scores, films, multiples, etc. The roll-call of participants in Fluxus includes almost every major avant-garde artist of the 1960s. Writing in 1972, Ken Friedman claimed that Fluxus originated the notion of "concept art." Despite the radical, experimental nature of Fluxus and its vaunting of the ephemeral, it now occupies a place in the histories of art and in the private collections and museums of modern art. GL32
Folk_Art Folk Art The works of self-taught artists, ranging from paintings and sculpture to metalwork, wood carvings, and needlework. The terms primitive, naive, and outsider have been associated historically or recently with the field.
Fourteenth_Street_School Fourteenth Street School A loosely affiliated group of artists named for the area of New York City where they had their studios. Among these urban realists who concentrated on depicting the local scene were Isabel Bishop, the brothers Raphael and Moses Soyer, and Reginald Marsh. 1968.61
Fraktur Fraktur A work on paper, usually done in watercolor or watercolor and ink, that features highly decorative calligraphy and colorful motifs such as birds, tulips, and unicorns. A Pennsylvania-German tradition, the Fraktur is frequently used for baptismal certificates and other family records. GL33
Frisian_carving Frisian carving GL36
Funk Funk from Walker: Glossary of Art and Architecture The adjective "funky" was first applied to visual works of art by artists living in the Bay Area of San Francisco in the late 1950s. The word was borrowed from blues or jazz terminology, where it meant a heavy beat, an earthy, sensual sound. It also had sexual connotations. In 1967 "funky" was shortened to "funk" when an exhibition with this title was held at the University of California. Artists associated with the tendency included Robert Arneson, Clayton Bailey, Bruce Conner, David Gilhooly, Mel Henderson, Robert Hudson, Kenneth Price, Joseph Pugliese, Richard Shaw, Chris Unterscher, Peter Vandenberge and Peter Voulkos. Funk Art was usually three-dimensional, but it did not resemble traditional sculpture. Rather it was an uneasy hybrid of painting and sculpture. Materials such as leather, clay, steel, fiberglass, nylon, vinyl and fur were employed in bizarre combinations. Many Funk artists were ceramicists (their work was also called "pop ceramics"), and clay seemed a medium peculiarly appropriate to their needs. The resulting objects were eccentric in appearance, and their imagery was often visceral, organic or biomorphic with ribald sexual or scatological connotations. Funk artists drew their inspiration from the vulgar world around them rather than from fine art. Their aesthetic was anti-functional, anti-Bauhaus, anti-intellectual and anti-formal. new acquisition
Futurism Futurism An early twentieth-century artistic and literary movement, primarily centered in Italy. Celebrating the dynamism of motion and rejecting the art of the past, the first "Manifesto of Futurist Painters" was promulgated in 1910 in Turin and was signed by five artists, including Umberto Boccioni and Giacomo Balla. Seeking to represent time and motion, these artists depicted multiples of moving parts in many positions simultaneously.
Gilded_Age Gilded Age Term applied to the era from the end of the Civil War (1865) to about 1900. A rising industrial economy had resulted in unparalleled prosperity for some Americans, who were able to acquire impressive homes, art, and other possessions to confirm their new status. Often criticized for its ostentation and vulgar taste, the Gilded Age also produced some art of exceptional quality. 1980.73 1980.71 1953.10.5
Greek_mythology Greek mythology Nineteenth-century American art displayed a new interest in classical subjects, often turning to Greek and Roman mythology for its inspiration. Motifs such as the Three Graces, Venus, and the Trojan War became popular. 1966.47.8 1966.47.40 1965.16.33
Harlem_Renaissance Harlem Renaissance In the 1920s the African-American community concentrated in the area of New York City above 125th Street known as Harlem witnessed a burst of creativity among its residents. Artists, writers, and musicians drawn to Harlem at this time found inspiration in this cultural milieu and the new sense of black identity it engendered. 1994.21 1967.59.1003
Hudson_River_School Hudson River School Thomas Cole is considered the founder of the Hudson River School of Romantic landscape painting in the nineteenth century. Although these artists were never part of an organized group, they shared the urge to depict the breathtaking natural beauty of the American landscape. Particularly appealing to many of them, including Frederic Edwin Church, Asher B. Durand, and Jasper F. Cropsey, was the scenery in New York State along the Hudson River in the vicinity of the Catskill Mountains. 1978.126 1982.96 1977.107.2 1911.4.1
Imagism Chicago Imagism Art that uses clear, precise images to convey ideas and emotions.
Impressionism Impressionism Movement that developed in France in the last half of the nineteenth century and significantly influenced the work of many American painters. Choosing spontaneity over predetermined calculation, the Impresssionists sought to create a visual impression of a scene rather than a realistic depiction; their particular concern was to capture the play of light at a given moment. 1909.7.64 1929.6.52 1909.9.6 1909.7.57
Los_Cinco_Pintores Los Cinco Pintores GL47
Luminism Luminism A genre of American landscape painting popular in the period 1850-75 in which views were suffused with light to such an extent that light became central to the painting's meaning. This tradition persists into the twentieth century. The term "Luminism" generally refers to depicted light, but some modern writers also use it to mean artworks made from real light sources. GL48
Magic_Realism Magic Realism A term used to describe the work of several different groups of artists, who share a preference for intensely sharp-focus realism that illuminates the magic quality in mundane objects by rendering them in precise detail.
Manifest_Destiny Manifest Destiny The doctrine, widely held in the mid- to late nineteenth century, that it was the destiny of the United States to expand its territory over all of North America and to extend its influence in economic, political, and social matters. 1931.6.1
Minimalism Minimalism A major abstract art movement of the mid and late 1960s, primarily sculptural (or rather three-dimensional). The major artists associated with Minimalism are: Carl Andre, Larry Bell, Ronald Bladen, Walter de Maria, Dan Flavin, Donald Judd, Sol Lewitt, John McCracken, Robert Morris, Richard Serra, Tony Smith, Robert Smithson, and William Turnbull. Apart from Turnbull, all these artists are American. The painters Kenneth Noland and Frank Stella were also Minimalists in the eyes of some critics. Minimal Art was the culmination of a long process of abstraction, purification and reduction (to essentials) in twentieth-century art. Precedents can be found for it in the work of [Kasimir] Malevich, in constructivism, basic design exercises, Barnett Newman's late work, the paintings of Ad Reinhardt and Robert Rauschenberg's monochromatic canvases of 1952. The aim of the Minimalists seemed to be to reduce art to a condition of non-art, to reduce culture to nature. The status of Minimalist objects as art depended almost totally on the art-world context, in particular the art gallery. Outside the gallery Minimalist pieces were often unrecognizable as works of art. A cube made from steel, wood or mirror glass was the favorite form of the Minimalists because of its geometry, clarity and simplicity, and because there was no part/whole relationship. (Minimalists viewed the latter as the lingering trace of cubism, an anthropomorphic aesthetic they wished to transcend.) The viewer was expected to pay attention to the discrepancy between the perception of the cube and knowledge of its ideal form, and to attend to the literal qualities of the materials from which it was made. Such a work set up a dialogue with the gallery space it occupied: the installation became very important as did the phenomenological aspects of its perception by visitors. The object was intended to have no references to an external reality, no symbolism or figuration, i.e. no illusions or allusions. The intention was to stress the reality and autonomy of the object as a new entity brought into existence by the decisions of the artist but not in order to express his or her feelings. Minimalist objects were made impersonally with no signs of craftsmanship or sculptural handwork; indeed, in the case of Andre readymade, commonplace materials such as bricks or metal plates were used to build or arrange simple forms; similarly, Flavin purchased readymade neon tubes and used them to mount light installations. Other pieces were fabricated in factories according to specifications supplied by the artists. The emphasis placed on a set of instructions which could be used to generate objects when and if required was to prove influential in terms of the development of conceptual art. In the late 1960s and in the '70s Minimal Art provoked much controversy and adverse criticism. In the artworld it was attacked by politically conscious artists and critics for its lack of human or social content. Also, the look of Minimalism resembled the plain design of modern buildings and office interiors favored by business and government bureaucracies: banks, multinational corporations, etc. Since it also seemed to mark an endpoint of reduction beyond which it was impossible to go, artists felt that another basis for making art had to be found. Meanwhile, the general public and the popular press viewed it as the ultimate con trick of modern art and in the case of the famous furor over Carl Andre's "bricks" at the Tate Gallery [in London], a blatant waste of public money. However, leading Minimalists such as Richard Serra and Donald Judd continued unabashed and became extremely successful in the art market, and the movement itself was accepted by major modern art museums.
Modern_Art Modern Art A complex notion ignored by most dictionaries of art. In a broad sense it is a chronological concept encompassing all the art produced during the modern era (however that is periodized). Hence some writers prefer the neutral description "twentieth-century art." More narrowly, it is an ideological concept referring only to that art of the modern era which self-consciously exemplifies modernity (however that is defined). No two critics or historians agree on a date for the birth of modern art, but most locate it in the middle or late nineteenth century (i.e. the realist, impressionist or postimpressionist movements). The question of when or whether modern art died is also a contentious issue. Given the immense variety of styles, movements and groups making up modern art, it is more sensible to speak of modernisms in the plural than modernism in the singular. It is not possible therefore to sum up all modern art in terms of the same checklist of characteristics. Even so, certain features do recur in many of the movements of modern art: a break with the past or with academic art; an experimental approach to form and content, materials, media and techniques; a rejection of ornament; a tendency towards abstraction; a desire to shock or disturb; a body of artists constituting an "advanced guard," etc. The intensive use of any adjective in relation to the art of a certain epoch inevitably links that word to that period. "Modern," for instance, was most closely associated with the radical European art movements appearing between 1910 and 1938. As new generations of artists emerged after 1945, there was a search for a new label to differentiate the young from the old. In the 1950s the word "contemporary" was tried, but it suffered the same fate as "modern." Periodically, critics and curators resort to the feeble label "the new art/wave" but of course this label is of limited value because newness does not last for very long and the term itself does not indicate what is novel about the new development.
Modernism Modernism A doctrine, ideology or system of ideas, principles and values subscribed to all those who consider themselves modern artists, architects, designers, musicians and writers. In fact, it is highly unlikely that all these people would share the same set of ideas because their different practices make different demands. Even so, there are certain recurrent or overlapping concerns. Ihab Hassan has identified the following conditions and features as relevant to Modernism: urbanism, technologism, "dehumanization," primitivism, eroticism, antinomianism and experimentalism. Clement Greenberg, on the other hand, claimed that Modernism was characterized by "inclusiveness, openness and indeterminateness." He added: "Modernism defines itself in the long run not as a 'movement,' much less a program, but rather a kind of bias or tropism: towards aesthetic value as such and as an ultimate." In this way Modernism distinguished itself from popular culture and the mass media. Other striking characteristics of Modernism were its self-critical and reflexive attitudes: art which reflected upon itself, which advocated the "honest" use of materials (because of the "truth to materials" principle), which foregrounded medium, process and technique, which was committed to revolution, innovation and experiment and which put into question all artistic conventions and systems of representation. In so far as Modernism was committed to modernity, it rejected the past and it also rejected contemporary academic art. (Greenberg argued that the break with academic art was in fact a dialectical move designed to "maintain or restore continuity. . . with the highest aesthetic standards of the past.") The rejection of the past became institutionalized in the sequence of avant-garde movements, each one of which tried to go beyond the one before. However, once Modernism was established, the demand to rebel against the past became a demand to rebel against Modernism itself; the result was postmodernism. Most Modernist artists came from the middle class, and their principal audience and target was the bourgeoisie. That class was duly shocked by the antics of Modernists, but it was bourgeois patronage which supported them and eventually Modernism became the official culture of the ruling elites of the West--witness the founding of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Before 1939 the word "Modernism" had pejorative connotations of bourgeois decadence and disintegration for both the Nazis and the Stalinists. For many American conservatives, on the other hand, the word signified "abstract art made by communists." "Modernistic"' was often used disparagingly to refer to the dominant design style of the 1920s and '30s, i.e., Art Deco.
National_Academy_of_Design National Academy of Design
Naturalism Naturalism
Neo-Plasticism Neo-Plasticism A group of artists, notably the Dutch artist Piet Mondrian, who advocated abstraction using basic forms such as cubes, verticals, and horizontals. Only primary colors, plus white, black, and gray, were to be used. The name of the group was derived from the title of a journal launched in 1917 by the Dutch artist Theo van Doesburg, which played an important role in disseminating Mondrian's theories and supporting Bauhaus principles of design. Neoplasticism is now synonymous with the term De Stijl. 1986.92.4
New_Deal_art_project New Deal art project During the Great Depression in the 1930s President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal administration created four separate art projects that provided employment for the nation's artists, including the Public Works of Art Project and the Works Progress Administration/Federal Art Project. The WPA/FAP easel division was the largest single employer of artists, who created tens of thousands of works, many of which were allocated to publicly supported institutions such as libraries, schools, and museums. 1965.18.5 1965.18.12 1962.8.46 1964.1.22
New_Realism New Realism
Noble_Savage Noble Savage 1985.66.384,222 1985.66.149
Op_Art Op Art This term was first used by Time magazine in 1964 and popularized by James Canaday, art critic of the New York Times. It described an international movement in painting, fashionable in the mid 1960s, specializing in the production of powerful optical responses within the visual system of the viewer. Op paintings were abstract and geometric. They made use of parallel lines, or patterns of squares or circles, and periodic structures, all painted with sharp precision, and employing strong color contrasts, or black/white contrasts, to generate optical shimmer or flicker, after-images, moiré patterns, multi-stable images or ambiguous spatial effects, and so forth. Many of the devices employed by Op artists were derived from the diagrams found in psychology of perception textbooks. Op artists reworked this source material in order to offer a more intense visual experience. Since Op Art was concerned with virtual movement, it was closely aligned with kinetic art and the two tendencies were often discussed together. Op also shared certain formal characteristics with hard-edge painting. However, not all Op Art consisted of paintings--there were also reliefs and environmental constructions. A large-scale exhibition of Op Art called "The Responsive Eye" was held at MoMA, New York, in 1965. The best-known practitioners were Agam, Richard Anuskiewicz, Wolfgang Ludwig, François Morellet, Reginald Neal, Larry Poons, Bridget Riley, Jesús Raphael Soto, Jeffrey Steele and Victor Vasarely. Some critics considered Joseph Albers a precursor of Op Art, but he objected strongly to the term, arguing that since all pictorial art was "optical" it was nonsensical. He proposed instead "perceptual painting," but this does not seem any improvement. Other possible precursors were: [Marcel] Duchamp, [Piet] Mondrian, the futurists and the Bauhaus basic-course exercises. The founding father of Op was surely Vasarely, who was painting such images as early as 1935. For a short period in the mid '60s Op Art became very popular. Its eye-dazzling patterns appealed to designers, advertisers and business people (much to the disgust of Bridget Riley) and appeared on textile fabrics, clothes, interiors, trademarks, film and TV stage sets. As a result of over-exposure and dilution, the style was quickly exhausted. In any case, it was a form of art that appealed to the retina rather than to the mind. During the 1980s a revival of interest in Op Art occurred amongst painters associated with the neo-geo tendency.
Orientalism Orientalism A term used by various scholars to describe the conceptions and images of the Orient (i.e., the Arab Near East rather than China) propagated by Western artists and intellectuals. The taste for representing the Orient dates primarily from the nineteenth century when artists such as Gros, Delacroix, Gérôme, Gleyre, Tissot, Ingres, Renoir, Bonington and Lewis delighted in the exotic appeal of scenes set in North Africa, Turkey and the Middle East: paintings of harems, odalisques, despots, the desert, mosques, and so on. Several twentieth-century artists too have been intrigued by the same kind of subjects, Matisse . . . for instance. Some artists visited the Orient in order to make first-hand observations but others simply relied on their imaginations and existing records. Critics of Orientalism argue that the representations were mythical and an aspect of European colonialism.
Penland_School Penland School
Photorealism Photorealism Periodically a fresh generation of artists finds it necessary to confront that great nineteenth-century rival of painting, photography. Photorealism--short for Photographic Realism--was one such response dating from the 1960s and early '70s. . . . [Among the American artists included in this category are: Chuck Close, Robert Cottingham, Richard Estes, and Alfred Leslie.] This list indicates the international character of the genre, though the majority of the names are American. Most Photorealists used photographs as an impersonal source of visual imagery. Because their attitude to subject matter was neutral, they preferred reportage photographs and postcards of banal motifs--automobiles, suburban scenes, shop fronts, horses, ships and faces. . . . Often the scale of these canvases was monumental, e.g., Chuck Close's portraits. Their inflated size and cold, mechanical finish endowed them with a disturbing quality resembling surrealist paintings. In a sense Photorealists were not realists. They did not want to depict reality directly, only to copy visual signs that conventionally stand as truthful records of reality. Their attitude to photographs recalled the way that Jasper Johns had used flags and the pop artists had used mass-media images, i.e., as flat images to be used on flat surfaces. They were intrigued by the technical problems of rendering tones across a surface and capturing highlights and reflections. Arguably, Photorealism was more akin to formalist abstraction than realism. Photorealist pictures fulfilled their destiny when reproduced as photographs in art magazines: the viewer looked at a photo of a painting of another photograph and felt uncertain about the identity of what was being reproduced. Many critics reacted negatively to this genre and condemned it as "a late bourgeois edition of salon painting."
Pop_Art Pop Art The term "Pop Art" dates from the 1950s. It has been credited to the British art critic Lawrence Alloway, though when he first used it at meetings of the Independent Group in London, it referred to popular or mass culture rather than works of fine art based on popular culture. Pop Art emerged in the mid and late 1950s in Britain--the work of Peter Blake, Richard Hamilton and Eduardo Paolozzi--and it flourished in the 1960s in both Europe and the United States. . . . The Americans included Jim Dine, Jann Haworth (who worked in Britain), Robert Indiana, Roy Lichtenstein, Claes Oldenburg, Mel Ramos, Larry Rivers, James Rosenquist, Andy Warhol and Tom Wesselmann. . . . The 1950s neo-dada work of Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg was a major influence on the development of Pop Art, which was part of a widespread reaction against the dominant, gestural abstract painting styles of the 1950s. Pop was "cool," analytical, detached in its manner. Not only did it draw its subject matter from the mass media and the affluent consumer society, it also simulated the mechanistic, graphic styles and techniques of the mass media, e.g., Lichtenstein's paintings based on comic-strip images imitated the benday dots and hard-edge lines of the source material. Transformations of sources did occur in Pop Art--as material was transposed from "low" to "high" culture--but the extent to which a critical or moral comment was involved proved controversial. Warhol (1928-1987)--who began as a commercial illustrator--was the quintessential Pop artist. He became a media celebrity and a successful, wealthy businessman, head of an enterprise marketing products in a dozen different media. His art spanned the division between fine art and mass culture. Pop Art did, in fact, reach a far wider audience than previous avant-garde movements and it fed back into the mass media themselves.
Post-studio_Art Post-studio Art
Precisionism Precisionism
Primitivism Primitivism
Process_Art Process Art In the practice of action painting and tachisme [abstract painting] in the 1940s and 1950s particular stress was laid on the creative act of the artist; the making process became as important as the end result. Pollock's drip paintings and, later on, Morris Louis's stain paintings were records of the technical procedures employed to produce them; hence process became both the means and the subject of the works. Process Art, as a specific minor genre within avant-garde art, emerged in the late 1960s and represented a formalization and systematization of the earlier work of Pollock and Louis. It also marked the introduction of time, chance and change into minimal art. Artists regarded as belonging to the category included both painters and sculptors, [such as Robert Morris, Keith Sonnier, Rafael Ferrer and Richard Serra]. A typical example (by Morris) consisted of the artist firing a shotgun at a wall, photographing the result, placing an enlarged print of the first mark on the wall, then firing the gun again, then photographing the result, etc. Since Process Art tended towards the generation of a series of similar artifacts, systemic painting was included in the category by some critics. . . . Carl Andre welcomed the fact that his open-air pieces made from steel rusted because the work became "a record of everything that happened to it." The critic Thomas Albright defined Process Art as "the act of change, the process of creation itself" and distinguished two kinds: performance or body art and "force art," i.e., art making use of nature's forces or elements.
Purism Purism
Realism Magic Realism
Regionalism Regionalism
Romanticism Romanticism
Social_Realism Social Realism
Spiral_group Spiral group
Surrealism Surrealism
Symbolism Symbolism
Tachisme Tachisme (Tachism in English). An aspect of . . . [abstract art] that emerged in Europe during the late 1940s and remained fashionable for a decade. "Tachisme" is a French word derived from "tache" meaning "stain, blot or speckle." . . . [and was used] in the modern sense to describe a type of abstract painting that was expressive, spontaneous, intuitive and lyrical rather than rational and geometric. Tachist techniques involved dripped paint, pigment squirted from tubes, gestural and calligraphic brushmarks, and emphasized the materials, process and ritual act of painting, hence it was the European equivalent of American action painting. . . . Sam Francis can be regarded as a link between the Tachists and the action painters because he was an American who worked in Paris in the 1950s and because his style blended aspects of both. GL77
Taos_Society_of_Artists Taos Society of Artists from GOTTLIEB <p>At the end of the nineteenth century, artists in the United States began to establish summer colonies in old eastern towns removed from the concerns of urban life. In these semirural retreats artists hoped to find an essential America—a subjective, elusive, and probably nonexistent concept—by distancing themselves from contemporary society. <p>Others, continuing in the tradition of artist- explorers such as <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::000814">George Catlin</persname> and <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::003508">Thomas Moran</persname>, looked for inspiration amid the rugged landscape and exotic Native American and Hispanic cultures of the Southwest. By the mid-1890s, Taos, and later Santa Fe, New Mexico, had begun to attract a steady stream of painters, photographers, anthropologists, writers, and others seeking new cultural and geographic terrain for exploration and fresh stimuli for artistic and intellectual creativity. <p>In 1915 Oscar Berninghaus, Ernest Blumenschein, Eanger Irving Couse, W. Herbert Dunton, Bert Phillips, and Joseph Henry Sharp founded the Taos Society of Artists to promote their art and to circulate exhibitions of their paintings in the eastern United States and the Midwest. Each of these academically trained artists had established a successful career by the time he settled in New Mexico. Members of this first generation of Taos artists transformed their sentimental views of the local Indian and Hispanic populations into ideal figure paintings reminiscent of their academic training. The next generation of artists to arrive in New Mexico—notably Andrew Dasburg, Raymond Jonson, B. J. O. Nordfeldt, and Nicolai Fechin—brought new ideas from the art centers of the eastern United States and Europe. These artists, influenced by Cézanne, Matisse, the Futurists and Cubists, and Bauhaus design, experimented with modernist painting techniques.
Ten,_The Ten, The
Washington_Color_School Washington Color School <p><eventdesc>In <date>1965</date> the <orgname>Washington Gallery of Modern Art</orgname> presented an exhibition entitled <eventname type=exhibition>The Washington Color Painters</eventname>. Although artists and critics had been aware since the 1950s of the evolution of a new attitude toward abstract painting in the nation's capital, the 1965 exhibition confirmed the city's distinctive contribution to color-field abstraction.</eventdesc> <p>The show featured only six artists:<persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::003085">Morris Louis</persname>, <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::003670">Kenneth Noland</persname>, <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::001193">Gene Davis</persname>, <persname>Thomas Downing</persname>, <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::003360">Howard Mehring</persname>, and <persname pointer="PERSON::NMAA::004093">Paul Reed</persname>. These painters, who tended to stain unprimed canvas with acrylic paint in order to give greater impact to color and abstract form, quickly inspired others to work in ways that brought new revelations about the role of color in abstract art. from Walker: Glossary of Art and Architecture:
assemblage assemblage The term "assemblage" was first used in a fine art context by Jean Dubuffet to describe his own work in 1953. He preferred it to collage because he thought the latter should be restricted to cubism. Assemblage is a technique or method similar to montage--constructing a work from various bits and pieces--while assemblage art describes the end results of that process. This form of art marked a departure from traditional art forms. Objects were made from various materials and items of junk; they were mixed-media works or composites and thus they transgressed the purity of medium aesthetic and blurred the difference between painting and sculpture. This kind of art was especially fashionable in the late 1950s and early '60s. W. C. Seitz's 1961 survey show entitled "Art of Assemblage" illustrated the historical origins of assemblage art in cubism, dada, futurism and surrealism and the range of work being produced in Europe and America. 1984.124.71 1969.47.70 1994.40 1986.4 GL6
automatism automatism GL7
bisque bisque GL12
blackware blackware 1966.27.15
bultos bultos GL14
burin burin GL15
calligraphy calligraphy During the 1950s, at the time of the heyday of abstract expressionism, action painting and tachisme, a number of painters in Europe and the United States produced gestural paintings that evoked the direct brushwork of Oriental calligraphy. Some of these artists were directly influenced by the calligraphy of the East, while others produced canvases which simply resembled it. Mark Tobey (1890-1976), the American West Coast painter, was an example of the former: he learned about calligraphy through a friend, Teng Kuei, in the 1920s, visited Japan, and developed a form of miniature calligraphy he called "white writing." GL16
graffiti graffiti Originally, graffiti were crude drawings, caricatures or writings scratched into the surface of walls ("graffio" is Italian for "scratch"), but today they are almost invariably painted or written marks executed with cans of spray paint or with felt-tipped pens and magic markers. Graffiti have constituted a kind of subversive folk art since the days of ancient Egypt, but only in the twentieth century, as a result of modernism's cult of the primitive, have they been taken seriously as a form of popular culture, influenced professional artists and attained the status of art in their own right. . . . A striking outbreak of popular graffiti occurred in New York during the 1970s when subway trains were "bombed," i.e., covered with polychromatic "name writings" and "tags" (invented names, stylized signatures). Later on, much more ambitious designs were created which involved elaborate interlocking letters, figures and imagery quoted from fine art and the mass-media sources. . . . While the transit authorities viewed the graffiti as crime/vandalism and tried to eliminate them, others regarded them as an authentic expression of grassroots culture manifesting, in many cases, considerable energy, creativity and skill. 1994.81 GL38
graining graining
grisaille grisaille 1910.9.13 GL39
hard-edge_painting hard edge painting This label was first used by the California critic Jules Langsner in 1959 to characterize the abstract paintings of four West Coast artists: Karl Benjamin, Lorser Feitelson, Frederick Hammersley and John McLaughlin. Their work signaled a reaction against the gestural, improvised style of action painting and tachisme fashionable in the 1940s and '50s. According to Lawrence Alloway, a critic who extended the hard-edge concept, this type of painting treated the whole picture surface as one unit: forms extended across the canvas from edge to edge so that there were no "figures on the field" or other depth effects. Paint was applied evenly to produce an immaculate finish; colors were restricted to two or three saturated hues, and delineations between areas of color were abrupt (hence "hard-edge"); often an optical shimmer resulted from the contrast of complementary hues. (If "hard-edge" merely means a technique of painting with sharp rather than fuzzy edges--some writers use the term in this way--then it would be equally applicable to Pop art.) Aside from the artists listed above, the main exponents of the hard-edge idiom were Ellsworth Kelly, Alexander Liberman, Al Held and Jack Youngerman. Their precursors were Josef Albers, Ad Reinhardt and Barnett Newman. At first sight this kind of art appeared to continue the European tradition of geometric abstraction, but in most instances the relation was to preceding American painting rather than to the European tradition. 1993.55 1986.92.4 1976.108.33
memento_mori memento mori see also still-life GL52
memorial_picture memorial picture
memory_vessel memory vessel
miniature miniature from TOKNSAFF Authors: Robin Bolton-Smith and Dale T. Johnson <p>Unlike oil portraits that hung in the formal rooms of a house, miniatures celebrated a more intimate sentiment and were fashioned to be set in a piece of jewelry or secreted in a drawer for private viewing. The gift of one's miniature was the traditional means of marking an important family event or special relationship, such as an engagement, a marriage, a long separation, or a memorial. Some miniature cases also included in the back a lock of the sitter's hair, often intricately braided or intertwined with the hair of a loved one, and sometimes ornamented with gold filigree initials, reinforcing the personal nature of the portrait. Mourning scenes, painted with hair pigment made from the ground hair of the sitter, served as another means of private tribute. <P>The original technique for painting miniatures, <rs>gouache</rs> on vellum, was lifted directly from the pages of the medieval manuscript. In the eighteenth century it was modified. A less opaque watercolor was applied to a translucent piece of ivory in thin coats of paint, judiciously layered to gradually build up the image. Light passing through the ivory in the pale, painted areas, like the flesh and filmy fabrics, lent life to the portrait. The sacred roots of the miniature were echoed by its placement in a small case of precious or semi-precious metal, itself derived from the medieval reliquary. Again, by association, the miniature was endowed with vestigial, reverential properties. The composition of these portraits, which was usually bust to half-length, their close focus and informal attitude, was appropriate to the personal nature of the miniature, envoy of a quiet, private message. <P>A colonial family's miniatures might have been among the few possessions brought to the New World, reminders of loved ones left behind. Once settled, they carried on the tradition of exchanging miniatures to mark the important events in their lives, adapting the miniature to conform to the time and taste of a new land. Many of the first miniatures painted in the Colonies were by European-trained artists, like <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::004041">John Ramage</persname> from Ireland and <persname>Pierre Henri</persname> from France. Alongside, mimicking the foreign hand with unschooled awkwardness, were artists like Boston's Joseph Dunkerley and Connecticut's William Verstille. Other artists, such as <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::003827">Charles Willson Peale</persname>, Robert Fulton, Henry<PB> Benbridge and Edward Savage, were able to benefit from art instruction abroad. <P>The American miniature, although based directly on the mid-eighteenth-century European model, was painted with a new directness and simplicity. Above all, the artist sought truth in the likeness, not what Sir Joshua Reynolds called <q>the general air</q> found in the work of England's master miniaturists of the period. The earliest American miniatures were small, measuring approximately one and one-half to two inches in height, usually oval, and painted with precision and clarity in dense, strong colors on a plain, dark background. If a bit naive in attitude, they possessed an innocence and modest charm not wholly inappropriate to a new nation. <P>Following the example of the work of many European miniaturists who immigrated to America at the end of the eighteenth century, the American miniature came of age and found its own expression in the <daterange from=1780 to=1820>two decades before and after 1800</daterange> in the hands of masters like <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::003828">James Peale</persname>, <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::003165">Edward Greene Malbone</persname>, <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::005000">Benjamin Trott</persname>, their contemporaries and followers. Miniatures from this period were generally larger by an inch or more and were painted in pale washes of color, adopting the background of cloud-filled sky from their English counterparts. This freer, paler technique was appropriate for expressing the sense of gracious elegance that characterized the dress and taste of the Federal period. <P>By the 1820s and 1830s, more and more sitters were drawn not only from the East Coast upper class but from the new mercantile middle class, who were eager to enjoy the prerogatives and traditions of the nation's gentry. The new century also saw an increase in the public exhibition of art, including miniatures. Following the lead of their English colleagues, American miniaturists altered their style to better attract the viewer's attention when their work was hung alongside larger, more imposing oil paintings. <P>By the <daterange from=1820 to=1829>1820s</daterange> the American miniature had adopted a more public attitude, its dimensions larger, its shape more frequently rectangular than the traditional oval, and more often framed for hanging on the wall or placed in a leather-hinged case for table-top display. Its role adjusted to the changing needs and fashions of the day. By the <daterange from=1840 to=1849>1840s</daterange> the most admired miniature was as nearly as possible a record of fact, accomplished by the greater use of intense, opaque color and painted in a denser, more precise technique. The background was now darker and sometimes mimicked the large-scale portrait by including the suggestion of a window or column. The sitter was often shown in one-half to three-quarters length, and now was seated farther from the viewer in a more formal, remote pose, the dress carefully described as well, like the large oil paintings of the day, only much reduced. <P>With its high finish, intricate detail, and deep tones, the mid-century miniature was almost photographic in its accuracy. American miniaturists Thomas Seir Cummings, John Carlin, <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::001344">John Wood Dodge</persname>, and <persname Pointer="Person::NMAA::000642">John Henry Brown</persname> had attained a mastery of the technique comparable to that of Malbone, the Peales, Wood, or Trott, but with a very different aim and effect, these differences an echo of the era in which the miniature was created. The gentle reserve and soft elegance of the Federal miniature gave way to a less subtle Victorian concentration on surface detail, slick precision, and hard finish. By <date value=1839>1839</date>, when American miniature painters were seeking exact realism, the arrival of photography only urged them toward a higher level of precision. Likewise, as photographs moved into the arena of portraiture they adopted many of the characteristics of the mid-century miniature, thus sharing the miniature's formal setting, posed sitter, crisp finish, and explicit detail as well as its cases. Over the years, the miniature had adjusted to suit changing tastes. Originally a personal ornament and cherished icon, it became more public as a table-top or wall decoration. This change, however, meant that the miniature lost much of its intimate significance as a harbor of sentiment. 1946.3.16 1942.2.2 1952.12.2 1959.5.1
naive naive Naive Art is difficult to define. The term "primitive" is unsatisfactory because it leads to a confusion with tribal art; the description "non-professional," meaning "without a formal art training, not employed full-time as an artist," is inadequate because some Naive artists do make a living from their art; nor is the term "Laienmalerei" ("layman's painting") adequate because although Naive artists are often elderly men and women who turn to art as a hobby in their retirement, it is necessary to distinguish them from the majority of amateur, Sunday, spare-time or do-it-yourself artists who lack the intense and obsessional character of the true Naive artist. There is clearly an overlap between Naive Art and the categories of l'art brut [raw, uncultured art] and outsider art. The word "naive" derives from the Latin "nativus," meaning "acquired through birth"; hence the typical Naive artist is naturally gifted and his/her work has a childlike innocence; it is spontaneous, ingenuous, unaffected. The paradox of the genre is that it is an artless type of art. Naive artists generally favor painting as a medium; they like bright colors and revel in meticulous detail and precise delineations; they play havoc with the rules of perspective, almost invariably treat figurative subjects and paint from their immediate experience or knowledge. Their pictures tend to be small in scale, flat, highly finished and decorative, static and crowded. Naive artists ignore the historical stage of development of their chosen medium; their view of art is uncritical, unreflective, anachronistic and provincial. They address themselves to matters of private import rather than to issues of public concern; they suffer from an excessive narrowness in imagination and are limited in terms of methods and techniques; their art is frequently sentimental and ingratiating in its appeal.
nerikomi_technique nerikomi technique from THOADLE1: A complex method in which patterns of color are literally embedded in the body of a vessel. The elaborate procedure [begins with] coloring white porcelain clay with metal oxides and <rs>ceramic</rs> stains. Thin slabs of colored clay are stacked to form a laminated block. Uniform slices are taken from this multi-layered loaf, placed on a work surface and gently twisted, rolled, and stretched to create intricate, fluid patterns of line and color. The sheets of clay are then carefully pressed into a mold made from a thrown pot and allowed to dry. GL57
nonobjective_art nonobjective art 1993.55
oatmeal_pottery oatmeal pottery
pastiche pastiche GL58
pentimento pentimento GL59
perspective perspective A system developed in the early Renaissance to represent three-dimensional objects on a two-dimensional surface in order to create the illusion of realistic space.
photomontage photomontage The art of arranging photographs or segments of them to form a unified composition. The segments are distinct yet also merge into the whole composition to convey a singe theme. The term is also used for photographs that have the same visual effect. GL60
pictograph pictograph A pictorial sign or symbol, commonly used by Native American artists. Twentieth-century abstract artists such as Adolph Gottlieb used a type of pictograph in their work.
picturesque picturesque GL61
pochade pochades A rapid oil sketch made either as preparatory to a larger work or as an ordinary outdoor study. GL62
pointillism pointillism GL63
polychrome polychrome Multicolored decoration of an object, such as wood stone sculpture. GL64
polyptych polyptych A set of paintings or bas-reliefs---composed of three or more parts---on hinged panels. GL65
portrait portrait Of almost any medium, sculpture, painting, drawing, etc. a portrait is the likeness of a person, living or dead. Although open to interpretation, the artist tries to capture the essential charateristics of the person. Some portraits in the collection of the National Museum of American Art include Chuck Close's "Phil" of Philip Glass, miniatures by R. Peale, and "John Adams"
rayograph GL67
reductionism reductionism
redware redware
relief relief Sculpture in which the image projects from a wood or stone background. In a bas or low relief the image is very flat. In a high relief the image the image projects boldly from the background almost detaching from it. The term relief is also used to describe the part of the woodblock that is cut away and hense left white during the printing of a wood cut.
representational_art representational art Art that attempts to represent the visual charateristics of objects, people and places so that it is recognizable to the viewer, although it might not be completely realistic.
retablo retablo RETABLO from ARTNMBIO: sometimes used to refer to a complete altar screen, the term more commonly describes an individual, two dimensional panel painting, which may or may not be a component of a larger decorative scheme GL68
roundel roundel an art object, or a part of the object, which is circular in shape. GL69
santo santo from ARTNMBIO: santo a religious folk image, painted or carved, used in daily Christian practice; santos decorated homes, private chapels, and churches and were often carried in religious processions GL70
savant_art savant art GL71
scrimshaw scrimshaw folk art objects made of whale bone, both useful and fanciful. In the 19th century, fishermen etched and tinted with paint these small object for their amusement. Chk Hemphill for more. GL72
scumble scumble A painting technique in which a thin opaque layer of paint is lightly spread over another layer of paint which is allowed to show through. The irregular contrasts created by the bottom and top layers can bring about interesting tonal and color effects. GL73
self-portrait self-portrait An artist's rendering in their own likeness. Often artists use mirrors which results in the intense gaze self-portrait often exibit. Painting from photographs and snap shots of themselves are also used.
serigraph serigraph also known as SILK SCREEN perfected as an art medium by artists working under the Federal Arts Program in the 1930s, a serigraph is a modern silk screening technique based on the use of stencils. see silk screen(The process involves stretching a piece of silk screen taunt across a wooden frame and placing it over a piece of paper or other suitable material. Stencils are then cut out and adhered to or a pattern is painted directly onto the silk screen. Paint is then applied or wiped across the screen with a squeegee. The paint is thus applied through the silk screen onto the paper below. By using more than one screen and a combination of colors it is possible to build up a many layered, rich print. The serigraph can recreates a variety of painting effects common in oil painting and watercolor.) from Walker, Glossary of Art and Architecture: (Also Photo-Screenprinting) A technique commonly employed in the textile and graphic arts which has been adopted by many painters since the heyday of pop art in the 1960s. By squeegeeing ink across photo-stencils made from silk, mass-media images can be transferred to canvas thus eliminating the need to construct an image by means of drawing or painting. Oil or acrylic paint can however be applied by brush to the support before printing the image, or it can be applied afterwards. (Silk screened paintings often involve a disjunction or "misregistration" between their images and their colors.) Variations of color can also be achieved by using printing inks of different hues. The silk-screen process multiplies the image-making capacity of the artist: the same image can be repeated again and again either within the same canvas or across a number of separate canvases. Although in the applied arts and in fine art printmaking, the aim is normally to generate a limited edition consisting of a series of identical prints, painters often encourage printing "errors" in order to generate a series of similar but unique pictures. In the post- 1945 era thousands of artists have created screenprints usually in association with skilled printers such as Chris Prater and Stanley Hayter. Artists particularly noted for their prints include Richard Hamilton, R. B. Kitaj, Eduardo Paolozzi, Richard Smith and Gerd Winner (Smith made three-dimensional screenprints as multiples in the '60s). Painters employing the process of photo-screenprinting on to canvas have not been so numerous but they include: Alain Jacquet, Robert Rauschenberg, John Stezaker and Andy Warhol. GL74 silkscreen
silkscreen silkscreen
slipware slipware a type of ceramic ware created by the process of slip casting. Slip, a fluid mixture of clay and water, is poured into a cast mold containing plaster. The plaster absorbs the water and after a few minutes a clay wall builds up. The remaining liquid slip is drained leaving the clay to dry and shrink away from the mold. The economical process leaves a thin-walled ceramic piece.
stabile stabile In 1932, Jean Arp and Marcel Duchamp coined the phrase "stabile" to describe the stationary sculptures of Alexander Calder. They are characterized by their large, abstract, immobile parts which give them the appearance of being rooted. from acalder2: Impressed by the work of <persName>Juan Miró</persName>, <persName>Jean Arp</persName>, and <persName>Fernand Léger</persName>, Alexander Calder created his first <rs pointer="TERM::STABILE">abstract stabiles</rs> in 1930. These works also owe much to the rectilinear designs of <persname>Piet Mondrian</persname>. From these early works and his interest in movement, Calder developed handcranked, motorized, and then wind-powered constructions that were dubbed <rs pointer="TERM::MOBILE">"mobiles"</rs> by the French artist <persName>Marcel Duchamp</persName>. These sculptures, usually painted in bold basic colors, turn, bob, and rotate, in a constantly changing relationship to the space around them. Alexander Calder's stationary abstract sculptures, or stabiles (a term invented by the French artist <persName>Jean Arp</persName>) are less well known than his mobiles, but they possess the same <rs POINTER="TERM::KINETIC ART">kinetic</rs> quality. The stabiles have often attained a very large scale—more than fifty feet in height—and a heroic effect. GL75
stain-painting stain-painting The technique of pouring or spilling acrylic paint on raw unprimed canvas developed by Helen Frankenthaler in the 1950's. Inspired by Jackson Pollock's action painting, the paint is poured onto a prone canvas then folded and shifted so that the paint spills in various directions. In this way, stain painting is in offshoot of the Abstract Expressionist movement of the 1940's and 1950's. Other artists from the Washington Color School who adopted the technique are Morris Louis, Howard Mehring, and Kenneth Noland.
stained_glass stained_glass Stained glass as an art is created in two distinct methods. In the first, glass of different colors are cut with a hot iron and then pieced together with lead piping to form a design as defined by the artist. The second technique is created by applying paint to the glass directly. Stained glass is often used to decorate windows, lamps and vases. Developed by Byzantine artists and used prominently in Gothic cathedrals, the stain glass technique experienced a revival due to its use by artists of the arts and crafts movement and the art deco style most notably Louise Comfort Tiffany.
still_life still_life A groups of objects usually arranged by the artist and studied at close view. The arrangement provides an opportunity for the artist to explore the interaction of light, color, and compositional elements. Subject matter commonly used includes flowers, fruits, vases, bottles, animal carcases, and skulls. Objects are often chosen for their symbolic value, for instance an hourglass to signify the passage of time or coinage to indicate wealth. (see vanitas) Previously, still-lives were devalued as a genre, but starting in the 18th century they have increasingly been used as vehicles to study form for its own sake as well as demonstrating technical skill and virtuosity.
stippling stippling The technique of repeatedly applying small dots and slashes of paint with the end of a brush to effect gradual changes in light and color. Often used by Impressionist, pointillist and Pop artists to different effect. GL76
tempera tempera A watercolor technique that uses color made from ground pigments, mixed with a combination of egg yolk, egg white and water. The mixture is then applied to canvas primed with gesso with a red sable brush. The consistency of the resulting paint is such that it must be applied with very short brush strokes with the point of the brush. Also, tempera will not blend so the artist must employ short brush stroke techniques such as hatching to develop gradual color variations. The colors dry at once and become extremely water resistant. After several months the surface also becomes extremely hard. The tempera film does not need varnishing, instead it can be polished to a glossy finish. Early tempera techniques were developed in Byzantine paintings and refined in the 14th and 15th centuries until experiments with oil mixtures lead to and perfected oil painting techniques which soon gained popularity with artists of the time. The late 19th century and early 20th century saw a revival in interest and use of the tempera techniques as some modern artists found the process lend itself to their pictorial aims. GL78
terra-cotta terra-cotta pottery made of clay, usually a robust reddish-brown color. GL79
tintype tintype
totem totem A traditional totem is a pole carved or painted with a series of animals and objects which have been claimed as emblems for North American Indian families. Modern and folk artists have been attracted to the emblematic qualities of the totem. In addition to family unity, the totem structure is used to symbolize a wide variety of themes both cultural and personal in nature.
trompe_l'oeil trompe l'oeil A French expression meaning "deceive the eye". In the discourse of art criticism, either a particular genre of illusionistic images (usually still lifes) intended to trick viewers into thinking they are seeing something real instead of something painted, or the technique of painting employed to achieve such illusionistic images. (Trompe L'Oeil paintings are paradoxical in the sense that if they do succeed in fooling the viewer, then they cease to be recognized as art at all.) This term pre-dates 1945 but an entry has been included here because despite the opposition of most modern artists to illusionism, this type of art has continued to thrive in the twentieth century. Trompe L'Oeil techniques were employed by the surrealist painter Salvador Dali and by the fantastic realists of Vienna; they were also part of the stock in trade of the commercial artists who painted high illusion billboards in the United States; the tradition was also kept alive by unfashionable artists exhibiting at the annual summer exhibitions of the Royal Academy; in the 1960s and '70s illusionism played a key role in photo-realist painting and in verist sculpture; many interior designers, community muralists and other wall painters were fond of Trompe L'Oeil effects (causing Charles Jencks to speak of "superdeception" and "Trompe L'Oeil counterfeit"); finally, the advent of post-modernism in the '70s and '80s resulted in a reversal of the values of modernism and hence illusionistic images and techniques achieved a new legitimacy and popularity. GL80
tusche tusche A greasy black fluid that contains lithographic crayon ingredients, tusche is used in lithography to draw a design on the plate or stone surface. Applied by a pen or a brush, the printed areas appear solid black unlike the grainy surface created by the lithographic crayon. GL81
vanitas vanitas The use of objects in a painting as reminders of the transience of life. Still-lives often depict vanitas themes by illustrating the process of decay. Flowers, skulls, bones, time pieces and objects symbolic of wealth, such as coins and crowns, are often used to remind the viewer of their own place in the cycle of life. Also refered to as 'Memento Mori' from Latin meaning "remember, you must die". GL82
wet-on-wet wet-on-wet The process of applying a new layer of paint to a surface with a wet coating of paint. This process is also known as mixed technique, frequently oil paint on a tempera undercoat.
woodcut woodcut An original print made from a relief printing technique. A pattern is drawn on the surface of the wood block, then the unmarked wood is carved away to reveal the design. The print is made from inking the relief while the parts cut away remain white. There is only one major difference between a woodcut and a wood engraving. The block of wood used to create a woodcut is cut longitudinally from a tree trunk so that the grain runs in parallel lines in the block, the wood engraving is made from cutting across the grain.
academic art academic art The established art academies in the nineteenth century were committed to the tradition of realism, emphasizing rigorous study of the human form, expert draftsmanship, and a method of teaching that was highly structured. Because of their opposition to new art movements, the term "academic art" took on a negative connotation, signifying conservative work that lacked imagination.
rayograph Invented by photographer Man Ray, this photography process involves exposing film to light without the use of a camera.
