DOCSLIB.ORG

Realism Impressionism Post Impressionism Week Five Background/Context the École Des Beaux-Arts

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Realism Impressionism Post Impressionism Week Five Background/Context the École Des Beaux-Arts Realism Impressionism Post Impressionism week five Background/context The École des Beaux-Arts • The École des Beaux-Arts (est. 1648) was a government controlled art school originally meant to guarantee a pool of artists available to decorate the palaces of Louis XIV Artistic training at The École des Beaux-Arts • Students at the École des Beaux Arts were required to pass exams which proved they could imitate classical art. • An École education had three essential parts: learning to copy engravings of Classical art, drawing from casts of Classical statues and finally drawing from the nude model The Academy, Académie des Beaux-Arts • The École des Beaux-Arts was an adjunct to the French Académie des beaux-arts • The Academy held a virtual monopoly on artistic styles and tastes until the late 1800s • The Academy favored classical subjects painted in a highly polished classical style • Academic art was at its most influential phase during the periods of Neoclassicism and Romanticism • The Academy ranked subject matter in order of importance -History and classical subjects were the most important types of painting -Landscape was near the bottom -Still life and genre painting were unworthy subjects for art The Salons • The Salons were annual art shows sponsored by the Academy • If an artist was to have any success or recognition, it was essential achieve success in the Salons Realism What is Realism? Courbet rebelled against the strictures of the Academy, exhibiting in his own shows. Other groups of painters followed his example and began to rebel against the Academy as well. • Subjects attempt to make the ordinary into something beautiful • Subjects often include peasants and workers • Subjects attempt to show the undisguised truth of life • Realism deliberately violates the standards of the Academy. • Genre scenes, a favorite of the Realists, were considered unworthy subjects for art by the Academy • The paintings are not technically sophisticated. Sometimes brushwork is still visible (impasto) Realism Gustave Courbet, Stone Breakers, 1849 hyperlink: Gustave Courbet’s Ordinary road workers are elevated to the status of art. Painted nearly life size on painting technique, 3 min an enormous canvas, this painting was considered ugly, offensive and rude by Academic standards. Realism Gustave Courbet, Studio of a Painter: A Real Allegory Summarizing My Seven Years as an Artist, 1854 •50 people were invited to Courbet’s studio. They were posed informally • The people on the left are the peasants and workers • The people on the right are the Parisian intellectuals and collectors • Nobody pays any attention to Courbet except the nude, the boy and the dog. • Courbet organized his own exhibit for this painting in 1855. The show was called “Du Realisme.” • By organizing his own show in an era when the Academy dictated taste, Courbet was proclaiming artistic freedom from Academic tyranny. Realism Gustave Courbet, Burial at Ornans, 1849 Realism Jean-François Millet, The Gleaners, 1857 Realism Honoré Daumier, Rue Transnonain, 1834 Realism Honoré Daumier, The Third Class Carriage, 1862 American Realism Thomas Eakins, Wm. Rush Carving his Allegorical Figure of the Schuykill River, 1876-1877 Compare with neoclassical painting of a similar subject: Jean-Léon Gérôme, Pygmalion and Galatea, 1860 American Realism Thomas Eakins, The Gross Clinic, 1875 American Realism Henry Ossawa Tanner, The Banjo Lesson, 1893 Impressionism What is Impressionism? hyperlink: Sister Wendy: Impressions of Light (1), 10 min. • The term is applied to describe a group of artists who exhibited in Paris in the 1860s to 1880s Manet, Olympia •Impressionist subjects are often of the Parisian nouveaux-riche, enjoying themselves in Monet, Impression Sunrise leisurely activities Monet, Waterlilies • The Impressionists often made extensive use of complementary colors • The Impressionists left their brush marks visible Renoir, Boating Party (beginning) • The goal of the Impressionists was to create beautiful canvases. Creating a sense of modeled, believable 3-D space was not a priority. The Impressionists acknowledged the flatness of the canvas. • The Impressionists left their brush marks unblended and visible. The strokes of paint hyperlink: Sister Wendu Impres- sit on the surface and acknowledge the flatness of the canvas. sion of Light (2), 10 min. Artistic Freedom Renoir, Boating Party • During the second half of the 1800s, artists began to decide they had the freedom to Berthe Morisot paint anything they wanted to paint Degas, The Dance Class • The hierarchies of the Academy were eliminated (history painting at the top, still-life at Seurat, La Grande Jatte, Young the bottom, etc.) Woman Powdering herself • Artists depended less on the Salons for success. There was an increasing number of independent art dealers and galleries for exhibiting and selling art. •The Academy no longer had a monopoly on dictating style and taste Impressionism Edouard Manet, Luncheon on the Grass, 1863 • Classical nudes had always been a favored subject of the Academy and the Parisian elite. • This nude, however, was not classical. She is an ordinary woman seated beside two men. She looks at the viewer with a frank expression. • She was a Scandal! She was considered vulgar and obscene by the elite. • The nude attacks the hypocrisy of the Academy • The style violates Academic standards as well • The lighting is unreal. The bather is lit from a different source • The sharply defined contours of the figures contrast with the background. The figures look flat and as if they were cut from another painting and pasted on this one. • There are 3 disconnected scenes: the picnic still-life, the three people and the bather. It is as if this is 3 different paintings • The bather is too large in scale to be as far in the distance as the landscape suggests. Impressionism Courbet, The Bathers, 1853 (Realism) Manet was an admirer of Courbet. In what ways does Manet’s Luncheon pay tribute to Courbet? Impressionism Édouard Manet, The Fifer, 1866 • The Fifer’s style was so anti- Academic, that it was considered laughable. •The boy is sharply defined against a contrasting background. It is as if he is a paper doll • The background does not suggest a believable 3-D space. It is as close in the foreground as the boy •The lighting is unreal. The cast shadows are too tiny for the bright light • The pant legs are not modeled. The folds are indicated by a single stroke of black paint. • Manet’s deliberate measures to “flatten” his subject acknowledges the flat surface of the canvas. Impressionism Edouard Manet, The Bar at the Folies Bergere, 1882 •Much of the composition takes place on the surface of the mirror. This re-emphasizes the flatness of the canvas • The mirror image of the Parisian bourgeois enjoying themselves contrasts with the unhappy barmaid. • The brushstrokes are left unblended and visible to sit on the surface of the canvas. This acknowledges the flatness of the canvas. • Manet’s first loyalty was to create a beautiful canvas. Creating an illusionistic window on the canvas was always secondary. Impressionism Claude Monet, On The Banks of the Seine, 1868 •Monet preferred to paint landscapes, a subject that was considered inferior by the Academy. •The painting is full of sunlight. To achieve this luminosity, black is avoided and the darkest color is the green leaves •Areas of brown are enlivened with oranges, yellows and bright greens • The sky is a flat patch of pure blue • The tree is essentially a dark, flat silhouette •There is no attempt to blend colors. The colors are left pure and unmixed--as if they are mosaic tesserae Impressionism Auguste Renoir, Luncheon of the Boating Party, 1881 •Renoir often painted scenes of the Parisian nouveaux-riche enjoying themselves • The scene in informally posed. It has a “snapshot” quality • There is extensive use of bright complementary colors. The yellow hats contrast with the purple garments • The short brushstrokes are left unblended and visible on the surface • Unlike the other Impressionists, Renoir never fully abandoned his classical training. His figures are fully modeled and they exist in believable 3-D space. Impressionism Edgar Degas, The Glass of Absinthe, 1876 Absinthe is a highly addictive alcoholic drink. • The pitiful woman slumps over her drink •the low light casts ominous shadows behind the figures •the zig-zag composition makes the eye restless. The front table juts into the viewer’s space •The use of diagonal compositions to suggest negative emotions was common in Japanese prints, which Degas studied. • Degas did not adopt the gay scenes and bright colors of the other Impressionists Impressionism Edgar Degas, The Tub, 1886, pastel • Radical composition. The viewer looks over a table top. • The initial contour lines of the objects are left visible. The outlines flatten the objects against their background •The contour lines are in-filled with scratchy color. The strokes of color are left unblended to sit on the surface, emphasizing the flatness of the drawing • The perspective is conflated. The objects are tipped up toward the viewer Impressionism Claude Monet, Arrival of the Normandy Train, Gare St. Lazare, 1877 Impressionism Claude Monet, Impression Sunrise, 1872 Impressionism Claude Monet, Luncheon, 1874 Impressionism Claude Monet, Rouen Cathedral: The Portal (Sun), 1894 Impressionism Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Le Moulin de la Galette (the pancake mill), 1876 Impressionism Edgar Dégas, The Ballet Class, 1879 Impressionism Edgar Dégas, Viscount
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Impressionist Adventures
    impressionist adventures THE NORMANDY & PARIS REGION GUIDE 2020 IMPRESSIONIST ADVENTURES, INSPIRING MOMENTS! elcome to Normandy and Paris Region! It is in these regions and nowhere else that you can admire marvellous Impressionist paintings W while also enjoying the instantaneous emotions that inspired their artists. It was here that the art movement that revolutionised the history of art came into being and blossomed. Enamoured of nature and the advances in modern life, the Impressionists set up their easels in forests and gardens along the rivers Seine and Oise, on the Norman coasts, and in the heart of Paris’s districts where modernity was at its height. These settings and landscapes, which for the most part remain unspoilt, still bear the stamp of the greatest Impressionist artists, their precursors and their heirs: Daubigny, Boudin, Monet, Renoir, Degas, Morisot, Pissarro, Caillebotte, Sisley, Van Gogh, Luce and many others. Today these regions invite you on a series of Impressionist journeys on which to experience many joyous moments. Admire the changing sky and light as you gaze out to sea and recharge your batteries in the cool of a garden. Relive the artistic excitement of Paris and Montmartre and the authenticity of the period’s bohemian culture. Enjoy a certain Impressionist joie de vivre in company: a “déjeuner sur l’herbe” with family, or a glass of wine with friends on the banks of the Oise or at an open-air café on the Seine. Be moved by the beauty of the paintings that fill the museums and enter the private lives of the artists, exploring their gardens and homes-cum-studios.
    [Show full text]
  • Paul Gauguin
    Sarah Kapp Art History and Visual Studies Major (honours) Business Minor De-Mythicizing the Artist: Presented March 6, 2019 This research was supported by the Jamie Cassels Undergraduate Research Award University of Victoria Supervised by Dr. Catherine Harding How Gauguin Responded to the Art Market Assistance from Dr. Melissa Berry Political Conditions Introduction Imperialism and Primitivism in the Late-Nineteenth Century Like celebrities, famous artists face rumours and myths Gauguin’s stylistic innovations were just one component of his self-promotional endeavor that overwhelm their public reception. Vincent van Gogh that appeared in the Volpini Suite. It was his engagement with ‘primitive’ subject- has become inextricably linked to the tale of the tortured matter—which included depictions of local peasant and folk culture—that served as a soul who sliced off his ear; Pablo Picasso to the tale fashionable and marketable technique (Perry 6). In the 1889 suite, Gauguin depicted of the womanizing innovative artist; and Salvador Dalí people in their daily surroundings, including: Breton peasant women chatting, Martinican as the eccentric artist who did too many drugs. This women carrying baskets of fruit, and women from Arles out walking (Juszczak 119). research dismantles the myth of Paul Gauguin (1848- After his creation of the Volpini Suite, Gauguin’s use of ‘primitive’ subjects intensified, 1903), who, in the late-twentieth century, became ultimately becoming a defining feature of his artistic practice. Gauguin’s work in the the target of feminist and post-colonialist theorists, Volpini Show correlated to contemporary ideas about the ‘primitive’. The Exposition who criticized him for sexualized depictions of young Universelle juxtaposed the newly built Eiffel Tower and the Gallery of Machines with women, as well as ‘plagiarizing’ and ‘pillaging’ the art ethnographic exhibits from around the world (Chu 439).
    [Show full text]
  • Taylor Acosta
    Taylor Acosta book review of World History of Realism in Visual Arts, 1830–1990: Naturalism, Socialist Realism, Social Realism, Magic Realism, New Realism, and Documentary Photography by Boris Röhrl Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide 15, no. 3 (Autumn 2016) Citation: Taylor Acosta, book review of “World History of Realism in Visual Arts, 1830–1990: Naturalism, Socialist Realism, Social Realism, Magic Realism, New Realism, and Documentary Photography by Boris Röhrl,” Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide 15, no. 3 (Autumn 2016), https://doi.org/10.29411/ncaw.2016.15.3.9. Published by: Association of Historians of Nineteenth-Century Art Notes: This PDF is provided for reference purposes only and may not contain all the functionality or features of the original, online publication. License: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License Creative Commons License. Acosta: World History of Realism in Visual Arts, 1830–1990 Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide 15, no. 3 (Autumn 2016) Boris Röhrl, World History of Realism in Visual Arts, 1830–1990: Naturalism, Socialist Realism, Social Realism, Magic Realism, New Realism, and Documentary Photography. Hildesheim, Germany: Georg Olms Verlag, 2013. 680 pp.; 97 b&w ills.; notes; bibliography; index; dictionary. $78.00 (cloth) ISBN: 978-3-487-14387-3 The literature on Realism is extensive and includes theoretical texts, historical analyses, and artist monographs, and at the center of many of these intellectual projects is a persistent debate surrounding the term itself. In 1856, the art critic Edmond Duranty declared, “To give a definition of realism regarding aesthetics would be time lost—an opening of sluice gates releasing a flood of discussion solely about words” (1).
    [Show full text]
  • Myth Y La Magia: Magical Realism and the Modernism of Latin America
    University of Tennessee, Knoxville TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange Masters Theses Graduate School 5-2015 Myth y la magia: Magical Realism and the Modernism of Latin America Hannah R. Widdifield University of Tennessee - Knoxville, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_gradthes Part of the Latin American Languages and Societies Commons, and the Literature in English, North America, Ethnic and Cultural Minority Commons Recommended Citation Widdifield, Hannah R., "Myth y la magia: Magical Realism and the Modernism of Latin America. " Master's Thesis, University of Tennessee, 2015. https://trace.tennessee.edu/utk_gradthes/3421 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Masters Theses by an authorized administrator of TRACE: Tennessee Research and Creative Exchange. For more information, please contact [email protected]. To the Graduate Council: I am submitting herewith a thesis written by Hannah R. Widdifield entitled "Myth y la magia: Magical Realism and the Modernism of Latin America." I have examined the final electronic copy of this thesis for form and content and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts, with a major in English. Lisi M. Schoenbach, Major Professor We have read this thesis and recommend its acceptance: Allen R. Dunn, Urmila S. Seshagiri Accepted for the Council: Carolyn R. Hodges Vice Provost and Dean of the Graduate School (Original signatures are on file with official studentecor r ds.) Myth y la magia: Magical Realism and the Modernism of Latin America A Thesis Presented for the Master of Arts Degree The University of Tennessee, Knoxville Hannah R.
    [Show full text]
  • Mickalene Thomas Sleep: Deux Femmes Noires
    MICKALENE THOMAS SLEEP: DEUX FEMMES NOIRES Mickalene Thomas, Sleep: Deux Femmes Noires, 2013, Mixed Media Collage, 38 1/2 x 80 1/2 inches, Ed. 25 Durham Press is pleased to announce the completion of Mickalene Thomas’s Sleep: Deux Femmes Noires. The new edition is a large-scale mixed media collage, comprised of woodblock, silkscreen and photographic elements. It measures 38 ½ by 80 ½ inches and is made in an edition of 25. Sleep: Deux Femmes Noires is based on a small collage that Thomas used to conceive both the print and a large painting (of same title) that featured prominently in her solo exhibition “Origin of the Universe”. The widely acclaimed traveling show, organized by the Santa Monica Art Museum, was at the Brooklyn Museum earlier this year. Sleep, both in title and subject, directly references Gustave Courbet’s erotic painting Le Sommeil from 1866, but transports the interior scene of reclining nudes to a disparate collaged landscape of bright color and pattern. The work hints at influences from the Hudson River Painters, Romare Bearden, David Hockney and Seydou Keita. Thomas deftly weaves themes of black female beauty, power, and sexuality into classical genres of portraiture and landscape, creating works of stunning originality and strength. The print, Sleep: Deux Femmes Noires, is a remarkable work made with 61 colors, 58 screens, 27 individual blocks, and 50 different collage components, including mahogany and cherry veneers. Each component and process adds to the lush composition of color, texture and pattern. The figures included in the collage are printed from an interior scene Thomas composed and photographed at 20 x 24 Studio in New York using a large format camera.
    [Show full text]
  • International Scholarly Conference the PEREDVIZHNIKI ASSOCIATION of ART EXHIBITIONS. on the 150TH ANNIVERSARY of the FOUNDATION
    International scholarly conference THE PEREDVIZHNIKI ASSOCIATION OF ART EXHIBITIONS. ON THE 150TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE FOUNDATION ABSTRACTS 19th May, Wednesday, morning session Tatyana YUDENKOVA State Tretyakov Gallery; Research Institute of Theory and History of Fine Arts of the Russian Academy of Arts, Moscow Peredvizhniki: Between Creative Freedom and Commercial Benefit The fate of Russian art in the second half of the 19th century was inevitably associated with an outstanding artistic phenomenon that went down in the history of Russian culture under the name of Peredvizhniki movement. As the movement took shape and matured, the Peredvizhniki became undisputed leaders in the development of art. They quickly gained the public’s affection and took an important place in Russia’s cultural life. Russian art is deeply indebted to the Peredvizhniki for discovering new themes and subjects, developing critical genre painting, and for their achievements in psychological portrait painting. The Peredvizhniki changed people’s attitude to Russian national landscape, and made them take a fresh look at the course of Russian history. Their critical insight in contemporary events acquired a completely new quality. Touching on painful and challenging top-of-the agenda issues, they did not forget about eternal values, guessing the existential meaning behind everyday details, and seeing archetypal importance in current-day matters. Their best paintings made up the national art school and in many ways contributed to shaping the national identity. The Peredvizhniki
    [Show full text]
  • The Peredvizhniki and West European Art
    ROSALIND P. BLAKESLEY "THERE IS SOMETHING THERE ...": THE PEREDVIZHNIKI AND WEST EUROPEAN ART The nature of the dialogue between the Peredvizhniki and West European art has been viewed largely through the prism of modernist concerns. Thus their engagement - or lack of it - with French modern- ist luminaries such as Manet and the Impressionists has been subject to much debate. Such emphasis has eclipsed the suggestive, and often creative, relationship between the Peredvizhniki and West European painters whose practice is seen as either anticipatory of or inimical to the modernist camp - to wit, Andreas Achenbach and his circle in Düsseldorf; artists of the Barbizon school; certain Salon regulars; and various Realist groupings in France, Germany and Victorian Britain.'I My intention herc is to explore the subtle connections between such artists, but not as part of any wider art historical concern to challenge the hegemony of modcrnism, for the position of Russian artists vis-ä- vis Western modernist discoursc - before, during and after the time of the avant-garde - is of ongoing concern. Rather, my aim is to question the still prevalent interpretation of the Peredvizhniki as "national" art- All translations are my own unless otherwise indicated. 1. These parallcls havc not gone unremarked. Alison Hilton, for example, writes: "Aside from the Russian settings, the work of Perov and his colleagues shows the same general concern for rural and urban poverty, alcoholism, prostitution, and other mid-nineteenth-century problems that troubled many European artists and writers." ("Scenes from Life and Contemporary History: Russian Realism of the 1870s- 1 880s," in Gabriel P.
    [Show full text]
  • Mnittv of Fmt ^Rt (M
    PAULGAUGUIN AS IMPRESSIONIST PAINTER - A CRITICAL STUDY DISSERTATION SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIRIMENTS FOR THE AWARD OF THE DEGREE OF Mnittv of fmt ^rt (M. F. A.) BT MS. SAB1YA K4iATQQTI Under the supervision of 0^v\o-vO^V\CM ' r^^'JfJCA'-I ^ M.JtfzVl Dr. (Mrs.) SIRTAJ RIZVl Co-Supervisor PARTMENT OF FINE ART IGARH MUSLIM UNIVERSITY ALIGARH (INDIA) 1997 DS2890 ^^ -2-S^ 0 % ^eAtcMed to ^ff ^urents CHAIRMAN ALiGARH MUSLIM UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF FINE ARTS ALIGARH—202 002 (U.P.). INDIA Dated. TO WHOM IT BIAY CONCERN This is to certify that Miss Sabiya Khatoon of Master of Fine Arts (M.F.A.) has completed her dissertation entitled "PAOL GAUGUIN AS IMPRESSIONIST PAINTER - A CRITICAL STUDY", under the supervision of Prof. Ashfaq M. Rizvi and Co-Supervision Dr. (Mrs.) Sirtaj Rizvi, Reader, Department of Fine Arts. To the best of my knowledge and belief, the work is based on the investigations made, data collected and analysed by her and it has not been submitted in any other University or Institution for any Degree. 15th MAY, 1997 ( B4RS. SEEMA JAVED ) ALIGARH CHAIRMAN PHONES—OFF. : 400920,400921,400937 Extn. 368 RES. : (0571) 402399 TELEX : 564—230 AMU IN FAX ; 91—0571—400528 CONTENTS PAGE ND. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT 1. INTRODUCTION 1-19 2. LIFE SKETCH OF PAUL 20-27 GAUGUIN 3. WORK AND STYLE 28-40 4. INFLUENCE OF PAUL 41-57 GAUGUIN OWN MY WORK 5. CONCLUSION ss-eo INDEX OF PHOTOGRAPHS BIBLIOGRAPHY ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I immensely obliged to my Supervisor Prof. Ashfaq Rizvi whose able guidance and esteemed patronage the dissertation would be given final finishing.
    [Show full text]
  • Courbet the Painters Studio Initial Analysis-14Dkgtk
    Gustave Courbet. The Painter’s Studio initial analysis Gustave Courbet, initial analysis The painting was refused The Painter’s by the Salon and was first In the central section Gustave Courbet sits at large canvas shown in Courbet’s own Studio, Real on an easel painting a landscape. He is watched by a young pavilion titled RÉALISME, Allegory, boy and a naked female model. She holds a white sheet. On erected as an alternative to Determining a the floor other cloth and a wooden stall. Between them on the Salon. In the same the floor a white cat. Behind this scene a large wall painted space Courbet exhibited 40 Phase of Seven with an indistinct landscape. Hanging on the wall a large paintings including many Years in My circular gold medallion. portraits which directly Artistic Life, identify some of the people in the right hand section. 1854-55, oil on canvas, After this showing the 361 x 598 cm (142 x The painting hangs in the Musée d’Orsay, Paris. painting was not on public 236”) The painting was restored in recent years. That work was view until 1920 when it completed in 2016. was acquired for the Louvre from one of Courbet’s family. In the left hand section a In the right hand section a very varied group of group of people. All of figures and a dog, many them have been identified. can be named, all of them (See below.) On the floor a personify various political young boy is drawing. positions. On the floor a Behind the scene a window guitar and a dagger.
    [Show full text]
  • The Green Herrings of Realism
    The green herrings of realism Devin Fore, Realism after Modernism: The Rehumanization of Art and Literature, MIT Press, Cambridge MA, 2012 hb and 2015 pb. 416 pp., £26.95 hb., £17.95 pb., 978 0 262 01771 8 hb., 978 0 262 52762 0 pb. According to Roman Jakobson, writing in 1922, seeking freedom from modern alienation and ‘mute realism ‘is an artistic trend which aims at conveying reality’, but an immanence akin to Adorno’s ‘mimesis reality as closely as possible and strives for maximum of the hardened and alienated’. Through examples verisimilitude. We call realistic those works which crossing a series of representational renewals – of we feel accurately depict life by displaying verisimili- figuration in painting and photography; perspective tude.’ Acknowledging the diversity of artistic move- in photography; gesture and filmic documentation ments which have made claim to exactly this sense in theatre; representation, myth and autobiography of realism in their works – futurism, expressionism, in fiction – Fore presents a case for the deepening of various modernisms, as well as the nineteenth-cen- both ‘realism’ and ‘modernism’ as innovative forms of tury movement known as ‘realism’ – Jakobson notes epistemic enquiry. This, he argues, is especially the the ‘extreme relativity of the concept of “realism”’. case for figuration, since the return to representa- Hereafter, further ambiguities unfold. The most tion of the human form depended upon an object/ poised is perhaps that summarized by Jakobson subject that had entirely changed: a new kind of under the heading B (as if issued from the position human being. In sum, realism was not the same after of an author’s intention to be realistic): modernism.
    [Show full text]
  • The Early Netherlandish Underdrawing Craze and the End of a Connoisseurship Era
    Genius disrobed: The Early Netherlandish underdrawing craze and the end of a connoisseurship era Noa Turel In the 1970s, connoisseurship experienced a surprising revival in the study of Early Netherlandish painting. Overshadowed for decades by iconographic studies, traditional inquiries into attribution and quality received a boost from an unexpected source: the Ph.D. research of the Dutch physicist J. R. J. van Asperen de Boer.1 His contribution, summarized in the 1969 article 'Reflectography of Paintings Using an Infrared Vidicon Television System', was the development of a new method for capturing infrared images, which more effectively penetrated paint layers to expose the underdrawing.2 The system he designed, followed by a succession of improved analogue and later digital ones, led to what is nowadays almost unfettered access to the underdrawings of many paintings. Part of a constellation of established and emerging practices of the so-called 'technical investigation' of art, infrared reflectography (IRR) stood out in its rapid dissemination and impact; art historians, especially those charged with the custodianship of important collections of Early Netherlandish easel paintings, were quick to adopt it.3 The access to the underdrawings that IRR afforded was particularly welcome because it seems to somewhat offset the remarkable paucity of extant Netherlandish drawings from the first half of the fifteenth century. The IRR technique propelled rapidly and enhanced a flurry of connoisseurship-oriented scholarship on these Early Netherlandish panels, which, as the earliest extant realistic oil pictures of the Renaissance, are at the basis of Western canon of modern painting. This resulted in an impressive body of new literature in which the evidence of IRR played a significant role.4 In this article I explore the surprising 1 Johan R.
    [Show full text]
  • Paul Gauguin
    Paul Gauguin Painter, Sculptor 1848 – 1903 • Born on June 7, 1848 in Paris, france • Mother was peruvian, family lived Peru for 4 years • Family returns to France when he is 7 • Serves in the Merchant Marine, then the French Navy • Returns to Paris and becomes a Stockbroker • Marries a danish woman and they have 5 children • They live in Copenhagen where he is a stockbroker • Paints in his free time – buys art in galleries and makes friends with artists Portrait of Madame Gauguin • Decides he wants to (1880) paint full time – leaves his family in Copenhagen and goes back to Paris • His early work is in the impressionist style which is very popular at that time • He is not very successful at his art, he is poor • Leaves France to find a simpler life on a tropical island Aline Gauguin Brothers (1883) Visits his friend Vincent vanGogh in Arles, France where they both paint They quarrel, with van Gogh famously cutting off part of his ! own ear Gauguin leaves france and never sees van Gogh again Night Café at Arles (1888) Decides he doesn’t like impressionism, prefers native art of africa and asia because it has more meaning (symbolism) He paints flat areas of color and bold outlines He lives in Tahiti and The Siesta (1892) paints images of Polynesian life Tahitian women on the beach (1891) • His art is in the Primitivist style- exaggerated body proportions, animal symbolism, geometric designs and bold contrasting colors • Gauguin is the first artist of his time to become successful with this style (so different from the popular impressionism) • His work influences other painters, especially Pablo Picasso When do you get married? (1892) Gauguin spent the remainder of his life painting and living ! in the Marquesas Islands, a very remote, jungle-like ! place in French Polynesia (close to Tahiti) Gauguin’s house, Atuona, ! Marquesas Islands Gauguin lived ! alone in the ! jungle, where ! one day his houseboy arrived to find him dead, with a smile on his face.
    [Show full text]