3. Finding out more is a great
thing to do.
But NO amount of information
will answer all your questions.
4. There are as many flavors of art
as there are people who make
it.
New flavors are being created
all the time.
You get to pick your favorites.
5. The point is to give it a try and see which kinds
you think are especially great. Then
experience to the fullest and enjoy.
Hint: You might like them all.
6. Morris Louis, Tet, 1958, synthetic polymer paint on canvas, 95 x 153 in, WMAA
7. Olafur Eliasson, Your strange certainty still kept, 1996
Water, strobelight, plexiglass, recirculating pump, foil and wood
Base 20 x 204 3/4 x 10 inches
Top 173 1/4 inches long
19. You’re allowed to—
supposed to!—respond
personally to artwork.
The artist wants you to have an experience—an
emotional, physical, spiritual, intellectual, moral
(some combination of these or all of them)
experience of the work.
20. If you like a work of art, you’ll
often want to find out more
about it.
That’s great, find out more, it will enrich your experience of
the work, no doubt about it. But there is no “final correct
answer” to the meaning of a given work. There are more and
less satisfying interpretations, more and less sensitive readings,
but no single reading is ultimately correct.
21. Like your parents probably told you,
“How do you know you don’t like it if
you won’t even try it?
This class gives you a chance to try out different kinds of art.
There’s no obligation to like the things that I, or your classmates, like.
Pick your own likes and dislikes.
However, you can learn from—even come to appreciate—works you
don’t particularly care for.
23. One way we try to experience art
more fully is by understanding how it
creates the effects it has on us.
experiencing art
24. experiencing art
Experience, with your eyes, mind,
feelings, memories, body. What does
this piece do to me?
Examples: Does it make me happy?
Uncomfortable? Sad? Upset? Does it turn
my stomach? Does it make me shiver?
Worry? Sweat?
25. experiencing the effects
1. Experience comes first. What do you
SEE and how does it make you FEEL in
your bones.
At this point, it doesn’t matter who made
it, when, or why. The point is to try to
figure out, as completely as possible, the
effect the work is having on you.
So let’s sum this up as “experiencing the
effects” of the work. This process can
take a while. It is not necessarily simple. In
fact, one definition of art could be work
that takes the viewer some time and
trouble to experience.
26. accounting for the effects
Now that you have a handle on what
you’ve experienced, you want to know
how the piece made you feel that way. Cf.
driving a car to learning how it actually
works.
This is where formal analysis can be helpful.
How did this piece make me feel (x, y, and
z) way? How is it structured to achieve
those specific effects?
This is where purely personal, idiosyncratic
responses can be weeded out if you are
writing to share with an audience.
28. Effects 1
Bruce Nauman
Hanging Heads #2, 1989, wax and wire
two heads, the first is 10 3/4 x 9 1/2 x 7 ¾, the second is slightly
smaller, both suspended approx 6' above the floor
31. What will
happen in this
movie?
How do you
know?
http://prezi.com/
sazemrmsx16b/
what-is-a-
genre/
32. Advertisers work hard to create
visual messages that can be
decoded in a rapid glance.
“This is a
romantic
comedy with
two young
stars.”
33. Edgar DEGAS
Edmondo & Thérèse Morbilli
circa 1867
Oil on canvas
45 7/8 x 34 ¾ inches
What is going to happen
to these two people?
What is their relationship like?
We aren’t sure. We’re not sure
at first, and even after long
observation, we may not be able
to answer these questions definitively.
34. Art is much slower and typically cannot be
understood at a glance. Learning to “read”
the formal vocabulary of art will go a long
way toward helping you understand it better.
35. To help us, we can make a distinction
between subject matter and form.
Arnold GENTHE
Portrait of Helen Cooke in a
Field of Poppies
1907
40. Stuart Franklin (Magnum photo)
Peter Melchett’s
organic farm in
Ringstead, with
poppies and
cornflowers growing
alongside organic
wheat
2008
41.
42. What is Formal Analysis?
Breaking a work down into
component parts for purposes
of systematic observation and
understanding.
When the parts are put back
together, you do so with a
richer understanding of each
part and how they fit together.
43. TO BEGIN a formal analysis
IDENTIFY the materials and medium.
What is the work physically made of: oil
on canvas, charcoal on paper? Be sure
you know.
44. MATERIALS
EXAMPLE: art made of paper will have
a different resonance than art made
of steel
Materials can have a strong expressive
content.
Even similar materials can be handled
quite differently, resulting in different
nuances of meaning.
47. What is the MEDIUM of the
work?
1. What is the medium of the work? Is it 2-
dimensional?
drawing—charcoal on paper
painting—pigment on a prepared
surface
print—lithograph, silkscreen, etching
photograph
48. Rackstraw Downes, Under the Off-Ramp from the George
Washington Bridge, 2009. Graphite on light blue paper with blue
threads, 17 x 36 3/4 in.
59. What is the MEDIUM of the
work?
Is it three-dimensional=existing in space?
Sculpture
Relief (bas-relief or low-relief)
Sculpture in the round
Installation
Architecture and landscape architecture
(4th Dimension—time)
Film
Video
60. Brief Nod to Subject Matter
DESCRIBE the subject.
What subject is depicted? (Major features
only, at this point it does not need to be
too detailed.)
Include the genre if applicable and if you
know it.
history painting
portraiture
landscape
still life
are some examples of artistic genres.
61. COMPOSITION
composition: how the various elements
of the work are arranged in relationship
to each other
things to look for:
spatial relationships:
foreground
middle ground
background
where is the viewer positioned?
how are the objects or elements
ordered?
62. LINE
The literal lines that the artist uses to
create shape, suggest depth, etc. These
lines can have a variety of
characteristics, for example; line can be
fine and delicate, or bold and chunky, it
can be fluid or halting, precise or
sketchy.
66. COLOR
1. Ask yourself, how important is color in
this work?
2. In some works, color is quite significant;
in others, far less so.
67. Otto Dix
Portrait of the Journalist
Sylvia van Harden
1926
Color is one strong element that
contributes to the sense of disharmony,
confusion and conflict in this picture.
It is not the only element Dix uses to
create that sensation, but it is a
significant one.
68. Otto Dix
Small Self-Portrait
1913
By contrast, color has a less
significant role in this earlier
painting by the same artist.
It is not that color is absent—of
course it isn’t—and it’s not that
color isn’t skillfully handled—
actually, the color here is quite
subtle and fascinating. And
perhaps
it is symbolically significant as
well:
those burning cheeks in
tandem
with all those frosty blues and
silvers
seem to indicate a passionate
personality in a cool, even
cold environment.
69. Quick Historical Interlude: LINE and
COLOR
Long history of talking about these two
properties
Disegno versus colore (in Italy)
Dessin vs. couleur (in France)
Are considered the two most basic elements of
two-dimensional art
70. LINE
Line/design can mean
several things:
(It’s clearer if we use a
more direct translation:
design)
Design could mean:
A drawing
A plan to make
something
74. Color was thought to be secondary;
line primary.
But artists hate rules. As soon as you give
them one they will try to break it.
This academic rule “design has priority; it is
the first thing, and the most important
thing” was closely associated with the
city of Florence.
So the artists of Venice tried to disprove it.
95. Cy Twombly
Leda and the
Swan
1962
oil, pencil and
crayon on
canvas
6' 3" x 6' 6 3/4"
96. Texture can be also achieved through literal means, as in Yayoi Kusama’s
Narcissus Garden, 2013
97. Try this at home!
Following are some examples you can use to review.
Here are the guidelines:
medium/materials (what is it made of?)
subject matter/genre (keep very brief for now)
composition
line
color
shape
texture
size
orientation
REMEMBER, not all of these categories will be applicable
to every work of art. Choose the categories that are
most relevant to the work you are considering.
99. Some artists have characteristic subject
matter, which you can use to help
identify them, along with their style.
100.
101.
102.
103.
104.
105.
106.
107.
108.
109.
110.
111.
112.
113. IN MATTERS OF STYLE…
…nuance is key. You are training your
eyes to detect subtle differences,
rather than blatant ones.
The more fine-grained the differences
you can observe, the better you will
have understood the artist’s style.
“God is in the details.”
Hinweis der Redaktion
Find some things you like, and enjoy them.
Seriously. There’s art made out of chocolate, art made out of steel, art made out of cardboard boxes, ribbons, toy airplanes; if you can imagine it, an artist has probably used it in their work.
Find some things you like, and enjoy them.
Seriously. There’s art made out of chocolate, art made out of steel, art made out of cardboard boxes, ribbons, toy airplanes; if you can imagine it, an artist has probably used it in their work.
Genre is a structure of expectations that guides the viewer through the work.
In contrast, artists do not usually assume that they reach their viewers in a competitive situation where there is only a moment to grab and hold visual attention.
Typically the expectation is that artists can present more ambiguous visual information, and part of the fun is in discussing and debating how we put that information together.
1000s of example of movie posters
May or may not have seen 1000s of examples of
Familiarity
Also, medium is different and less familiar
Also, requirement of immediate intelligibility isn’t present
Set of techniques
Developed mostly in the writing
Jean August Dominique Ingres
Robert Rauschenberg, Monogram, 1955
The Desperate Man
Date 1844-1845
Medium oil on canvas
Dimensions 45 × 55 cm (17.7 × 21.7 in)