The Stolen Kiss by Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1760) is an oil on canvas painting depicting a young man attempting to steal a kiss from a young woman to her own dismay while another young woman holds her hands and watches the scene unfold. Once belonged to Bailli de Bréteuil, this painting is a great example of the Rococo style of art. The bodies of the three figures in the painting are in correct proportion and are very naturalistic, a hierarchy of scale is not present. A sense of weight is seen in each figure; the girl getting kissed has a sense of weight in relation to the boy holding her, the boy has a sense of weight in how he leans in and on the girl for a kiss and lastly the other girl has a sense of weight in how she leans on the table. …show more content…
Themes of Rococo artwork deal with easygoing and light scenes of mythical places and courtship. Rich but delicate brushwork, lighter pastel colors and sensuous coloring are central to Rococo artwork. The Stolen Kiss by Jean-Honoré Fragonard is most definitely a piece of the Rococo period because it has many of these characteristics. The painting portrays a light scene involving love between young people of the aristocracy. Love and lust are the main themes of the painting and the artist uses delicate brushwork, lighter pastel colors, and a sensuous feel to accomplish this. Another piece that is similar to The Stolen Kiss is a piece called Pilgrimage to Cythera by Antoine Watteau (1717). In this painting, a representation of the mythical love island of Cythera is portrayed. A statue of the goddess of love is present along with scenes of courtship, mythical cupid and gorgeous nature scenes all with delicate brushwork, pastel colors and a sensuous feeling. All things central to Rococo artwork. Another oil on canvas titled The Swing by Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1767) depicts a lustful and in love man hiding in the bushes to look up the skirt of the women he loves. The woman is portrayed very light, free and in love and she swings in the air on a red velvet and gold seat with a fabulous hat, white stockings and a very flowing and free dress. This Rococo painting centers on the theme of courtship, nature and the opulence the aristocracy created for themselves. Lastly, The Progress of Love: The Meeting by Jean-Honoré Fragonard (1771-1773) is one part of a many paneled piece depicting young lovers meeting in an extremely overgrown, yet fabulous nature scene being overlooked by a statue of the mythical symbols of love- Venus and Cupid. This indulgent piece with uncontrolled nature, a love theme, delicate brushwork and sensuous coloring
The view of the painting brings to mind the all the senses. Smell is the first to come to mind as the smoke from the candle billows up, the burning smell reaches the noise as well as the burning cigar. The fruity smell overshadows that of the smell of chicken and peas. The noise of a dropped tray and the breaking of glass as it hits the floor makes everyone turn to the right. People talking over each other to be heard. All of the senses are realized as the painting is viewed.
Large and medium sizes of the forms dominate over small in the painting. The arrangement of the objects in this art piece is mostly centric. However, even though it is central, it is not symmetrical. The painter also touched the left edge of the burlap and the right bottom corner of it; this helps viewer’s eye to enter the painting smoothly, move around and escape from it. The asymmetry of the arrangement creates the sense of imbalance. Lam uses basic lines and shapes in the composition. Nevertheless, the painter creates wonderful light movement inside the figure with wavy shapes, which directs viewer’s eye from the top to the
Contextual Theory: This painting depicts a portrait of life during the late 1800’s. The women’s clothing and hair style represent that era. Gorgeous landscape and a leisurely moment are captured by the artist in this work of
...elationship between the people in the composition and their feelings in each other’s company. The viewer is forced to think critically about the people in the painting and their feelings and body language.
The painting’s canvas has been exploited perfectly. All the space on the canvas had been used. However, space was not used to create depth, and there was no layering or recession present. The painting does not feel that it has motion, apart from what it looks like the creatures eating from the tree of life. The eating motion was depicted by the posture of the creatures, with arms extending towards the plants – in the case of creatures – or beaks being wide open – in the case of birds. All these factors 'accord' the painting with a unique
The composition of this painting forces the eye to the woman, and specifically to her face. Although the white wedding dress is large and takes up most of the woman’s figure, the white contrasts with her face and dark hair, forcing the viewer to look more closely into the woman’s face. She smokes a cigarette and rests her chin on her hands. She does not appear to be a very young woman and her eyes are cast down and seem sad. In general, her face appears to show a sense of disillusionment with life and specifically with her own life. Although this is apparently her wedding day, she does not seem to be happy.
Throughout centuries, art has been one of the best ways that people use their imaginations. Paintings like many other ways have been used to represent those imaginations. Due to the evolutions in materials and painting skills of the artists, artworks have become almost lifelike scenarios that force the mind to create the illusion of the actions. These paintings were painted with the same technique and they both have a lot of movement all around them. it is very catchy how they move the attention from one side to the other especially when looking carefully, it gives the idea that that the artists almost had the same feeling when they were painting these compositions. Though artists may have used similar styles and techniques, these works can
The Interpretation/Meaning (III) will be written without any guideline points, the aim of this part will be to determine what the painter wanted to express with his piece of work and what it tells us in a symbolic or not instantly clear way. This part will also handle why the artist drew the painting the way he did it and why he chose various techniques or tools.
Corvi shows a soft smile on both the face of Cupid and the face of Psyche, hinting at the fact that they were both happy in their relationship, however, Psyche needed an answer to the burning question in her mind of her lover’s identity. Corvi does a magnificent job of creating a look of admiration in the expression of Psyche as she gazes at the man she has loved for the first time. While making this painting more monochromatic than polychromatic, the artist uses high value contrast to create a focus on both Psyche and Cupid, which helps to portray the use of a candle by Psyche. Although the creation date of this painting seems to be during the Rococo art movement, the dark and dull colors and slightly melancholy theme do not quite seem to match the average Rococo elements, meaning that it could have been created during the transition from the Rococo movement to the Neoclassicism
The French 1884 oil on canvas painting The Song of the Lark by Jules-Adolphe Breton draws grasps a viewer’s attention. It draws an observer in by its intense but subtle subject matter and by the luminous sun in the background. Without the incandescent sun and the thoughtful look of the young woman, it would just be a bland earth-toned farm landscape. However, Breton understood what to add to his painting in order to give it drama that would instantly grab an onlooker’s interest.
work of elegance, beauty, and one in which every character in the painting is expressive
“Art must be an expression of love or it is nothing.” Art is just that, one of many ways that people can express love. LOVE by Robert Indiana and The Kiss, by the French sculptor, Auguste Rodin are just two sculptures that demonstrate love. LOVE is a structure of the word love in red with the first two letters above with the “O” slanted, and the last two letters bellow the first two, that is displayed publicly in New York City. The Kiss can now be found in the Musée Rodin in Paris, France. The sculpture is of two characters of the opposite sex kissing. The materials and colors used in the two sculptures, as well as the aspect of love that they represent and the history behind the sculptures, The Kiss seems to be more romantic.
The painting has an order and there are different shapes and angles. Rectangular shape is main trend around this piece, including the wooden chest, the leg rest and the canvass. Also things overlap, creating the illusion of the shape look closer to viewer than the shape behind it. The example in this piece would be the chair on which Adelaide Labille Guiard sits be close to viewer than the girls behind it. This adds depth to the space. Also due to linear perspective girls behind the chair are smaller due to being farther away.
In 1668, King Charles II had a painter, Peter Lely, create a piece of Venus and Cupid, but by taking a closer look the viewer can see that it’s actually a portrait of Charles II’s mistress Nell Gwynn. The girl in the portrait looks benignly at the viewers and showed “her submission to the owner’s feeling and demand.” (Ways of Seeing 52). The king hung the painting behind another landscape so he could unveil it and make “his guest envied him.” (Ways of Seeing 52).
Of all the Impressionist artists, it is Pierre Auguste Renoir who is most interested in painting humans and studying the portrayal of human emotions. Renoir’s technique of broken brush strokes was combined with brash colours to portray the light and movement of the subject. He was greatly inspired to paint figures, particularly of women. Renoir succeeded in assembling several figures in one frame and his compositions were complex and demanded several revisions. In the 1880s Pierre-Auguste Renoir sought to move his art beyond Impressionism and to forge a link between modern art and the classical tradition of French painting from the Renaissance period. The result was this large-scale composition of nude bathers, which occupied much of his attention for three years. This work is unique in the history of modern painting for their representation of feminine grace, and they show Renoir’s ability to capture the soft and pearly texture of skin. Even though his figures in “The large Bathers” do not follow the impressionist style of broken brush strokes, the landscape in this painting seems looks like an impressionist landscape.