Erased de Kooning, seemingly a blank sheet of paper with just a few brush strokes on it, was originally a painting by Willem de Kooning. Knowing and admiring de Kooning as the most significant artist of the day, Robert Rauschenberg asked for his permission to erase one of de Kooning’s works. With de Kooning’s full understanding and consent, Rauschenberg chose to unmark a multimedia piece rather than other simple graphite sketches. As a result, the drawing became resonant and remained debated between groups of people, who either appreciate it or doubt that it is even an art because it is missing an essential component which is form. Even though people argue that there is an absence of form in the final product, Erased de Kooning drawing is revolutionary …show more content…
Turning what importance people used to value upside down, building a new possibility to what form of art people used to consider beautiful, Robert Rauschenberg is the actual author of this piece. Modifiying to a finished work of art, some may say, is wrong even with the artist's consent; however, Rauschenberg's modification serves to create this drawing a part of the American twentieth century cultural landscape (Fenner). If “that the drawing was erased is itself more culturally significant than the original drawing,” a modified art can express more accurately and so becomes acceptable. Insofar such acts of Rauschenberg have been regarded as “[reprising] the attempts of historical avant-gardists like Duchamp to negate the forms of traditional art,” Erased de Kooning can represent neo-conceptualism and Dadaism (Butt 138). Rauschenberg’s artwork not only speaks to reform the art-world that had been deeply influenced by traditional art form and practices, but also creates an effect of “anti-bourgeois and [has] political affinities with the radical left”
Humanity has faced the challenge of placing a definition on the ever so abstract concept of art since the beginning of the Renaissance. The ongoing dispute between art critics and aesthetic philosophers has generated the creation of numerous textual and pictorial compositions in regards to varying views on the idea of art. To translate a scene of a room and a bed onto a large canvas should not be considered true art. Early art philosophers struggled between perceiving art as an inspiration or a true knowledge. Andrew Wyeth’s watercolor, Master Bedroom, seems to just be an imitation of a real master bedroom instead of a true work of art. The piece deserves the least amount of appreciation because of its lack of originality, creativity, and
In the Enseigne, art is also shown to serve a function that it has always fulfilled in every society founded on class differences. As a luxury commodity it is an index of social status. It marks the distinction between those who have the leisure and wealth to know about art and posses it, and those who do not. In Gersaint’s signboard, art is presented in a context where its social function is openly and self-consciously declared. In summary, Watteau reveals art to be a product of society, nevertheless he refashions past artistic traditions. Other than other contemporary painters however, his relationship to the past is not presented as a revolt, but rather like the appreciative, attentive commentary of a conversational partner.
At the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Rauschenberg art piece was definitely one form of art I once did not consider to be art. The artwork is not exactly a painting to me but certainly an illustration of something that is connected to real day to day objects. It was created by the artist Robert Rauschenberg in 1954. It is oil on canvas painting which is eighty by ninety six in size and the materials used are oil, paper, fabric and metal which are all on wood. It looks quite messy, with materials like newspapers, cut out fabrics, the colors’ drips and how they are splashed around. The image doesn’t look attractive but it sure does attract different ideas from the viewers on what the image itself is trying to portray.
Roy Liechtenstein, (fig 1) was born in 1923 into to a middle class Hungarian family living in New York, there was no artists on either side of his family and throughout Liechtenstein’s schooling there were no art classes. He used to paint in oils and draw, sometimes sketching musicians he saw playing in Harlem and the Apollo Theatre as a hobby. It was not until ‘1939’ the summer of his last year at high school that he enrolled in art classes in the Art Students League run by a man called Reginald Marsh. Liechtenstein’s influences regarding his painting style at this time had been the European avant-garde artists such as Picasso. These cubist and expressionist styles were rejected buy by Marsh who favoured painting the masses of New York life such as carnival scenes, boxing matches and the subways catching the detail in fleeting brush strokes, in a non-academic easily recognisable way. This style of recognisable American art that used everyday scenes are directly related to the consumer orientated Pop Art that Liechtenstein was to develop later in his life.
(3) Mark Sagoff, " On Restoring and Reproducing Art," The Journal of Philosophy LXXV: 9, September 1978, pp. 453-470. Parenthetical page references to Sagoff will be to this work.
Mark Rothko is recognized as one of the greatest artists of the twentieth century and during his lifetime was touted as a leading figure in postwar American painting. He is one of the outstanding figures of Abstract Expressionism and one of the creators of Color Field Painting. As a result of his contribution of great talent and the ability to deliver exceptional works on canvas one of his final projects, the Rothko Chapel offered to him by Houston philanthropists John and Dominique de Menil, would ultimately anchor his name in the art world and in history. Without any one of the three, the man, the work on canvas, or the dream, the Rothko Chapel would never have been able to exist for the conceptualization of the artist, the creations on canvas and the architectural dynamics are what make the Rothko Chapel a product of brilliance.
After the 1940 surrender of Paris, which many Americans viewed as the fall of culture due to Paris’ status as the international mecca for the arts, it was evident that the world required a new and superior cultural hub. Throughout the 1940s American artists, with the influence of European Modern and Surrealist painters, were able to elevate New York City to the center of the art world by implementing a “new, strong, and original” artistic style that simultaneously fought fascist ideology: Abstract Expressionism (Guilbault 65). After the war, galleries throughout Europe exhibited American Abstract art, Rothko’s in particular, to prove that American art, once thought tasteless, possessed artistic depth and merit (“Mark Rothko”). Therefore, Abstract Expression had a major role in making New York City the worldwide cultural metropolis that it is today. In terms of shifts in worldview, Abstract Expressionism placed a great importance on intense emotion and spirituality in a society where religiousness was, and continues to be, replaced by other, often self-centered or materialistic, pursuits. The movement allowed and encouraged the public to explore their darkest fears and woes, which, in the wake of the Second World War and, later on, during the Cold War was likely therapeutic. Above all else, it made society recognize that art should no longer be viewed with suspicion; instead, it should be accepted as an integral element of culture
It appears to me that pictures have been over-valued; held up by a blind admiration as ideal things, and almost as standards by which nature is to be judged rather than the reverse; and this false estimate has been sanctioned by the extravagant epithets that have been applied to painters, and "the divine," "the inspired," and so forth. Yet in reality, what are the most sublime productions of the pencil but selections of some of the forms of nature, and copies of a few of her evanescent effects, and this is the result, not of inspiration, but of long and patient study, under the instruction of much good sense…
Imagine you can own one of the famous painting in the world. Which one would it be? What will you do with it? If I got to own a famous painting, I would hang it in my bedroom and I’ll show it to my family. In this situation, If needed to narrow it down it will be The Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dali or Nighthawks by Edward Hopper. These paintings are extremely different, and their artistic movement is opposite from one another. By the end of this essay, you’re going to know the differences and similarities of these paintings.
In the book “Ways of Seeing,” John Berger explains several essential aspects of art through the influence of the Marxism and art history that relate to social history and the sense of sight. Berger examines the dominance of ideologies in the history of traditional art and reflects on the history, class, and ideology as a field of cultural discourse, cultural consumption and cultural practice. Berger argues, “Realism is a powerful link to ownership and money through the dominance of power. ”(p.90)[1] The aesthetics of art and present historical methodology lack focus in comparison to the pictorial essay.
From the creation of art to its modern understanding, artists have strived to perform and perfect a photo realistic painting with the use of complex lines, blend of colors, and captivating subjects. This is not the case anymore due to the invention of the camera in 1827, since it will always be the ultimate form of realism. Due to this, artists had the opportunities to branch away from the classical formation of realism, and venture into new forms such as what is known today as modern art. In the examination of two well known artists, Pablo Picasso and Jackson Pollock, we can see that the artist doesn’t only intend for the painting to be just a painting, but more of a form of telling a scene through challenging thoughts, and expressing of the artists emotion in their creation.
Many people look at a piece of art and add their own interpretations or meanings to it before they read the title or learn the backstory. The way we see things is damaged by our knowledge and beliefs. When a picture is zoomed in or focused on a certain part, the whole painting’s meaning is taken out of context. Words and titles surrounding the painting change the meaning and interpretation of the painting. In essay four of his book, Ways of Seeing, John Berger presents to us a collage of art that have no relevance to each other, so that we can give our own opinion without interruption that the titles and words give us.
Willem de Kooning was known as one of the major artists of the Abstract Expressionism period. In the post World War II era, de Kooning painted in the style that is referred to as Abstract expressionism, Action painting, and the New York School. Like all Modern art, the intent of these forms of art was not to produce beauty, but critical reflection. The intent was to awaken in the viewer a recognition of the specific, usually social or political, concern of the artist (New World, 2008). De Kooning reflected this period by working in such as a way as to both eschew all traces of visible reality in the painting as well as to create uncontrolled and sometimes violent gestures, which is reminiscent of this time (Gale Encyclopedia, 2006). His works show great emotion, mostly of a tortured, aggressive nature, which was thought of by many to be the ultimate expression of this abstract period.
The. Theories of Contemporary Art. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1985. Kotz, Mary Lynn. Rauschenberg/Art and Life. New York:
“In a decaying society, art, if it is truthful, must also reflect decay. Moreover, unless it wants to break faith with its social function, art must show the world as changeable. And help to change it.” This quote by Ernst Fischer, a German composer, means that truth in art exposes the parts of society, and of life, that no one wants to see. In order for art to change society, it must first reflect the fears and failures of its people. The artist can change how people think of themselves and the world by using less conventional methods of creating art. The artist, in doing this, introduces new ideas of human placement in time and space, new frontiers of thought, that are furthered by the disciplines of science and philosophy. The artist works to introduces unique- and sometimes offensive- ideas so that society will be exposed to new ways of thinking and understanding the world. The artist does this through experimentation with color, style, and form. Therefore, the purpose of the artist should be to challenge how individuals perceive themselves and the offensive aspects of society reflected in art to bring about innovations in the greater society.