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Essay on Abstract Expressionism
Essays about abstract expressionism
Essays about abstract expressionism
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I decided to choose my subject by walking around the museum and seeing which one “called” to me. I chose Glisten (1972) by Sam Gilliam because the bright colors grabbed me as soon as I saw it and a feeling of happiness washed over me. Sam Gilliam (b. 1933) is a very well known African-American painter, innovative for his use of three-dimensional canvases (University of Kentucky), who is a part of the American Abstract Artists group, as well as many other movements, such as the Washington Color Field movement (Malyon). Glisten is a 27 x 73 15/16 x 3” acrylic on canvas 3-dimensional artwork (University of Kentucky).
The lines in the painting seem painterly, meaning I couldn’t find any distinct borders to them. It seems most apparent in the yellow line on the middle right side of the painting and the two blues lines near the top left corner. I believe he used this form because it is fairly common in Abstract Expressionism (Dempsey) to use line this way. I feel he is also trying to convey a mood by using this form of line because it adds a certain softness to the atmosphere surrounding it.
I can identify mostly organic shapes in the work and don’t seem to find any geometric shapes. The drops of paint in the bottom left corner and at the top have no visible shape to them, neither do any of the stains. I believe the artist was more about the flat shapes specifically on the canvas, because the canvas itself appeals to the three-dimensional mass. I see a strong figure-ground relationship between the paint splatters and the color stained background. I think the artist did this for a certain effect on the painting.
The color used in this work is the most effective element. The artist uses a mix of primary and secondary colors, but no vis...
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...he paint splatters, however, seem to intentionally unbalance the rest of the canvas with its concentration at the top. This allows the eye not to focus on just one spot.
The artist puts a lot of emphasis on color in the painting, and on space and texture of the canvas itself. He does this to bring the viewer into his world and express the emotion he is putting into words with paint. The painting is non-representational and is a part of the Abstract Expressionism movement. The artist particularly involved in the American Abstract Artists group. The concept of Abstract Expressionism was very popular at the time, and this artist was influenced by other Abstract Expressionist artists, such as Jackson Pollock and Helen Frankenthaler (University of Kentucky). This painting in particular says a lot about the innovative techniques Gilliam used and why is he world renowned.
These lines are regular and seem to come together and space out depending on the desired effect. Lines running vertically on the page represent the bamboo. Hiroshige makes heavy use of line in the bridge, which is architecturally semi-realistic. A technique used to create a shadow in this print is crosshatching where multiple lines are crossed over each other to create depth. In Riverside Bamboo Market, Kyobashi crosshatching can be seen on the items in the man’s boat helping to show shadow as well as texture.
I visited Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, California for the first time hoping to learn more about the European artworks this place has to offer. Norton Simon Museum holds the remarkable amounts of artwork by world-renowned artists: Vincent Van Gogh, Rembrandt van Rijin, Caravaggio, Raphael, and Pablo Picasso just to name a few. I observed many European paintings in the 18th to 19th century; I chose to discuss the artwork by the incredible Claude-Oscar Monet. Claude-Oscar Monet’s Mouth of the Seine at Honfleur, 1865 is an oil painting of a seascape on a canvas. The Parisian artist is considered one of the most influential artists in the late nineteenth to early twentieth century.
The Artwork that I will be analyzing is ‘(blossoming) Autumn sun’ paint in 2006 by Imants Tillers using acrylic, gouache on 54 canvas boards. Imants Tillers is an Australian artist, curator, and a writer who was born in the 1950’s in Sydney. He is also known for painting ‘Conversation with the bride, ‘The Bridge of reversible Destiny, ‘The Letter I, and ‘The Forming of Place.
His brush stokes are small and careful in the portrayal of grass to create the illusion of wind flowing through it. What also gives the grass a sense of “softness” is that the man looks comfortable enough to take off his shoes comfortably walk through it. Even though the brush stokes look small and soft he is still able to create the texture of stone on the house chimney, the bark on the tree, and the wood on the wheel barrel with these small careful strokes. The painting almost looks as if it would be soft to the touch and the mediums used have a lot to do with it. The gesso panel on wood makes the surface of the painting even and the paint glide easier across the surface, leaving no clumps of painting anywhere.
His analysis of color associated blue with the masculine, yellow with the feminine, and red with the physical often violent. He took a cubist approach, in the display and creation of the animals that he depicted in his works; simplicity was often seen as a means to his creative process as well, as most pieces simply focused on the animal, and the raw emotion, as opposed to drawing in from external factors, to create the printed art works during his
This piece is acrylic, oilstick, and spray paint on wood panel that is 186.1 centimeters in height and 125.1 centimeters in width. This piece features a human-like figure in the center that is mostly half red and half black. This figure has a gray head with one yellow eye and one light gray eye and above its head is a black halo. The background consists of patches of various colors such as light blue, black, dark red, light green, beige, turquoise, pink, and yellow. On the bottle left corner there is a figure drawn that looks like a fish and has a strip of mustard yellow painted through it. Also towards the bottom right of the artwork, there is some drawn on letters that almost look like words but are messily painted over with a desert sand color. This piece is my favorite because I find it aesthetically pleasing. There is a lot going on in this piece that makes looking at it genuinely interesting. The colors that Basquiat choses for the background go very well together and overall compliment the figure in the center. I like how incredibly expressive this piece is and it makes me want to buy a canvas and start painting that I desire. I also like how the human-like figure is drawn. One could see what looks like an outlined ribcage on the figure, which makes me believe that the head is actually a skull. Upon further research I learned that Basquiat was
Leyster was a student of Frans Hals who seemingly was able to mimic some of his ability for loose brushwork. Her painting used vertical and diagonal lines and she used earthy colored browns and greys. The painting, “Young Flute Player” is a realistic painting. The boy is sitting in his chair lost in his music and behind him are other instruments, the violin and a recorder. “Leyster takes us to a blank background to reinforce all the details within.” (www.kweiseye.com) She does this in order for us to take in the full view, for example, his clothes that billow out from him or the patterns on the top of the chair. With the background not bustling with activity but being a simple brown background, your attention gets drawn to the boy playing the music. And with your attention on the boy you look and stare to try to “hear” what has him so intensely focused
himself through his mediums. He used oil on canvas for his medium in this painting. There are
The colours used in the artwork are earthy tones with various browns, greens, yellows, blues and some violet. These colours create a sense of harmony on the...
The painting is organized simply. The background of the painting is painted in an Impressionist style. The blurring of edges, however, starkly contrasts with the sharp and hard contours of the figure in the foreground. The female figure is very sharp and clear compared to the background. The background paint is thick compared to the thin lines used to paint the figures in the foreground. The thick paint adds to the reduction of detail for the background. The colors used to paint the foreground figures are vibrant, as opposed to the whitened colors of the Impressionist background. The painting is mostly comprised of cool colors but there is a range of dark and light colors. The light colors are predominantly in the background and the darker colors are in the foreground. The vivid color of the robe contrasts with the muted colors of the background, resulting in an emphasis of the robe color. This emphasis leads the viewer's gaze to the focal part of the painting: the figures in the foreground. The female and baby in the foreground take up most of the canvas. The background was not painted as the artist saw it, but rather the impression t...
The painting has realistic 3 dimensional space by the use of linear perspective and chiaroscuro. It also looks to be 2 dimensional as well, because it almost looks like some influence on the Japanese print, like flat patches of paint. The lines converge from the edges of the paint to the center letting off the effect of a background and a foreground. It looks as though the trash is in the foreground and the man is in the background. In the back of the painting, it is darker which also adds to the effect of the 3 dimensional space.
...hese repeated vertical lines contrast firmly with a horizontal line that divides the canvas almost exactly in half. The background, upper portion of the canvas, seems unchanging and flat, whereas the foreground and middle ground of the painting have a lot of depth to them.
...tal aspects to understand who the female subject is. Miller doesn’t used repetition; in fact, he doesn't use geometric or organic shapes at all. The lack of the use of shapes and repetition mimics the way a woman would put on makeup. Typically, makeup isn’t put on in perfect shapes, much less organically shaped patterns. The impressionist style reflects the message of this painting more accurately than a more classical style, like Cenni’s, could.
...rivers of paint rush across the dark black ground, creating writhing intertwining shapes that suggest figures in a landscape setting, but without any specificity whatsoever.
The composition of this particular piece of work is very crowded and the only space that is apparent is where the geometrical shapes overlap creating some small gaps between them. Perhaps the distressed society of the time explains the chaotic feeling of this piece. The war had created complete upheaval and had ruined many people’s lives and societies. The combination of torn edges and sharp edges encourages the viewer to feel erratic and unordered yet everything is arranged and given a particular place. I think that Schwitters wanted to create some kind of order within his work as well as having an undertone of chaos. I feel that the layers of paint t...