San Francisco, Lombard Street is a piece painted by Tomas Kinkade, a popular American artist. Kinkade painted the timeless scene of Lombard Street in 2002. Kinkade’s goal was to exhibit city life along with the endless possibilities it brings. The 25.5” x 34” work is exhibited in my own home. Kinkade used acid-free, premium grade paper to display his artwork on. He also implemented his own DNA in the paint to prevent any sort of forgery. 2. Descriptive Criticism: Account for all of the major elements of artistic form for the type of work you are critiquing, based upon the handout on the Major Elements of Artistic Form. Give at least one example of each element. If the work does not exhibit one or more elements, note this in your critique. …show more content…
Upon closer inspection, a long line in the painting begins to move the viewers eyes. This open, vertical line outlines the street, Lombard Street. While following this line you eventually end up at the city skyline and sunset. There are also some other lines on the sides of the homes. These closed lines seem to quickly lead your eyes out toward the skyline. There is also a horizontal axis line along the pier, the Aquatic Park Pier. It’s almost that this line separates city from the sea and sunset. This gives an asymmetrical view on the housing and city life in the foreground and the sunset and sea in the background. The vertical axis line could be Lombard Street itself. The line could be separating the homeowners along the sea from the homeowners that have land all around them. This axis line gives an asymmetrical view as the houses on the sea are vastly different than the houses on land. These axis lines give an incredible illusion of depth. The horizontal axis line across the horizon helps give this effect. Nowhere does the painting seem abstract or flush with the canvas it’s painted on. It’s almost as if the painting were 3D and the viewer could reach passed the canvas and even walk down Lombard Street itself. The lines make the eyes move at a slower pace due to the limited open space and togetherness of the painting. At no point in the painting is the eye not stimulated by something. For example, the eye could take note of the sea background, the busy street, the different styles of houses, and more. However, observers’ eyes always seem to end up in the background. The painting immediately projects play between light and dark when the viewer first sees it. The bright city skyline and sunset reflect adequately off the darkened roads and house exteriors. For example, Kinkade has achieved this using many yellow lights, green forestry, and blue flowers that contrast off the black roads, tan houses, and brown stone barriers. This use of chiaroscuro reasonably reflects the texture of the painting. San Francisco, Lombard Street gives a smooth and glossy feel if one were to touch the surface. There are three regions in the painting that stand out the most. One region is the city in a rectangular shape. The open lines and bright yellow lights are what mainly outline this region. Another region is the rectangular sea region outlined by open lines along the pier and housing. The last region is the mountains and sky which is also in a rectangular shape. This region can be made out because of the open lines along the bottom of mountains. There is also a significant change in color and mood moving from the city and sea region. 3. Interpretive Criticism: State what you believe to be the subject matter(s) of the work you are critiquing. Support your claim with examples from the work’s elements of artistic form. The subject matter of San Francisco, Lombard Street is timeless Lombard Street itself along with how beautiful a San Francisco evening is. I think this subject matter can relate to many of the viewers interests. For example, many observers may be able to relate to seeing extravagant skylines. Whether it be from their hometown, an exotic vacation, or even other works of art, the skyline can issue a positive reaction. The busy city may also be of interest to observers. I’m confident many have experienced the sounds and sights of a busy street and can surely relate that positive/negative experience to the image they see of Lombard Street, CA. 4.
Interpretive Criticism: State what you believe to be the content(s) of the work you are critiquing. Support your claim with examples from the work’s elements of artistic form. I think the content in San Francisco, Lombard Street is the eagerness and warmth that San Francisco brings. I feel warmth when I look out toward the horizon at the skyline and city line. Kinkade uses cooler colors around the mountains, sea, and sky to depict this. I feel the eagerness when I view the bright lights along with the traffic down Lombard Street. I can immediately feel a thriving city along with many different city sounds. The combination of brighter colors and warmer colors is the reason why I think the content what it is. It shows San Francisco can be a home for anyone. For the younger, more active crowd the painting depicts you can find a home in the city where all the action is. For the older, and more relaxed crowd you can find a home along the sea or in the mountains looking over the city. 5. Evaluative Criticism: Describe your personal participation with the work you are critiquing, and what that participation was like. Give a brief and objective appraisal of the artistic merit of the work: not that “it is a work of art,” but how good a work of art it is, and why you think
so. I truly enjoy this work by Thomas Kinkade. It first appeals to my sense of sight. I’m fascinated each time I walk by this piece in my home. The depth is the main feature I’ve participated with. It feels as if I’m in San Francisco while I view this painting. The imagery of a busy city also appeals to me. San Francisco, Lombard Street depicts a strong cultured city life combined with the beauty of California. I’m overwhelmed with a sense of eventfulness when viewing the foreground, but I experience peace and tranquility when I take note of the background. One feature I particularly love is how the golden evening blends with the busy city. The painting perfectly displays an evening night in San Francisco. I also took note of how the piece is timeless. The painting could be depicting Lombard Street at nearly any point in modern time. This stood out to me because Kinkade wanted to only depict the values and features that Lombard Street possess. Kinkade wanted to show a piece of San Francisco in its raw beauty. He wasn’t concerned with including any ever-changing trends that many cities go through.
They might not be very prominent, but they exist the painting and serve as the base for creation. For starters, the window pane contains lines that highlight its simple design. Simplicity remains as the core of this work. Moreover, sill is roughly represented by a thick brown line underneath the window as a boundary in a quietly brilliant fashion. The work has a wonderful color allocation to express the mood. The color is limited within the muted palette color range. Grey—the intermediate color of black and white, is the dominate color for both exterior view and the interior part, as a matter of fact, the observer notices that nearly all colors are mixed instead of natural this work. The cloudy sky corresponds to the grey color of the wall, yet the brightness is not influenced. However, this consistency has successfully created a cold, grave and silent environment for a crowded place such as New York. The whole environment of this painting seems to be surrounded by the negative and depressive
Canal is heavy on the use of values. The piece of art work has heavy contrasts and deep shadows. This can be seen with the building on the right’s corridor. In the middle left he uses high light to show the sun light in the horizon. On the right bottom in the building’s outer corridor Canal uses cast shadow and core shadow. The shadows of the individuals walking are consistent in not only in direction, but in length. Canal used planes to divide the surroundings with the building and lines to divide the building to the sky. He also uses lines to create movement and direction as you can see the citizens heading toward the middle of the art work. The “View of the Molo” also gives the building a sense of texture on the surface. The building does not look flat. The windows protrude a bit. One can see depth on the window sills and the bottom corridors. Canal uses one-line perspective and the vanishing point is the building in the bottom middle. Canal’s use of color is minimal. The colors are not vibrant at the same time not dull. The art work uses colors minimally. The temperature of Canal’s art work is
My goal for this paper is to give a practical critique and defense of what I have learned in my time as a Studio Art Major. During my time here I have learned that Pensacola Christian college’s definition of art “art is the organized visual expression of ideas or feelings” and the four parts of Biblosophy: cannon, communication, client, and creativity. Along with Biblosophy I have studied Dr. Frances Schaeffer 's criteria for art, seeing how the technical, and the major and minor messages in artwork. All of these principles are great but they do need to be refined.
In Gaut’s essay, “The Ethical Criticism of Art”, he addresses the relevance of an art piece’s ethical value when making an aesthetic evaluation. His key argument revolves around the attitudes that works of art manifest such that he presents the following summary “If a work manifests ethically reprehensible attitudes, it is to that extent aesthetically defective, and if a work manifests ethically commendable attitudes, it is to that extent aesthetically meritorious”. In direct contrast with formalists, who divine a work’s merit through an assessment of its style and compositional aspects, Gaut states that any art piece’s value requires a pro tanto judgement. This pro tanto position allows for pieces considered stylistic masterpieces, to be
A traditional method assumes that the criticism involves both explication of what actually went on when the speaker engaged his or her audience, and an evaluation of how well the speaker performed the task of changing the audiences’ perspective of reality. It is also assumed that the traditional method will create a feeling of identification and sense of relatedness between the speaker or writer and the
In existential thought it is often questioned who decides what is right and what is wrong. Our everyday beliefs based on the assumption that not everything we are told may be true. This questioning has given light to the subjective perspective. This means that there is a lack of a singular view that is entirely devoid of predetermined values. These predetermined values are instilled upon society by various sources such as family to the media. On a societal level this has given rise to the philosophy of social hype. The idea of hype lies in society as the valuation of something purely off someone or some group of people valuing it. Hype has become one of the main driving forces behind what society considers to be good art and how successful artists can become while being the main component that leads to a wide spread belief, followed by its integration into subjective views. Its presence in the art world propagates trends, fads, and limits what we find to be good art. Our subjective outlook on art is powered by society’s feedback upon itself. The art world, high and low, is exploited by this social construction. Even when objective critique is the goal subjective remnants can still seep through and influence an opinion. Subjective thought in the art world has been self perpetuated through regulated museums, idolization of the author, and general social construction because of hype.
Critical thinking is a very important aspect to understanding art. As David Perkins put it in “The Intelligent Eye”, we must avoid “experimental thinking”, a rash, quick way of thinking based on observations and use “reflective intelligence”, a way of thinking in which a viewer takes their time and dissects details and nuances to fully understand a work of art. A majority of viewers will look at a piece of art and come to a quick analysis of it, without much thought. But, according to Perkins, “The more attentive the observation is, the better the opportunity is for deeper learning” (Perkins 14). As Banksy said in Exit Through the Gift Shop, “the reaction to the work of art is the most important thing about it.” Without a reaction or an opinion, the work of art has no meaning. Therefore, in order to trul...
Just as other works that reflect art, pieces in the category of fine arts serve the important message of passing certain messages or portraying a special feeling towards a particular person, function or activity. At times due to the nature of a particular work, it can become so valuable that its viewers cannot place a price on it. It is not the nature or texture of an art that qualifies it, but the appreciation by those who look at it (Lewis & Lewis, 2008).
What I see in this piece is peacefulness. Stokes of the paintbrush are perfect to make it look whole. With the sun shinning down making the colors pop out even more. The olive trees glowing in the suns light with the mountains behind it. It is a piece I could look at for a long time with out getting bored. The colors of the piece just make it look so complete. With the lines of the
W. K. Wimsatt and Monroe C. Beardsley are two of the most famous New Critical theorists. Their essay, “The Intentional Fallacy” impacted and further developed the study of New Criticism. It even has a profound impact on the way scholars practice criticism now. “The Intentional Fallacy” exposes the various “fallacious” or mistaken approaches to the interpretation of literature. It is false to believe that literature follows through with what the assumed purpose is from the author himself. Wimsatt and Beardsley argue that there are a whole variety of meanings of which the author might even be unaware of or never intended to be. If the audience can produce textual evidence, that meaning is valid. Meaning is found within the text itself and not within the intentions of the author. If the reader focuses on the intentions of the author, that is a fallacy or a mistaken approach to the
Also, in the painting, we see two horse carriages, (black and yellow), although we see no horses with few people surrounding these carriages. We can also see two large buildings that take up majority of the space in the painting. The buildings, has a mixture of two browns, one lighter than the other which also include the color grey, consisting of 3 levels in one building and 4 levels on the other one. On the mid left, we see rooftops of stores or houses in the painting. And lastly, his signature appears on the bottom right written in the color orange.
Despite the fact that I spotted the little town in the background with a smoking chimney stack, my eyes kept glancing back at the boat in the very front. This painting has a broad color palate, which is not realistic but symbolizes an atmosphere of joy. The next thing I noticed was the use of bright contrasting colors everywhere. The dark colors: blue, green, and purple form the shadow of the distant hill and the boats in the background. Contrasting color values are shown to create three-dimensional forms, such as where the water meets the land.
His first statement is that “Literary criticism is a description and evaluation of its object” (Brooks 19). The literary critic reports on the work that he is criticizing and picks out the meaning that he deems important, which might be different from what the next critic would pick out. To describe the work it is therefore already a subjective exercise, such as in Doctor Faustus, in the A-version of the text, some people ...
Literature is an intricate art form. In order to attempt to understand the meanings and ideas within literary work, there are many forms of criticism that propose different approaches to its interpretation. Each criticism is crucial to the understanding of how individuals interpret literary works. Since each criticism has a different approach to enrich the understanding literary works, the question is raised whether one criticism should be used over others, whether a certain combination of criticisms should be used, or whether all criticisms should be taken into account. This may all be dependent on the reader’s individual preference or opinion, but each criticism presented builds on the others to create a well-rounded and unique understanding
There are intrinsic and extrinsic criticisms of novels, letters, and poems. Each method offers a different perspective on how the readers interpret each piece. Intrinsic criticism is the process of how readers summarize the main points of the piece. Extrinsic criticism is the background information such as: the time period, the author’s biography, and historical references. Any additional data gathered assists with the analysis of the literary text. Emily Dickinson’s poem The Wife will be analyzed by using these two methods of criticism. An intrinsic reading of the poem will be given, insight on whether extrinsic criticism contributes to the reading of the poem or alters its meaning will be disclosed, and lastly a reflection on the relative merits of both criticisms will be provided.