Through his Precisionist paintings, Charles Demuth shows the influence his cultural upbringing provided in his youth and hometown of Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Lancaster becomes a local industrial icon through Charles Demuth's use of Precisionist painting through inspiration from grain elevators, storage complexes, and architecture in his last series of panels depicting Lancaster and in turn, becomes some of his most well known work. For Charles Demuth, his hometown of Lancaster would be the primary source of both frustration and strength. However, it would be his latest oil paintings of architectural subjects that would represent his efforts to describe the Precisionist style. Through Demuth’s depictions of chimneys, towers, and other industrial symbols, he would provide a closer look into his life in Lancaster and create new local imagery of his hometown. A lot of this iconography includes local architectural buildings such as steel …show more content…
Demuth created many famous still life paintings, and much of his personal work life remains a mystery. Thomas Norton stated that Demuth left no family or money to speak of and so his paintings would have to tell Demuth’s story. Marcel Duchamp, who was another friend of Demuth’s, explained Demuth as someone who did not care where he belonged or where he stood socially. Betsy Fahlman described Demuth in her book Pennsylvania Modern: Charles Demuth of Lancaster, as someone who created a lot of enthusiasm and a keen understanding of the most advanced developments in American and European art. He was regarded as one of the more important figures in contemporary American paintings. Fahlman goes on to describe Demuth as, “While he possessed an astute understanding of the latest aesthetic developments in Europe, these paintings affirm the importance of place to a painter who, as part of a broad cultural discussion, reassessed what it meant to be an American
Many of Frank Gehry’s early works reflect a refined manipulation of shapes and structures, whereby many of his buildings present distorted shapes or apparent structures. From the Guggenheim museum to the Walt Disney concert hall, Frank Gehry’s architecture is close to none. He cleverly plays with shapes and geometries. In this essay, I shall start with a brief analysis of Gehry’s house and the influences in the design of the house. I shall then analyze the extent to which Frank Lloyd Wright has inspired and influenced Gehry in the design of his house through a comparison with Frank Lloyd Wright’s Jacob’s house.
Raymond Johnson, most famous for his collages in the days of early Pop art was simply never a household name. Instead, the movie How to Draw a Bunny proclaims he was "New York's most famous unknown artist.” The movie explains this and so much more as the people “closet” to Raymond reflect how disconnected and different he was from society in his lifetime. The movie captures this and so much more as the director thouroughly investigates the enigma of what Raymond was and his mysterious death that baffled both friends and the public by interviewing people th...
Georges Seurat used the pointillism approach and the use of color to make his painting, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, be as lifelike as possible. Seurat worked two years on this painting, preparing it woth at least twenty drawings and forty color sketched. In these preliminary drawings he analyzed, in detail every color relationship and every aspect of pictorial space. La Grande Jatte was like an experiment that involved perspective depth, the broad landscape planes of color and light, and the way shadows were used. Everything tends to come back to the surface of the picture, to emphasize and reiterate the two dimensional plane of which it was painted on. Also important worth mentioning is the way Seurat used and created the figures in the painting.
Landscape painting was extremely important during the middle of the nineteenth century. One of the leading practitioners of landscape painters in America was Thomas Cole. He visited many places seeking the “natural” world to which he might utilize his direct observations to convey the untainted nature by man to his audience. His works resolved to find goodness in American land and to help Americans take pride in their unique geological features created by God. Thomas Cole inspired many with his brilliant works by offering satisfaction to those seeking the “truth” (realism) through the works of others.
He suggests that the use of “electronic imaging prevents imagining and promotes thinking about architecture rather than bring architects, contractors, clients and critics to think within architecture” (275). Inspired by Frascari, the strategy of technography is encouraged (278). This is a “different way of thinking about the relationship between a [working] drawing and a future building. Rather than “simply Cartesian, technical lines showing edges, corners and joints these technographic drawings reveal both the symbolic and instrumental representations of the future building.. it is to make visible what is invisible”. Ridgway remarks, “The fact that any of this could be considered contentious indicates that extent to which architects have become alienated from the heart of their profession” (279). He asserts, “Part of any technography must be an acknowledgement of the historical context of construction knowledge. This is not only so we can better understand our rich architectural ancestry, but because it re-establishes a connection with the origins of our profession in building” (279). Rather than a “miniature projected representation of an imagined building, details are drawn as poetic constructions themselves, following the logic of drawing and not building and representing the “built detail symbolically, in addition to instrumentally. The symbolic and practical are one and the same thing” (280). “What are the symbolic qualities we are trying to embody in our buildings and how would we represent them in drawings?” becomes the question (278). These drawing “may not be easy or straightforward to understand or interpret.
William Holbrook Beard was born in Painesville, Ohio on April 13, 1824 and began his early art career as a traveling portrait painter. He traveled throughout Europe to Germany, Switzerland and Italy with other well known artists and learned all aspects of his craft. After a brief time in Buffalo, New York, he relocated to hone his talents and become a respected portrait painter. He exhibited extensively in the major US cites of Chicago, San Francisco, Montreal, Cincinnati, and Boston on a regular basis, but he was most successful with his exhibited works at The National Design Academy in New York, where his most loyal customers demanded his most prized works of art and where he was a member. “In 1866, he traveled West by train, and in Colorado his companion was Bayard Taylor, a writer and lecturer. He wrote to his wife, the daughter of New York portraitist Thomas le Clear that he thought the landscape was monotonous, was disappointed he didn't see more buffalo, and was unhappy with wild life and hardship living. As a result, he turned more and more to his imagination, retaining an interest in wildlife but not in studying their habits and environment first hand. Many of his paintings showed animals, especially bears, as realistic physically but atypical in their behavior.”("William Holbrook Beard (1823-1900 ) ") These early experiences in life and travels had a profound effect on the life and choice of future subject matter being studied and painted. He felt that for some odd reason that the animals didn’t talk back as humans do, so placing them in situations where they can translate human drama and personal experiences in art became his most masterful talent during his life time.
ImageAs time passed and society evolved, inviting the manifestation of industrialism into its ranks, so too did the concept and aims of realism. This phenomenon can be witnessed in the works of one of the most quintessential painters of the twentieth century, Edward Hopper, as realism made its way over to the superpower of the new world: America. Hopper's paintings delved into a darker, melancholic exploration of everyday people in their established environments. His most famous work Nighthawks (1942) includes both a common feature of American life (in this case, a diner) as a primary source of his subject matter, as well as his deeply explored theme of loneliness and detached isolation.
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.
Richard Estes’ Realism is an exhibit consisting of a variety of paintings of various places around the world. The exhibit could be seen at the Portland Museum of Art from May 22, 2014, through September 7, 2014, before it became an online exhibit on the Smithsonian American Art Museum website. The exhibit is made up of paintings solely created by Richard Estes. The exhibit features paintings of urban scenes from various cities and countries. Estes' 50 years of work as an artist is showcased in this exhibit.
At the age of 14, Charles was very inspired by Jackson Pollock and his art. His work and style had a huge impact on a young Charles. That gave him much determination to pursue his life as an artist. He was enrolled at the University of Washington, which soon graduated in 1962. After that, he instantly started to migrate east to Yale for him to get a Master of Fine Arts from University’s Art and Architecture school. He soon figured out his passion for Yale wasn’t that deep, which turned his focus on photo-realism. He made large-format polaroids of models and would recreate them on big canvases. His method was described as “knitting”. His early work some people would clarify as bold, intimate and up-front, replicating those particular details of the selected faces he did. His work had a blend of both painting and photography in a way no one has ever accomplished before. That paved the way to the development of the inkjet
Paul's Cathedral. He completed a total of 99 paintings, 72 of which were portraits. An artist of many talents ranging from painting to etching, Anthony van Dyck is now best remembered for his depictions of Charles I and his court. Van Dyck defined English portraiture painting and influenced many artists for centuries after. Some critics believe that van Dyck's legacy did little more than encourage his successors, including William Dobson and Isaac Fuller, to create elegant, romantic, yet bland portraits. However, in An Essay on the Theory of Painting, 1715, 41, Jonathan Richardson writes, "When van Dyck came hither he brought Face-Painting to us; ever since which time ... England has excel'd all the World in that great Branch of the Art.
Frank Lloyd Wright, born Frank Lincoln Wright on June 8th, 1867 in Richland Center, Wisconsin and passed away April 9th, 1959 in Phoenix, Arizona at the age of 91, helped build the United States' Architectural profoundness to the point it is at today. His awards include; the Royal Gold Medal for Architecture, the Sir George Watson Chair by the Royal Institute of British Architects, the Gold Medal of the American Institute of Architects, the Centennial Award from Popular Mechanics magazine and many others including honorary degrees from eight different institutions. On display for public viewing are over fifty of Frank Lloyd Wright’s amazing and influential architectural pieces, with hundreds of others around the
Frank Lloyd Wright has been called “one of the greatest American architect as well as an Art dealer that produced a numerous buildings, including houses, resorts, gardens, office buildings, churches, banks and museums. Wright was the first architect that pursues a philosophy of truly organic architecture that responds to the symphonies and harmonies in human habitats to their natural world. He was the apprentice of “father of Modernism” Louis Sullivan, and he was also one of the most influential architects on 20th century in America, Wright is idealist with the use of elemental theme and nature materials (stone, wood, and water), the use of sky and prairie, as well as the use of geometrical lines in his buildings planning. He also defined a building as ‘being appropriate to place’ if it is in harmony with its natural environment, with the landscape (Larkin and Brooks, 1993).
Marcel Duchamp was born in Normandy in northern France 1887; he traveled a lot. Marcel Duchamp used the Mona Lisa to create a famous rendition of her that falls under pastiche and parody as he took a reproduction of the Mona Lisa and used her to make another artwork through the addition of adding in a penciled in of a mustache and a goatee to it therefore introducing the masculinized female, this brings forth the theme of gender reversal. Marcel Duchamp was part of the Dada movement which really had a noticeable effect on postmodernism in its enquiring of authenticity and originality. As well as with the concept of appropriation, postmodernism often took the undermining of originality to the extent of copyright violation, even in the use of photos that have minor to having no change to the original as possible.
In order to explore new venues of creativity Modernists tinkered with the perception of reality. During the Renaissance, the depiction of a subject was very straight forward. A painting had to look like what it represented. The truth was absolute and right and wrong were clearly defined. For Modernists, the world is much more obscure. In Impressionist paintings, lines are not definite and things tend to blur together. Faces usually do not differentiate one person from another.