Surprisingly, fifty years later, artist John Sloan happen to meet all the qualifications Baudelaire has designed for Monsieur G— making urban life observations and drawing from memory. Sloan adopts and employs Baudelaire’s idea of urban watching and further expands it for an American audience. Born and raised in Philadelphia, John Sloan first begun his art career as a newspaper illustrator. After years of working, he developed his own artistic style and started making paintings and etchings. When he moved from Philadelphia to New York, he has found that city life scenes of great interest that he then started observing and making etchings for scenes of modern life. He was well-known and celebrated as the founder of the Ashcan School and was most celebrated for this urban genre scenes. (Lobel, Chapter1)
Like Baudelaire, Sloan’s early work shows his interest in urban observations in the public spaces. In one of his painting Sixth Avenue and 30th Street, New York City, Sloan portrays a particular urban scene on the street. Objects like buildings, train, carriage, stores all suggest its modernity and contemporariness with John Sloan’s life. The center figure
…show more content…
In the etching, most of the people are unaware of the others. At the center, a partially dressed woman raises her arms and leans forward as if to display her body; in the foreground, another woman is reaching out to the clothesline, and right above her head shows a male figure’s silhouette, facing the windows across away. “Its subject is certainly voyeurism, but who is the voyeur? The man on the roof, the artist, the picture's viewer, or all three?” ( Zurier, 281) Looking at the work, it is hard to determine who is the spectator and who is being spectated, as the relationship between them is intricate and interactive. Here, Sloan not only portrays his observation, but also critiques the action of urban watching
Terrance Hayes “How to Be Drawn” gives his perceptions in on race, culture, family, art, and issues that he had experienced in his life in three parts of the book. Hayes not only describes the struggles of racism for African American men, but he also talks about how we all as one view ourselves and how we believe others view us. The themes that were mostly discussed in this book was race and self. The author tells his story in his poems about the struggles of him being invisible and visible as an African American. There is a great amount of questions that are being asked about how we understand things? How we process memories? Hayes was incredibly creative when creating this book of poems by showing inventive ways to tell his stories by showing
So I attempted to use this mentality whilst exploring the Highline, allowed the mindset to fill me with energy and then reflected on what I liked and didn’t like about the limitless attitude once I walked back towards Gansevoort Street. When I saw Kathryn Andrews’ “Sunbathers II” piece, I went inside the piece, and smiled while my cousin took a photo of me. I then continued to roamed through Chelsea while observing the people, billboards, paintings and the skyline, and was struck by the Sleepwalker sculpture. When Zadie Smith comes face-to-face with Corona’s “Find Your Beach” advertisement, she begins to analyze and find possible interpretations of the billboard sign. I then began to examine the Sleepwalker sculpture and discussed several potential inferences towards Manhattan the artwork might have with my cousin Michelle. I then got some stracciatella gelato, and Michelle got a coffee. With my recent purchases in hand, I was taken surprise by Andrews’ “Sunbathers I”. Michelle and I laughed
When looking at these pieces, it is best to use certain modes of analysis. Levine made art that showed how corrupt and unjust he felt that America was. Welcome Home is a work of satire, where he mocks the major general of the army that he himself served in during World War II. The contextual mode of analysis can be used when looking at this work, because it was made right after World War II and it is in context of the historical time period. The biographical analysis can also be used, since Levine was so strongly influenced by what he saw in the army, and he therefore displayed his strong views against what he saw as “undemocratic” leaders.1 When viewing City Landscape, it is best to use a contextual mode of analysis. This piece was made during the ...
Examining the formal qualities of Homer Watson’s painting Horse and Rider In A Landscape was quite interesting. I chose to analyze this piece as apposed to the others because it was the piece I liked the least, therefore making me analyze it more closely and discover other aspects of the work, besides aesthetics.
It is no wonder that Picasso, with his revolutionary style of painting, would be attracted to Gertrude Stein’s crowded Rue de Fleurus apartment on Saturday evenings for intellectual discussions on art and literature. From the barefoot dances and improvisational plays of Max Jacob to the comments of critics and would-be art patrons like Maurice Raynal and André Salmon, this salon was an assortment of artists, bohemians, professionals, and foreigners (Myers 18; Olivier 139). The beginnings of a marvelous relationship sparked betwixt the words of aversion and praise that filled the halls of the Steins’ extravagant home.
On the morning of February 23rd, 1901, Chung Yick stood chatting with Mr. Joseph Hoffman, the proprietor of the picture frame shop on the ground floor of the Charles Street house the two men shared with several other tenants. The house wasn't much better than a tenement building, with its dirty wooden face and narrow crooked stairs. A crude sign on one side said "PICTURES" in bold letters, marking the entrance to Hoffman's store. The Yicks lived on the other side, along with the Rileys and the widow Driscoll, who were cramped up on the second floor. Still, it was a decent street to live on, with a mixture of small shops and residential homes and the Mosshassuck River creeping alongside it like an emaciated and sleepy serpent.
The first painting analyzed was North Country Idyll by Arthur Bowen Davis. The focal point was the white naked woman. The white was used to bring her out and focus on the four actual colored males surrounding her. The woman appears to be blowing a kiss. There is use of stumato along with atmospheric perspective. There is excellent use of color for the setting. It is almost a life like painting. This painting has smooth brush strokes. The sailing ship is the focal point because of the bright blue with extravagant large sails. The painting is a dry textured flat paint. The painting is evenly balanced. When I look at this painting, it reminds me of settlers coming to a new world that is be founded by its beauty. It seems as if they swam from the ship.
Though most works of art have some underlying, deeper meaning attached to them, our first impression of their significance comes through our initial visual interpretation. When we first view a painting or a statue or other piece of art, we notice first the visual details – its size, its medium, its color, and its condition, for example – before we begin to ponder its greater significance. Indeed, these visual clues are just as important as any other interpretation or meaning of a work, for they allow us to understand just what that deeper meaning is. The expression on a statue’s face tells us the emotion and message that the artist is trying to convey. Its color, too, can provide clues: darker or lighter colors can play a role in how we judge a piece of art. The type of lines used in a piece can send different messages. A sculpture, for example, may have been carved with hard, rough lines or it may have been carved with smoother, more flowing lines that portray a kind of gentleness.
Edward Hopper is best known for his paintings depicting city life during the first half of the century. Some of his works, such as Night Hawks, would go on to become pop culture references. One of his paintings, Office in a Small City, at first glance simply depicts a man looking out of his office window, almost as if he is daydreaming but there’s more to it. Office in a Small City is not just a painting of an office worker, it is a critique of Urban living in America. It's a reflection of Hopper's ambivalence towards America's rapid march into modern urbanism, the isolation and loneliness he felt in the face of such changes. A theme that appears in many of Hopper's other paintings and reflects his views on urban living.
Jeffery Smart’s “The Turnoff at Dandenong” is a contemporary realistic painting that represents the influence of urban
In 1886 Mary Gibbons Lawson Hood was born in Honey Brook, Pennsylvania, on August 30 to William Gibbons and Agnes Gaston Lawson (Philadelphia Modernism 38). In 1907 Mary married Albert L. Hood on March 2 at her parents’ home (Philadelphia Modernism 38). “Mary G. L. Hood attended The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts directly out of high school in 1903, but curtailed her studies to marry and raise her four children” (Tow). “Her second experience at the Academy began in 1929 when her eldest child, Agnes graduated from Swarthmore College” (Tow). Dissatisfied with the Academy’s conservative climate, Mary Hood left after a year to study with Henry McCarter and then Arthur B. Carles whose teachings encouraged an individual expression of ideas and emotions with vigorous color and abstraction (Tow). “During the summers of 1937 and 1938, she also studied with Charles W. Ward whose modernist landscapes of Bucks County would exert a strong influence in their landscapes” (Tow). “Mary Hood and Agnes Hood Miller were given a dual “Mother and Daughter” exhibition at the Philadelphia Art Alliance in December of 1941, their last exhibition in Philadelphia until now” (Tow). Later that year, Mary G. L. Hood and her family purchased a farm in Springdale, near New Hope (Philadelphia Modernism 41). “There, Hood worked in her studio every afternoon painting the beautiful flo...
John Sloan’s painting depicts a dismal view of municipal life. The painting’s gloominess is achieved most effectively through Sloan’s use of color. He uses deep shades of purple with the contrasting color green in the background. This color scheme provides an eerie fog throughout the painting.
As I enter the Gioconda and Joseph King Gallery at the Norton Museum of Art the first thing that Caught my attention was a painting measuring approximately at 4 ft. by 10 ft. on the side wall in a well- light area. As I further examine the painting the first thing I notice is that it has super realism. It also has color, texture, implied space, stopped time, and that it is a representational piece. The foreign man sitting on the chair next to a bed has a disturbed look on his face and is deep into his own thoughts. It’s as if someone he loved dearly just experienced a tragic and untimely death. He is in early depression. I could feel the pain depicted in his eyes. A book titled The Unquiet Grave lying open on the floor by the unmade bed suggesting something is left unresolved. The scattered photos and papers by the bedside cause redintegration. The picture of Medusa’s head screaming on the headboard is a silent scream filled with anger and pain, yet it cannot be heard. I feel as if I am in the one sitting in the chair and I can feel the anger, and regret.
Edward Hopper’s painting, New York Office, expands forty-and-a-half inches by a little over fifty-five inches. A young women is the only full visible character, which she is placed inside of an office, located in the middle of the painting. Behind the young women are two other figures that are hard to make out. The overall composition of the painting is well balanced and guides the viewer’s eyes. To the left is a tall structure, almost like an apartment building. The building sitting next to the office creates a dark alley that is only visible half-way.
This essay will be studying the artwork of the Canadian artist Robin Collyer; known for his remarkable work in sculptures, subjected photography, and subject experimentation in architectural form and text. His work consists of a subtle, clean, geometric forms, and also takes inspiration from taking away. He challenges society, and the Mass-media industry’s role in producing the culture of representation. He explores a concept of societal media as a skillful creation of illusions of representations, and its dominion over the public realm and commodification of the private. His work as a Canadian artist, represents his keen focus on the small elements of the city of Toronto that condition the society to see from a centred single view.Through