The forties were a time of anxiety, fear, and conformity in post-war America. Conflict with the remaining portions of the USSR, the Red Scare, and McCarthy politics all pushed the American people to a state of conformity and fear of nonconformity that permeated the culture. Louis Bouché’s Gallery K represents the American ideal of conformity through the fashion and interaction of the people within the scene. By situating this work in the style of an American scene oil painting, the imagery and content of the art is further normalized and idealized as the typical American experiences that people strived for in the forties. The focus of the painting is on the people, not the art within the gallery. Blurred statues line the hall with general …show more content…
The boy and the man, presumably his father, in the center of the painting wear stereotypical American clothes for the period. The boy’s blue long sleeve shirt and khaki shorts could represent any America boy in the Forties due to their common nature. His father wears a grey jacket with white buttons down the front and on the pockets. His light grey pants fit with the current style and black shoes peak out from beneath them. For his hair, the father’s slicked back style meets the expectations that fashion in the forties has set. An older man stands behind the boy and father, looking into the main room from the pink back room. The old man dresses in dark grey pants similar to those of both other man within the scene. His white shirt has rolled sleeves and he appears without a jacket, unlike the rest of the men in the painting. Instead of loafers, he seems to be wearing tennis shoes that look similar to converse. While the older man does stand apart from the others in the painting, divided by style and room, he stills fits into the customary style of the forties within a different class structure. He seems to be of a lower status than the other people based on his clothing, but he still belongs within the context of the scene and does not feel out of place. Instead of representing the all-American middle and upper class, the older man represents a lower class that still fits into the painting of an idealized American scene. Finally the woman on the far left wears a yellow and blue plaid dress with matching blue shoes and a dark handbag. Her brown hair matches in style to the woman on the right, typical for the time period. Her knee length dress fits with the fashion of the time with a seemingly cinched waist due to the draping of the fabric and the high neckline conform to American style in the era. Each person within the scene dresses
The 1960’s changed the world in an explosion of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, for the first time women and men where declaring freedom and free love. The sexual revolution of the 1960’s saw changes in the way the world saw its self, and the way we saw each other. It changed what we wanted to buy, how we bought it and how we sold it to each other. Artistic free thinkers began to push boundaries everywhere they could. This is reflected in the music of the times, the notable events and the fashion.
After reviewing Jacob Lawrence’s direct and dramatic paintings, it was clear that his painting helped him express himself. The painting was and still is a product of the economic and cultural self-determination that African-American dealt in the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s, during the migration and still evident in society today. The visual qualities in Jacob Lawrence artwork that is appealing are the vibrant colors and his clever way of self-expressing the time he was so familiar. In final analysis, his artwork expressed how he felt about his environment and what his perspective were during that time. And, how restrained his painting were, for instance, Street Scene – Restaurant, even though African- Americans had access to restaurants in the neighboring area but, he still place patriot outside the restaurant waiti...
The dining room in the scene is decorated with the wallpaper screen, wooden floor, fireplace, Carcel lamp and sculpture. There is also a doll falls in the lower right corner. The doll that falls on the lower right corner may demonstrate the love of the parents to the baby; the buying of toys is equivalent to the showing of love, a sentimental element in a household. Moreover, the father wears a business-suit that is engraved with a gold chain and also wears a gold ring with red diamonds on his right pinky. The mothers wears a silk yellow-white hoop dress with pearl earrings. The foot of the mother is placed on a well-decorated red foot stool. These accesories suggest the wealth and affluence of the
Art is something that can be viewed and interpreted by a million different people in a million unique ways. Symbolism, color, texture, and size can all change the way it is viewed by others. However, certain distinct qualities have to be met for it to be actually considered “art.” The piece, American Icons, by Robin Murray, is a piece of art for many reasons, it has symbolism found throughout it, and many intriguing techniques are used with it.
When one arrives in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, he or she may be surprised, as I was, by its grand entrance. Upon entering this large pillared building, one is almost overwhelmed by the immense collection. Although very extensive, the museum undoubtedly concentrates on the grouping and placement of paintings and sculptures within the building. Through chronological and thematic paths, the museum takes the viewer through the major contributors to the advancement of art, from around the world. Separated by only a marble floor, the room containing Salomon Van Ruisdael’s Landscape with Cattle and an Inn, differs greatly from that of Claude Monet’s, Railroad Bridge at Argenteuil. These two paintings, when surrounded by the art of their contemporaries, create an environment for the viewer that parallels their original context.
Bringing together 16 sculptures made between 1958 and 1995, the exhibition allowed viewers to trace Sugarman's career from his carved-wood works of the late 1950s to his polychrome, laminated-wood pieces of the 1960s to the painted-aluminum work that has occupied him since the early 1970s. While the show did not cover Sugarman's extensive activity in the public-art realm--over the last 30 years he has created large-scale public sculptures throughout the U.S. as well as in Europe and Asia--it was an effective presentation of his "indoor" work. (Sugarman has drawn a useful distinction between what he calls the "indoor eye," a museum- and gallery-oriented esthetic vision which perceives the work of art in isolation from its surroundings, and the "outdoor eye,"
The late 1900s were a time of tremendous cultural change and instability in American history, but this change did not begin until after the relative unison of the late forties and fifties. After World War II (1939-1945) ended, a desire for normality led to large scale compliance to social constructs, with people reentering existing expectations such as men working, women tending the homes, and minorities functioning only as second class citizens. Because of these social barriers' reestablishment, conformity was simply the norm.
Art is such an eternal concept and part of our lives. It lives on through generations, transcending many periods, and can speak through many mediums. Art is a way of expression, when nothing else can capture, but is something that can be interpreted in many ways. I chose photography—that which best portrays mankind, in that it hides nothing and only shows what is there to begin with. “It is the language most readily understandable to all and our most important form of communication among nations and cultures.”(Schuneman; Koner 59-60) Two excellent representations of this is a street photographic piece by Garry Winogrand called American Legion Convention- Dallas, Texas 1964 and a piece by George Krause called Skip, Philadelphia 1962.
Many elements place emphasis on the smaller construction, such as the saturation and variety of the onion domes, which greatly juxtapose the uniformity and monotony of the larger constructions. Furthermore, the typical, Asian building is not to scale; in reality, it is not as small in comparison to the symmetrical buildings that dominate it within the painting. This proportional inaccuracy emphasizes the overwhelming and conquering atmosphere that the grand, modern buildings emit. Through contemplation of the title, the symbolism displayed in the painting is more apprehensible. “Orientalism: the representation of Asia… in a stereotyped way that is regarded as embodying a colonist attitude.” With this in mind, the painting now seems to represent the dominating presence that the western civilization radiates. The Asian architecture is the “stereotyped” symbol that represents the collective culture, while the imposing buildings symbolize the western and modern
It depicts a dark and grimy tightly crowded railroad car full of anonymous working class men and women. Shabbily dressed, the passengers are slumped slightly over seemingly submissive to their situation in life and the severity of the period’s economic reality. This oil painting is formally made up of dark sketchy outlines and textured surfaces. The profound contrast between lights and darks create clear edges in opposition to the looser brushwork elsewhere. This in a way helps to convey the hardship of the subjects’ daily life. The fact that this scene is set in a railroad car also exemplifies the use of new industrial subject matter of the nineteenth century
People were filled with desperation and conflict, especially post World War One. These painters worked on their paintings to depict the disturbed tie s people were experiencing in terms of the horrors of massive human death, absence of joy and the death of human freedom. They regarded their paintings as a reflection of the depth of the human soul, in terms of the cynicism, alienation and dissolutionment that so existed in people’s consciences, but unspoken of. They both use realism, space and the human body as the theatre of expression of human emotions (John 2).
I say this because they are all dressed up nicely. The women are in long, elegant looking dresses, and the man is in a suit and a top hat. This would seem irrelevant if I didn’t think about why it is odd that these upper class people are in such a dark area with so many negative feelings. What I noticed while studying this piece of art is that they show no happy emotions, which is what I have said all along. But, it becomes even more obvious when I noticed how fancy the figures are. This sets this painting aside from many others, because normally, rich people are portrayed positively rather than so sad and lonely, it is almost emotionless.
Langa's own level of inclusiveness in this chapter offers an important account of what has been popularly known as social realist art in America at a time when the country found itself looking for answers to its economic and social crisis. By carefully linking art to its social and political context, she successfully enriches her narrative and our understanding of the works of art discussed in the chapter.
The period leading up to the 1950s was considered as the Era of Conformity. At this time the majority of Americans were living in suburban areas called Levittowns, felt threatened by Communism, they were driven with conspicuous soncumption. Men would go to work all dressing up in a grey or blue flannel suit while women were domesticated for they stayed home to cook, clean, and tend the children. For Americans at that time eating a family dinner and watching TV every night was considered a conservative tradition. However this all soon changed during post World War Two. Tired of the boring, traditional day-to-day life style that they lived at the time, most Americans felt “beaten” down in a sense. Starting in 1984, the period after the second World War should be, as stated by Jack Kerouac and John Clellon Holmes, known as the Beat Generation. Those who were a part of the Beat Generation did not believe in straight jobs and they lived in dirty apartments selling drugs and committing crimes. Some of the Beat Generation beliefs include the rejection of mainstream American values, exploring alternate forms of sexuality such as homosexuality as well as experimenting with drugs like cocaine and LSD. The Beat Generation was meant to echo the Lost Generation in the 1920s but it made a larger impact than its historical counterpart. This generation was created because people were tired of doing the same exact thing every day, it got repetitive. These “rebels”, as some would call them, wanted to step of the normal day-to-day life that was expected of from every American. They wanted to created their own ways of living, exploring into lifestyles that were most time looked down upon, revolutionists if you would, changing the beliefs and life st...
I feel very strongly that there is an indifference to painting in today’s society. In today’s technology age, a high value is not placed on aesthetics such as painting. American society is drawn more to television programs and sporting events than to operas and art galleries.