Define the Word Critique in Regards to Fine Art

abstract/brainchild  - Abstract means the modification of a (usually) natural grade by simplification or distortion. Brainchild is the category of such modified images. (See also not-objective.)

alla prima  - (pronounced ah-la pree -ma) - Italian term, pregnant to paint on canvas or other ground directly, in full, opaque colour, without any preliminary cartoon or underpainting done offset. (Underpainting is often done to establish the larger masses of the composition, or to establish tonal values (lights and darks)).

all-over infinite  - A type of space in mod painting characterized by the distribution of forms every bit "all over" the picture surface, as opposed to the traditional composing method of having a focal point, or centre of involvement. In "all-over" space, the forms are seen as occupying the aforementioned spatial depth, unremarkably on the movie plane; also, they are seen equally possessing the aforementioned degree of importance in the painting. (In traditional painting, the focal signal (or center of interest) is meant to be the nearly pregnant part of the painting, both visually and subject-wise, for example, a portrait; whereas with "all-over" infinite, there is no 1 center of involvement visually or field of study-wise.) The Action painter, Jackson Pollock, was the outset to utilize all-over (also called infinite) space, in his famous "drip" paintings of the 1940's and '50's, and this spatial concept has influenced virtually 2-dimensional art since that time.

assemblage  - (pronounced every bit- sem -blidge) - A blazon of modernistic sculpture consisting of combining multiple objects or forms, often 'constitute' objects. (A institute object is one that the creative person comes upon and uses, as is or modified, in an artwork.) The most well known assemblages are those made by Robert Rauschenberg in the 1950'southward and '60's; for case, one assemblage consisted of a stuffed goat with an automobile tire encircling its stomach, mounted on a painted base of operations. The objects are combined for their visual (sculptural) backdrop, likewise every bit for their expressive properties.

atmospheric  - A quality of 2-dimensional images which has to do more than with space than with volume; an 'airiness,.' seen more in gimmicky than traditional images. Also refers to atmospheric perspective, which is a less technical type of perspective, using faded and lighter colors to announce far distance in landscapes.

atmospheric perspective  - Atmospheric, or aerial, perspective, is a less technical type of perspective, which consists of a gradual decrease in intensity of local colour, and less dissimilarity of lite and dark, as infinite recedes into the far distance in a mural painting or drawing. Often, this far distance volition likewise exist represented past a low-cal, cool, bluish-gray. (Encounter also perspective.)

automated (writing)  - Automated writing was a technique first used by the Dada and Surrealist artists in the early on 20th century, to tap into their hidden to write verse (Freud's ideas on the subconscious had been introduced in the early part of the 20th century). They would try to connect with their hidden to admission a 'stream of consciousness,' or more 'free' blazon of poesy. Visual artists in these movements besides tried to draw or paint "automatically," by allowing their subconscious to play a large role in the creative process. The Abstract Expressionists of the 1940's and 'fifty'southward also used this method, for example, Jackson Pollock'southward "drip" paintings.

biomorphic  - An attribute related to organic, since information technology describes images derived from biological or natural forms; it was a term frequently used in early- to mid-20th century art. The art of Joan Miro, Jean Arp and Alexander Calder contains examples of these simplified organic forms.

broken colour  - Cleaved color was outset used by Manet and the Impressionists in 19th century French painting, where color was applied in small "dabs," as opposed to the traditional method of smoothly blending colors and values (lights and darks) together. This method results in more than of a "patchwork" effect, where the dabs return the facets of light on forms, and/or the planes of the forms' volume, by ways of color and value. Broken color has continued to be used in much modern and contemporary painting.

calligraphy/calligraphic  - Calligraphy is beautiful personal handwriting, which has also been practiced in the Orient and Near East for many centuries. The term calligraphic is also practical to drawing or painting which contains brushstrokes reminiscent of calligraphy.

photographic camera obscura  - A organization of lenses and mirrors developed from the 16th to the 17th centuries, which functioned every bit a primitive camera for artists. With the photographic camera obscura, painters could project the scene in front of them onto their painting surface, as a preliminary cartoon. Vermeer, among others, is idea to accept used the camera obscura.

chiaroscuro  - (pronounced kyar-oh- scoor -oh) - Italian term for calorie-free and nighttime, referring to the modeling of course by the use of lite and shade.

collage  - (pronounced col- laj ) - French word for cutting and pasted scraps of materials, such equally paper, cardboard, chair caning, playing cards, etc., to a painting or drawing surface; sometimes too combined with painting or cartoon.

color field painting  - A mode of painting begun in the 1950's to '70'due south, characterized by small or large abstracted areas of color. Mark Rothko is one of the earliest and best known color field painters; Morris Louis, Jules Olitski and Helen Frankenthaler are other examples.

complementary colors  - Colors which are located reverse i another on the color cycle (east.g., blood-red and green, xanthous and imperial, blue and orange); colors which when mixed together volition (in colour theory) produce a neutral color (a color which is neither warm nor cool). In the case of the three main colors (red, yellow and blue), the complementary of one principal will exist the mixture of the other two primaries (complementary of red will exist a mixture of yellow and blueish, or green). When placed next to 1 another, complementary colors will make one another appear much more intense, sometimes in an "eye-popping" sense, which was utilized past Op artists of the 1960's to create optical furnishings. Also in colour theory, an object's primary color has its complementary color in its shadows (e.g., the shadows on and effectually a painted yellow apple will contain some purple).

limerick  - The process of arranging the forms of two- and three-dimensional visual fine art into a unified whole, past means of elements of design, such every bit line, shape, color, rest, contrast, infinite, using design principles such as balance, harmony, repetition, etc. for purposes of formal clarity and artistic expression.

conception/execution  - Conception is the nascency procedure of an artistic idea, from the initial artistic impulse through aesthetic refinement, problem-solving, and visualization/realization. Execution is the second one-half of the creative process: the actual conveying out of the thought, in terms of method and materials, which oftentimes involves compromises and alterations of the initial conception. Artists often come across the initial conception as the guiding forcefulness for their artful decisions, in terms of formal elements of design, and in terms of the expressive content desired. Contemporary conceptual artists identify more emphasis on the first part of the creative procedure; traditional artists are somewhat more concerned with the techniques and methods involved in producing the artwork. The painter Henri Matisse advised, in his essay On Painting , that artists should keep their initial impulse in the forepart of their minds when working on a painting, to make the best expressive and formal decisions.

conceptual  - Pertaining to the process involved in the initial stages of fine art-making (i.e., the initial conception, or idea). Too, the name of a contemporary art move which is mainly concerned with this process of conceiving of and developing the initial idea, equally opposed to the carrying-out of the idea into physical course. I think that conceptual artists also often think of the idea equally the real work of art, rather than its physical manifestation. It is possible for a conceptual art "piece" to not even be a tangible object - it may be an event or a procedure, which tin can't be seen itself, but the results of the consequence or process may exist displayed in text or photographs, for instance. Conceptual art tends to exist created across artistic categories - for example, mixing the mediums of photography, text, sound, sculpture, etc. My feeling about a lot of the conceptual piece of work I have seen is that it tends to be an experiential art, rather than the traditional 'passive' experience of viewing art on a wall or a pedestal. Perhaps because our historic period and time demand a more interactive experience; or considering art had by the late 20th century become a 'commodity,' to exist bought and sold like any other article, and artists felt a need to avoid this commodification. Ii examples come up to listen: 1) Maya Lin'south memorial to Vietnam veterans in Washington, DC. The traditional bronze statue of soldiers would not have been nearly as effective as a memorial to Vietnam veterans; as it is, it has become a powerful catharsis for Vietnam vets, and besides for the 2 state of war-era factions - the hawks and the doves - those who protested the war in the 1960'south, and those who supported the Vietnam state of war. two) In the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC, in that location is a big drove of shoes which belonged to Nazi concentration military camp victims. Though this may not be officially a conceptual artwork, information technology has the characteristics of one, and perhaps was influenced by conceptual art. A photograph on the wall of such belongings would be an acceptable representation of the horror of that time. Simply a huge pile of shoes in a room, to be walked through, to see the different types of shoes which resemble their sometime owners in personality and historic period, is to really experience the powerful emotions associated with such horror.

gimmicky art  - The term contemporary describes the most recent art, in this example equally distinguished from modern fine art, which is mostly considered to take lost its potency in the mid-1950's.

content  - Every bit opposed to subject matter, content is the "significant" of the artwork, e.g., in Moby Dick , the field of study matter is a man versus a whale; the content is a complex system of symbols, metaphors, etc. describing human'southward being and nature.

contour  - The outer edge of forms which implies iii dimensions, in contrast to an outline, which is a boundary of two-dimensional, flat form. Also, a blazon of line drawing which captures this three-dimensional outer edge, with its fullness and recession of form.

contrapposto  - (pronounced con-tra- pos -to) - Italian term, meaning to represent liberty of movement within a figure, equally in ancient Greek sculpture, the parts existence in asymmetrical human relationship to one another, commonly where the hips and legs twist in 1 management, and the chest and shoulders in another.

cool colors  - In colour theory, colors are described as either warm, cool, or neutral. A cool color mostly is one which contains a big amount of blue, as opposed to a warm color, which will incorporate more yellow. In theory, cool colors seem to recede in space, as the distant mountains or hills tend to appear low-cal bluish-gray, and the closer ones will be more dark-green or chocolate-brown (warmer). In landscape paintings, artists often paint the distant hills in this stake blue color; and it is by and large idea that cool colors will recede into infinite in any painting. All the same, color is a circuitous element, and colors oft misbehave - information technology is usually best to go on a case-by-case footing, because colors are influenced greatly by what colors they are next to, actualization "warm" in ane setting, and "cool" in another. (I recommend reading the abbreviated version of The Interaction of Color , by Josef Albers, for his ideas and exercises.)

cantankerous-hatching  - The practice of overlapping parallel sets of lines in drawing to indicate lights and darks, or shading. (Hatching is one set up of parallel lines, cross-hatching is ane or more set up going in i direction, with other overlapped ready(south) going in a unlike, often perpendicular, direction.)

diptych  - Two dissever paintings which are fastened by hinges or other means, displayed as one artwork.

directional move  - A principle of visual motion in artworks, which can be carried by line, dots, marks, shapes, patterns, color, and other compositional elements. Directional motility in paintings or sculptures directs the viewer'due south middle around or through the artwork, in a mode which the artist consciously or unconsciously determines. One important function is to go along the viewer's eye from "leaving" the work, and instead crusade the viewer to follow an inventive (interesting) path inside the piece of work, or exit in one expanse, only to exist brought back in another area.

cartoon  - Pencil, pen, ink, charcoal or other similar mediums on paper or other support, tending toward a linear quality rather than mass, and also with a tendency toward black-and-white, rather than color (i exception being pastel).

earthwork  - A type of contemporary art begun in the 1960'southward and 'seventy's, which uses the landscape, or environment, as its medium, either by using natural forms equally the actual work of fine art, or by enhancing natural forms with manmade materials. Two well-known earthwork artists are the husband and married woman team of Christo and Jeanne-Claude, and Robert Smithson. Some of these earthworks can exist very large, measured in miles. The origin of earth art may have been the surroundings-witting '60's and 'seventy's, only digging also refer back to ancient earthworks, such as the big Native American and other burial mounds. Christo' and Jeanne-Claude's work is various, usually temporary and site-specific, and ranges from "wrapping" an isle or a building (such as the onetime German Reichstag headquarters), to erecting a very high "drapery" of textile over miles of uninhabited (and inhabited) land. They piece of work with an army of workers to cock these works, and also work with the surrounding customs to become permission and establish guidelines of what they tin and cannot do, during which meetings they explicate their artistic purposes to community members, and often the residents evolve from their initial reluctance to requite permission, to condign enthusiastic supporters. It is a very interesting process to watch, and I recollect is another example of how some contemporary art tries to enlist the participation of the public in the art-making procedure, or at the very least to familiarize the public with artistic motivations. In Christo and Jeanne-Claude'due south work, I see a kind-of Quixotic whimsy - when they wrapped the former Reichstag headquarters building in Germany, it seemed to me to be a poetic expression of victory over the quondam Nazi Third Reich tyranny.

encaustic  - The process of using pigments dissolved in hot wax equally a medium for painting; mostly used long ago, but in that location are some gimmicky artists who have used encaustic, such as Jasper Johns.

engraving  - A general term used to describe traditional printing processes, such as carving, aquatint, drypoint, etc., where an image is made by the utilise of metal plates and engraving tools, and printed, usually through a printing press. The image can be incised into the plate, or drawn with fluid and and so dipped in acid to etch the uncovered areas. These processes are still used by artists, but of form have been supplanted by more modern processes for general printing purposes.

expressionistic  - A characteristic of some art, more often than not since the mid-19th century, leaning toward the expression of emotion over objective description. James Ensor, Edvard Munch and Vincent Van Gogh were perhaps the first expressionists, though at that place was not really a movement per se, just individual artists. At the stop of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries, expressionism became widely espoused, peculiarly by German and Austrian artists, such every bit Emil Nolde, Kirchner, Gustav Klimt, and others. Though there is variation, sure characteristics predominate: brilliant, even garish, color; harsh contrasts of black and white (as in woodcuts); exaggeration of form; and baloney or elongation of figures. There are nevertheless many artists whose piece of work has expressionistic tendencies; in the 1980's there was a period of art chosen Neo-Expressionist. (The word 'neo' before an fine art characterization ways that there is a reprise of work similar to the original movement.)

figurative  - A term used to describe art which is based on the figure, normally in realistic or semi-realistic terms; likewise loosely used to depict an creative person who paints or sculpts representationally, equally opposed to painting or sculpting in an abstract or non-objective manner.

effigy/ground  - The relationship of the picture surface (basis) to the images on the movie surface (effigy). The effigy is the space occupied past forms (e.1000., a person in a portrait) (too known as the 'positive' space); the ground is the "empty" or unoccupied space around the person in the portrait (too known as the 'negative' infinite) (The ground is also unremarkably called the 'background.') In fine art since the early 20th century, this sectionalization of the picture plane has been seriously challenged, to the point where at that place is not a distinction of figure/footing, but rather one continuous surface and space, with no 'positive' or 'negative' space, just ane interwoven space.

focal betoken  - In two-dimensional images, the center of interest visually and/or subject-wise; tends to be used more in traditional, representational art than in modern and contemporary art, where the pic surface tends to have more than of an overall importance, rather than one important surface area.

foreshortening  - Perspective practical to a unmarried object in an image, for a three-dimensional issue, which oft results in distortion with possible emotional overtones. Information technology is used specially with the human effigy, in Renaissance and Mannerist fine art.

formal  - A term used by artists to describe the visual elements of a work of art, such as composition, infinite, color, etc., i.e., formal elements.

found object  - Get-go used in the early on years of the 20th century (in the Dadaist move), a institute object is any object that an creative person comes upon, and uses in an artwork, or as the artwork itself. Marcel Duchamp chosen these works 'readymades.' He exhibited a urinal in the Social club of Independent Artists exhibition in New York in 1917, under the signature 'R Mutt'; Dada was the precursor to Surrealism, and was an 'anti-fine art' movement after World State of war I, which sought to avoid order and rationality in art. Dada also questioned the very meaning of fine art: what is art? who decides if an object is art? is it art because an artist places it in a museum and calls information technology fine art? etc. Afterward, Picasso made a balderdash'south head from found objects: the seat and handle confined of a bicycle.

fresco  - Wall painting in water-based paint on moist plaster, mostly from the 14th to the 16th centuries; used generally before the Renaissance produced oil pigment as a more easily handled medium.

frottage  - (pronounced fro- taj ) - French term, meaning to rub a crayon or other tool onto paper or other cloth, which is placed onto a textured surface, in order to create the texture of that surface on the paper. The Surrealist artist Max Ernst used this technique in some of his collages.

genre  - (pronounced jahn -re) - A type of painting representing scenes of everyday life for its own sake, popular from the 17th century to the 19th century.

gesso  - An undercoating medium used on the canvas or other painting surface before painting, to prime the sail; usually a white, chalky, thick liquid. In the mid-20th century, gesso became available already commercially prepared; before this time, artists often mixed their ain gesso mixture.

gesture/gestural  - The concept of gesture in drawing is twofold: it describes the action of a figure; and information technology embodies the intangible "essence" of a figure or object. The activity line of a figure is oftentimes a graphic undulating line, which follows the movement of the entire torso of the figure being drawn or painted. The term gestural is an extension of this idea to depict a type of painting which is characterized by brushstrokes with a gestural quality, that is, flowing, curved, undulating lines or forms. Gestural composition means a type of limerick based on gestural directional movements. The piece of work of Arshile Gorky, the Abstract Expressionist, is an example of gestural painting, which oftentimes connotes a spiritual or emotional content.

glaze/glazing  - A glaze is a sparse layer of translucent oil paint applied to all or part of a painting, to modify the tone or color underneath. Glazing is the procedure of using this technique.

gilt section  - A mathematical ratio outset used by the Greeks in their compages, and developed further in the Renaissance, which was said to exist in tune with divine proportion and the harmony of the universe. It has been used past artists to divide the picture surface (every bit a compositional device); among others, Seurat and Mondrian are idea to take used this ratio to create compositions.

graphic/graphic arts  - The graphic arts (drawing and engraving) are said to depend for their issue on drawing, as opposed to color. The term graphic describes drawings or prints which lean more toward drawing (line) than color (mass). I recall that this partitioning is less pertinent in modernistic and contemporary art than in traditional art or art of the past.

filigree  - A formal visual vehicle much in currency during 20th century art, the grid is a geometric construct of squares or rectangles that course the underlying or actual structure of some two-dimensional modern art. Though the meaning of the grid to artists is hard to describe in words, it is more than than just a visual armature. In a fashion, it can be said to represent the modern and postmodern opinion of the 20th century; and ofttimes seems to inspire nearly a reverence, every bit a symbol of aesthetic purity and integrity, particularly of modernism. Many artists accept used the filigree; two who come up to mind are Jasper Johns (paintings) and Louise Nevelson (sculpture).

grisaille  - (pronounced gri- zale ) - Painting entirely in monochrome (tones of 1 colour), in a series of grays. Strictly speaking, monochrome is in whatsoever one color, such as red, bluish or black; grisaille means in neutral grays only (French term). Grisaille may be used for its own sake as ornament, or may be the first stage in building up an oil painting (to plant the tonal range of the image). Grisaille was also formerly used every bit a model for an engraver to work from.

guild - During the Heart Ages, tradesmen formed guilds for economical, social and religious purposes; in that location were often several trades in one guild. Originally, painters were in the same order equally physicians and apothecaries (pharmacists), in Florence, Italia. All painters had to join the guilds, unless they were in the personal service of a ruling prince. Only a Main could ready a studio in business concern, accept pupils and utilise journeymen. To become a Principal, a painter had to submit a 'primary-piece' to the guild as proof of competence. Guild officers supervised the number of apprentices, work conditions, and also materials (they bought in majority, chose panels to work on). They had a merchandise spousal relationship mentality, which centered on uniformity of performance; this led to painters like Michelangelo and da Vinci insisting on the liberty and originality of the artist, with the status of a professional person and scholar/gentleman (an inspired beingness, rather than an honest tradesman). This new attitude toward artists led to the decline of the guilds, and the utilize of academies, which took over the didactics of art.

hatching  - A technique used in cartoon to indicate light and shade, or form, consisting of parallel lines of varying width, darkness and spacing. Cross-hatching is simply two or more than overlapping sets of these parallel sets of lines, at a perpendicular or other bending to the beginning set of lines.

hue  - Referring to the actual color of a form or object, eastward.m., a red car.

iconography  - Noesis of the meanings to be attached to pictorial representations; perhaps the visual equivalent of symbols or metaphors in literature. An creative person may exist enlightened of his/her iconography and use it consciously; probably simply equally often, the iconography is used in a semi-conscious way. An creative person volition intuitively cull images because of meanings they have for him/her, and over the form of fourth dimension a pattern can often be plant, equally a logical progression or repeating images. An artist can be said to accept a personal iconography, which is often noted and analyzed by others, including art historians, critics, writers and the public. Often, the meanings seen in an artist's work past others differs, somewhat or considerably, from what the artist has intended.

ideal art  - Art which aims to exist the true, eternal reality. In the 18th and 19th centuries, this included some Neoclassical fine art, which emulated the forms and ideas constitute in classical fine art (Greece and Rome). In modern times, this could include artists such as Piet Mondrian and Kasimir Malevich, who considered pure abstraction to be the manifestation of this pure reality. Perhaps the theoretical reverse of platonic art is realism, which tries to depict things non as some ideal, but equally they 'really' are.

impasto  - An Italian term for oil paint practical very thickly onto the sail or other back up, resulting in evident brushstrokes (visible).

installation  - A type of fine art, usually sculptural, which is often large enough to fill an entire infinite, such equally a gallery, and consists of a number and variety of components. Installation art perhaps began in the 1960'southward with Ed Kienholz and George Segal, 2 American sculptors. Ed Kienholz' work contains such elements equally cars and institutional furniture (suggesting a state hospital or prison house), with the content being death and serious societal bug. Segal'south work, in contrast, consists of lifesize plaster figures (cast from existent people and usually white), engaged in contemporary and mundane activities, such as adding letters to a movie marquee or waiting for the subway, and often correspond the poetry of the mundane. Installation art is often site-specific, meaning that information technology is created specifically for a sure site. There are many contemporary artists creating installations, such as Judy Pfaff.

linear  - Describing a quality related to the use of line in painting or sculpture; can refer to directional motion in limerick, or the actual use of the element of line in the epitome or sculpture, as assorted with the apply of mass or shape forms.

local color - The bodily color of a form or object, uninfluenced by the effects of light or reflected color. For instance, a vase may be turquoise (the local color), but appear pale blue considering of sunlight hitting it in certain places; dark blue considering of areas in shadow; and many subtle color shades in certain areas because of reflected light from surrounding surfaces.

lyrical  - A quality applied to various art forms (poesy, prose, visual art, dance and music), referring to a certain ethereal, musical, expressive, or poetic quality of artistic expression. Although difficult to define, when a visual work of art is described as having a lyrical quality, it means that it possesses a certain spiritual or emotional quality; perhaps the color relationships may be said to "sing"; or the linear quality of directional motility may be

of a sensitive and expressive nature; or the work expresses a particularly profound, passionate or tender sentiment, perchance related to romanticism or other lofty expression.

mannerism/mannered  - Mannerism was a style of art in 16th century Italia, characterized by somewhat distorted (usually human) forms and a high emotional key. Practitioners included the artist Pontormo. In modern and gimmicky fine art, the term mannered when applied to a style or piece of work of fine art is somewhat critical, implying that the style or work of fine art is washed not from the inner convictions and perceptions of the artist, but rather out of the artist's historical creative habits or preconceptions. In other words, the work appears contrived or forced, as opposed to arrived at by genuine and self-aware artistic impulses.

mass/masses  - Shapes or forms used in visual art, as assorted with lines; also masses often course the big role(s) of the compositional structure, without the boosted complication of detail.

medium  - Material or technique an artist works in; also, the (usually liquid or semi-liquid) vehicle in which pigments are carried or mixed (eastward.g., oil, egg yolk, water, refined linseed oil).

mobile  - (pronounced mo -beel) - A blazon of kinetic sculpture (that which moves), invented and first used by the creative person Alexander Calder. Trained as an engineer, Calder built many hanging mobiles with various fastened forms, which moved and inverse with air currents, etc. Many of them were very large, and hang in museum lobbies or auditoriums, from the ceiling. The forms which rotate and change their configurations are often of a biomorphic nature, similar to those used by Jean Arp and Joan Miro.

modeling  - Three-dimensional consequence created past the utilize of changes in color, the apply of lights and darks, cantankerous-hatching, etc. to depict forms in two-dimensional images. As well, the process of molding materials such as clay to create 3-dimensional forms.

mod fine art  - Generally considered to be the period from about 1905-6 to the mid-1950's, when Popular art ushered in what is referred to equally the postmodern period in fine art. Modern fine art is by and large characterized by formal experimentation and exploration, and by and large seriousness of purpose. (Dada and Surrealism may be the exceptions to this rule.)

motif  - (pronounced mo- teef ) - A French term which refers to: the field of study matter or content of a work of art (eastward.one thousand., a landscape motif); also refers to a visual chemical element used in a work of art, as in a recurring motif (i.e., Andy Warhol used the motif of soup cans in his early works; or Piet Mondrian used rectangles equally a visual motif.

naturalism  - A style of painting which uses an analysis of tone (value) and color of its subject, resulting in a realistic representation of the advent of forms or landscapes. Impressionism has naturalistic tendencies, because it analyzes tone and colour in the play of low-cal on surfaces. Naturalism can also have a sensual character (as against composition and drawing). The Impressionists were influenced past 19th century researches into the physics of color by Chevreul (a scientist) and others, which showed that an object casts a shadow which contains its complementary colour (see complementary color). This theory eventually hardened into Neo-Impressionism, where Seurat and others sought the maximum optical truth well-nigh nature and the ideal limerick and color relationships. This line of inquiry as well led eventually to Mail-Impressionism, where Paul Gauguin and Vincent Van Gogh, among others, used colour in a purely creative and anti-naturalistic manner, which was not-intellectual. (Colour used by Gauguin and Van Gogh is ofttimes deliberately independent of the local or light-influenced color of objects; and beyond that in the early 20th century, the Fauve painters used vivid color and forms fifty-fifty more distant from their perceptual origins.)

negative space  - In a painting or sculpture, the areas where there are no forms (the "empty" areas). In a painting, this means the areas which have no forms or objects (sometimes as well called the 'background' ). In sculpture, this ways the "holes" between forms or inside a form (e.g., Henry Moore sculptures). Negative space is the other side of the money of positive space, which is space actually occupied past forms in a painting or sculpture (the effigy in a portrait). The notions of positive and negative infinite were advanced during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, replacing the more traditional notion of a 'background' which was subordinate to and separate from the bailiwick prototype - portrait, withal life, etc. Since about 1950, the notions of positive and negative space have also been replaced past much contemporary art, which sees the picture show surface not as positive and negative areas, but rather one continuous surface where every area is every bit important, and at the same spatial depth. (See besides positive space.)

neutral color  - A color which in color theory is neither warm nor cool. Neutral colors are said to effect from the mixing of two complementary colors (east.g., red and green, blueish and orange, and yellow and majestic). Neutral colors tin as well be mixed by other means. Examples of neutral colors might be blackness, greyness and beige. (Meet likewise complementary colors, and warm and cool colors.)

non-objective  - A term used to describe visual art which is not based on existing, appreciable forms, but rather on abstract or idealized forms, such as geometric, mathematical, imaginary, etc. Non-objective art came into being in the early 20th century, frequently with much theoretical accompaniment. Piet Mondrian is an example of an creative person whose work is non-objective. (See also abstract.)

not-representational  - Not-representational art is fine art which is non based on external appearances; this covers several types of fine art - abstract, not-objective, and decorative; as contrasted with representational art, which is art based on "real" imagery, whether really existant or existant only in the artist'due south imagination.

one-point linear perspective  - Adult in 15th century Italia, a mathematical arrangement for indicating spatial distance in ii-dimensional images, where lines converge in a unmarried vanishing point located on the horizon line, as seen by a stationary viewer. (See also 2-bespeak linear perspective.)

organic  - A description of images which are partly or wholly derived from natural forms, such as curvilinear, irregular, indicative of growth, biologically-based, etc.

painterly  - An adjective used to draw a style of painting which is based non on linear or outline drawing, simply rather patches or areas of colour. In painterly 2-dimensional images, the edges of forms tend to merge into ane some other, or into the groundwork, rather than be separated by outlines or contours. Titian and Rembrandt are two artists with painterly approaches; Botticelli'south work is non painterly, but more linear/drawing oriented.

palette  - A thin piece of glass, wood or other material, or pad of newspaper, which is used to hold the paint to exist used in painting; also, the range of colors used past a particular painter.

pastel  - A cartoon stick fabricated of pigments ground with chalk and mixed with gum h2o; too, a drawing executed with these pastel sticks; also, a soft, subdued tint (light shade) of a color.

pentimenti  - Italian term, from the word meaning 'repent'; refers to the lines or marks which remain after an artist corrects his/her cartoon (or painting). Traditionally, this meant that these lines or marks remained unintentionally, in the quest for the perfectly drawn figure, for instance. Withal, at the cease of the 19th century (with Paul Cezanne), these marks became function of the visual expression; his figure drawings, for case, frequently bear witness several contours in the search for the "correct" one contour. With Cezanne'southward drawings, these multiple contours in fact aid in the expression of three dimensions, more than 1 contour alone would do, giving a sense of roundness and volume. In improver, these pentimenti contribute in an expressive sense. In drawings and paintings since, some artists accept taken reward of this expressive office of pentimenti, particularly in painting, and have left the marks/lines deliberately, or fifty-fifty created them on purpose. They tin add together richness to a work.

photomontage  - (pronounced photo-monday taj ) - A two-dimensional combining of photographs or parts of photographs into an prototype on paper or other material (a technique much used by the Surrealists in the 1920's, such every bit Max Ernst).

pictorial/motion-picture show surface  - The flat aeroplane of the canvas or other support, which is the two-dimensional arena of the image.

moving-picture show aeroplane  - The flat surface on which an image is painted, and that part of the image which is closest to the viewer. (In modern and contemporary art, the picture plane is synonymous with pictorial surface, significant that the entire epitome is located on the movie aeroplane, as assorted with art from the Renaissance until the mid-19th century, where the picture surface was considered as a window into which the viewer looked into the illusion of altitude.)

positive infinite  - The areas of a painting or sculpture which are occupied past forms or images, equally assorted with negative space, which are the "empty" areas where no forms/images are located. For case, in a portrait, the figure would exist the positive infinite, the "background" would be the negative space. In painting since around 1950, the differentiation betwixt positive and negative space has given style to a sense of a continuous surface/space/plane, where all the forms are located on the picture surface, rather than on different planes in space. (See besides negative space.)

postmodern  - A term used to depict the period of art which followed the modern period, i.e., from the 1950'south until recently. The term implies a shift abroad from the formal rigors of the modernists, toward the less formally and emotionally stringent Popular artists, and other art movements which followed.

printmaking  - The category of art printing processes, including etching, lithography, woodcut, and silkscreen, in which multiple images are made from the aforementioned metallic plate, heavy stone, wood or linoleum block, or silkscreen, with black-and-white or color printing inks.

proportion  - The relation of i part to the whole, or to other parts (for example, of the homo body). For instance, the homo body is approximately vii to 7-1/2 times the height of the head; the vertical halfway point of the body is the groin; the legs are halved at the knees, etc. Proportion also refers to the relative sizes of the visual elements in a composition, and their optimum relationships for proficient design.

realism  - Representational painting which, unlike platonic art, desires to depict forms and images equally they really are, without idealizing them. Gustave Courbet was one of the first realists, in opposition to the previous reigning Neoclassical fine art in France; 19th century realist artists wanted to depict life "as it is," warts and all.

representational art  - Art which is based on images which tin can be found in the objective world, or at least in the artist's imagination; i.e., images which can perhaps be named or recognized. For example, an objectively faithful depiction of a person is representational art; as well, a delineation of an alien from outer space can also be considered a representational image. (See likewise not-representational.)

rubbing  - A production of rubbing a crayon or other tool onto paper or other textile over a textured surface, in order to reproduce that texture into a two-dimensional prototype. For case, a rubbing of a gravestone, a penny, etc. (Run across also frottage.)

scumbling  - A painting technique (the opposite of glazing), consisting of putting a layer of opaque oil paint over another layer of a dissimilar color or tone, so that the lower layer is not completely obliterated, giving an uneven, broken issue.

shade  - A dark value of a colour, i.due east., a dark blue; as opposed to a tint, which is a lighter shade of a color, i.e., lite blueish. Likewise, to shade a drawing means to add the lights and darks, usually to add a iii-dimensional effect.

sfumato  - (pronounced sfu- ma -to) - Italian term meaning fume, describing a very frail gradation of light and shade in the modeling of figures; often ascribed to da Vinci'southward work (also called blending). Da Vinci wrote that 'light and shade should alloy without lines or borders, in the manner of smoke', in his Notes on Painting .

sgraffito  - (pronounced sgraf- ee -to) - Italian term pregnant scratched; in painting, ane colour is laid over another, and scratched in (with the other end of the castor, for example) so that the colour underneath shows through.

shaped canvas  - A type of painting/stretched canvas starting time begun in the 1960's, where the sail takes other forms than the traditional rectangle. Canvas is stretched over multiple three-dimensional shapes, which are combined to course a three-dimensional, irregularly shaped canvas on which to paint (often abstruse or non-objective) images.

spatial cues  - Methods of indicating 3-dimensional space in ii-dimensional images. Examples are: the modeling of forms with light and shade to indicate volume; overlapping of forms to indicate relative spatial position; decrease in the size of images as they recede in infinite; vertical position in the image (the farther abroad an object is, the college information technology is normally located in the image); the use of increased contrast of light and dark (value) in the foreground; the decreasing intensity of colors as they recede in space; the use of a perspective system, of lines converging toward the horizon line. Spatial cues are used besides in abstract or non-objective art to point relative position in relation to the motion picture plane, by means of overlapping forms, colour and size relationships, and other spatial cues, but generally without perspective and other indications of Renaissance (illusional) space.

stabile  - (pronounced stah -beel) - A type of 20th century sculpture which consists of a stationary object, normally on a base of some kind. Described in contrast to a mobile, the free-hanging sculptural invention of sculptor Alexander Calder, stabiles were besides created by Calder.

stained canvas  - A method of painting start begun in the 1960'south, consisting of the application of (liquid) paint directly to canvas by pouring or rolling, rather than with the traditional brush, and without the prerequisite layer of priming unremarkably done to stretched canvass. Helen Frankenthaler is i example of an artist who worked with stained canvas. This manner of applying paint gives a totally unlike image than one brushed on - obviously a more fluid image, with translucent fields of color - perhaps like the aurora borealis - an event impossible with traditional brushes.

stippling  - A drawing technique consisting of many small dots or flecks to construct the epitome; plainly, this technique can be very laborious, so mostly modest images are stippled. The spacing and darkness of the dots are varied, to betoken three dimensions of an object, and lite and shadow; tin be a very effective and interesting technique, which can also be used in painting.

report  - A preliminary drawing for a painting; as well, a piece of work done simply to "study" nature in general.

subject matter  - As opposed to content, the subject matter is the subject of the artwork, due east.g., all the same life. The theme of Vanitas (popular a few centuries agone) of vanity, death, universal fate, etc., used in the yet life, can exist considered the content. The however life objects used in the paradigm are the subject affair. (See also content.)

tint  - A light value of a color, i.e., a light scarlet; as opposed to a shade, which is a dark value, i.e., dark reddish.

tone  - The lightness or darkness of an area in terms of black to white; as well called value, i.e., a calorie-free or dark cerise, or lite or dark gray.

two-point linear perspective  - A more contempo version of perspective than i-point perspective; using two (or more) points instead of i on the horizon line gave artists a more naturalistic representation of infinite in two-dimensional images.

triptych  - A painting which consists of one center panel, with two paintings fastened on either side by means of hinges or other ways, every bit "wings."

underpainting  - A layer of color or tone practical to the painting surface earlier the painting itself is begun, to plant the general compositional masses, the lights and darks (values) in the limerick, or as a color to affect/mix with subsequent layers of color. Underpainting is generally a sparse, semi-opaque layer of paint.

value  - The lightness or darkness of a line, shape or area in terms of black to white; likewise called tone; east.g., a lite red will have a lite value; a night scarlet will take a night value.

volumetric  - A quality of two-dimensional images characterized by a sense of three dimensions, solidity, volume, as contrasted with atmospheric, which is characterized more by a sense of space, or airiness, than with volume. Volumetric is mostly more than characteristic of representational or traditional art, than with modern or contemporary art, which is by and large less concerned with the delineation of three dimensions in objects and space.

warm colors  - In color theory, colors which contain a large amount of yellow, as opposed to cool colors, which contain more than bluish. For case, a yellow-orange color would be warm; a greenish-bluish would exist cool. Warm colors are thought to appear to be closer to the viewer, while cool colors are thought to recede into the distance. (Run across also cool colors.)

wash  - A sparse layer of translucent (or transparent) paint or ink, specially in watercolor; also used occasionally in oil painting.

performance art  - A type of art which began in the 1960'due south (although the Dadaists had some event-oriented artworks in the early on role of the 20th century), which consists of events, or performances, presented as art. Sometimes many artists (and others) are involved; sometimes it is performed by a single artist. In the 1960's, Robert Rauschenberg and others were involved in 'happenings,' a like effort, where, for instance, someone would exist riding a bicycle around and through the functioning area, another person would be reciting a prose verse form, music might exist playing, lights and images projected onto the walls, etc. Performance art can sometimes be taken to extremes, as when, in the 1990's, an creative person shot himself as office of his performance piece.

perspective  - A semi-mathematical technique for representing spatial relationships and three-dimensional objects on a flat surface. (See also atmospheric perspective, 1-point linear perspective, and ii-point linear perspective.)

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Source: http://www.ndoylefineart.com/glossary.html