Analysis of the Wedding Dance

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Analysis of The Wedding Dance After analyzing the several means and the laws of unity and seeing how they work in various pieces of sculpture and painting, it seemed advisable to take one art work and make a more less complete analysis of it as a review of all the primary points concerned. It was no easy matter to find such a piece--one that would embody most of the principles outlined, all integrated and more or less complete; one that would illustrate masterful design, great theme, and superb technique. For our purposes Brueghel The Wedding Dance seemed to be a most suitable choice. THE CREATIVE ATTITUDE A most cursory study of The Wedding Dance will show that it is creative and not imitative. Although a realistic scene with people and objects of more or less natural appearances is depicted, the artist was creative in designing each segment and the whole. Natural contours are reshaped for purposes of greater dramatic expression, characterization, and variation. The size of the shoulders and arms of the dancer at the left is exaggerated in comparison with his legs; how the total contour is simplified and made into an interesting pattern; and how the mood of dance is dramatized by the exaggerated curve of his body and the angle of his knees. Notice these same things in the figure of the woman with whom he is dancing--the carefully felt pattern contours of shoulders, costume, and foot, the rhythmic lines in her hat and dress that add to the particular jumping motion that is her part in the dance. Other creative aspects of this painting will be brought out as its structure is studied, showing how the natural objects are reshaped, placed, and molded into the net plastic expression. TWO-DIMENSIONAL LINE The linear surface structure in The Wedding Dance is secondary, as is usual for this type of work which places emphasis on the arrangement of volumes in

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