These views were formed in retaliation the the Enlightenment Era and defined the characteristics of Romanticism. Romantic artists and writers sought to portray nature differently than the reason-thinkers of the Enlightenment. Romantics were drawn to the mysterious and rebelliousness of nature. In John Constable’s Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows (Document B) he portrays the appeal of Romantic art. He depicts a medieval church and the power of nature and allows them to work together; to coincide.
Intro: • I will evaluate that Barthes claim ‘the author is dead’ is correct, and in doing so will discuss the role of intention in responding to, and interpreting, works of art Define intention: • Intentionalism subscribes to the idea that an author creating an artwork has an intended message and intention to create a work of art. The value of this intention, and consequently the value of the author, can be evaluated through considering the intentions’ ability to construct/influence meaning for the responder when examining the artwork. Evaluation that Barthes claim ‘the author is dead’ is correct: • Intention has no role in helping us respond/interpret meaning of art. This is because intention certainly doesn’t reflect the meaning individual responders gain when responding to, and interpreting artworks. Therefore, the artist can be considered irrelevant to the meaning of the art, and the artwork itself.
(Collier's Encyclopedia, 745) Some major trends of the art in the 1920's were Impressionism, Art Deco, Cubism, Abstract Art, and Realism. Impressionism is the movement in painting and music. The impressionist movement is often considered to mark the beginning of the modern period in art. The primary object is to achieve a spontaneous, undetailed rendering of the world through careful representation of the effect of natural light on objects. ("Impressionism", Encarta) Art Deco, was used primarily in furniture, jewelry, textiles, and interior decoration.
In order for this style to be clarified artists used short brush strokes, dotting and smearing techniques. This was achieved in the paintings I’ve chosen, making them each historically significant. The post-impressionism transitions these styles by adding more emotion to the naturalism. It’s a movement in broad terms that covers many artists and styles. The post-impressionist paintings I’ve selected were closer to the impressionist style and created by founding artists of this new movement.
Instead, they placed more emphasis on the “structure, content, and formal order” ("Impressionism & post-impressionism,"). They liked to use unnatural colors and use geometric shapes, unlike the Impressionist’s use of soft lines and natural colors. Also, instead of painting outdoors to capture the moment, Post-Impressionist painted in a studio, and their paintings were based on the emotion and concept of the artist (Emelda, 2011). Like the Impressionists, however, they believed the originality of the painting was important. Like many artists of the 1880’s, the Post-Impressionist wanted to portray “emotion and intellect as well as the visual imagery” ("Post impressionist,").
Modern viewers of today can see this painting in a different way compared to artists like Van Gogh. Compared to today’s enviroment, the town in this painting appears to be old fashioned from a much older era. The buildings, people and enviroment seen to be not very detailed and rather simple. This particular style would either leave a blank or bored expression on their face or allow them to imagine their own emotions and feelings throught the painting. There are no expression, let alone faces, to go along with the people throughout the painting, so it allows the viewers to make up how the characters in the painting feel.
Thematic Essay: Romanticism and Realism From the mid-18th to the late 19th century, dynamic transformations in European art mirrored turbulent political and social changes, including revolutions, imperial conquests, and the emergence of the modern industrial age. The expressive, emotional aesthetics of Romantic art echoed a form of artistic rebellion against the orderly Enlightenment era to assert individuality of the artist and reject the stoic subject matter seen in the style of Neoclassicism. Romantic artists were primarily focused on exotic and tumultuous themes, often executed with loose and colorfully bold brushwork. Later in the century, proponents of the Realist movement turned to sober depictions of working people as the Industrial Revolution swept through Europe. Some Realists turned to nature, using landscape to convey a sense of direct experience of a specific place and time.
Perhaps what distinguishes Shelley’s “Mont Blanc” is not so much how amazingly his imagination recreates the magnificent and picturesque landscape of Mont Blanc and translates it into poetic language, but the fact that the “awful scene” doesn’t arouse the poet’s masculine instinct of worshiping magnitude, but touches his sensitive nerve and stimulates his speculation on the subtle relationship between the “universe of things” and “human mind.” The speculation, though, does not go as far as to settle on a clarification of his belief. Rather, I skeptically take the poet’s speculation to be his hesitation to assert his preoccupation with the Doctrine of Necessity, and meanwhile, to embrace the power of imagination. The hesitation is manifested near the end of the poem. It might be unjustifiable, though, to treat the last two lines as the finale, since they appear to be a paradoxical continuation of the poet’s speculation, with the potential of acceptance, rejection, or fusion. “The secret strength of things” “inhabits” the external world, and determines the complicated and “ceaseless motion” according to “a law,” or its principle, and ultimately “governs thought,” in other words, determines human’s perception of the external world that they occupy.
Although it is undeniably true that artists from two different periods were influenced by historical context and prevailing themes, they expressed their thoughts mainly based on their personal background and experiences. Some of the viewers criticized the specific artworks from their own perspectives while others were highly inspired by the meaning of the artworks. A famous artist from the Baroque period, Rubens Peter Paul, has created a major oil paint art piece called, Massacre of the Innocent which contains the story of mythology. An excerpt that is written by James Matheson Thompson, explained that historians and viewers tend to make the judgment of the artworks’ value by their own standards. They cannot judge or criticize because they do not have specific evidence that can tell the artists’ intention towards the artworks.
Analytical Cubism is one of the two major branches of the artistic movement of Cubism and was developed between 1908 and 1912. In contrast to Synthetic cubism, Analytic cubists "analyzed" natural forms and reduced the forms into basic geometric parts on the two-dimensional picture plane. Colour was almost non-existent except for the use of a monochromatic scheme that often included grey, blue and ochre. Instead of an emphasis on colour, Analytic cubists focused on forms like the cylinder, sphere and the cone to represent the natural world. During this movement, the works produced by Picasso and Braque shared stylistic similarities.