ImpressionismA style associated mainly with French artists of the late nineteenth century, such as Degas, Seurat, Manet, Monet, Pissarro, and Renoir. Impressionism seeks to re-create the artist's, photographer's, or viewer's general impression of a scene. It is characterized by indistinct outlines and by small brush strokes of different colors, which the eye blends at a distance. Soft, pastel colors appear frequently within impressionist images including ordinary subject matter, inclusion of movement, and unusual visual angles. Natural light is emphasized, and the essence of the subject is most important, rather than its details. |
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AbstractLike abstract art, abstract photography concentrates on shape, form, color, pattern, and texture - a visual language. The viewer is often unable to see the whole object. The subject of the photo is often only a small part of the idea of the image. Viewers may only know the essence of the image subject or understand it by what is implied. Abstract photography is based on the photographer's eye and mind. The objective is to capture something in a way not generally seen. They were looking for the details, patterns, lines, form, shape, and colors that complete a subject and utilizing those key features to make an engaging image. In the 1930s, many artists fled Europe to the United States. By the early 1940s the main movements in modern art, expressionism, cubism, abstraction, surrealism, and dada were represented in New York by: Marcel Duchamp, Piet Mondrian, Jacques Lipchitz, Andre Masson, and Max Ernst were just a few of the exiled Europeans who arrived in New York. During this period Mondrian's paintings characterized by primary colors, white ground, and black grid lines clearly defined his radical but classical approach to the rectangle and abstract art in general. The best-known group of American artists became known as the Abstract Expressionists and the New York School. Mark Rothko, born in Russia, began with strongly surrealist imagery that later dissolved into his powerful color compositions of the early 1950s. The expressionistic gesture and the act of painting itself became of primary importance to Jackson Pollock and Robert Motherwell. While during the 1940s Willem de Kooning's figurative work evolved into abstraction by the end of the decade. New York City became the center, and artists worldwide gravitated towards it. |
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SurrealismA 20th-century avant-garde movement in art that sought to release the creative potential of the unconscious mind, for example, by the irrational juxtaposition of objects in an image. Surrealist artists wanted to use art to show the mind's inner workings. In fact, artists often sought psychoanalysis to dig up deep, repressed feelings to use for inspiration. Magritte and other Surrealist artists wanted to create work that made the viewer think. None of the art has a solid answer. In fact, Surrealist art has a few characteristics you may notice. Surrealist art often uses dream imagery to show the mind's inner workings. Surrealists also used symbols as a method of telling a story. Symbols are objects that stand for ideas, events, or emotions. Surrealist artists use collages. A collage is a work of art created by using images not normally associated with one another. These associations are meant to make the viewer question and think about the rules of art and popular culture. View Gallery |
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Realism |