What is Action Painting? The action painting, also known as “gestural painting,” is a style of abstract painting in which paint is spontaneously dripped, smeared, splashed, or poured directly onto the canvas. It emerged in the 1940s in the US among a group of artists belonging to Abstract Expressionism, including Willem de Kooning (1904 -1997), …
What is American Modernism? American modernism is part of a globally spread modernist artistic and cultural movement. As elsewhere, modernism in America has been developing since the end of the 19th century and culminates in the interwar period, which was crucial for repositioning America’s role in international relations. The modernist response to inherited cultural/artistic/political patterns …
What is Analytic Cubism? Analytic Cubism is the early phase of the Cubism art movement that developed around 1907 and lasted until 1912. Analytic Cubism is characterized mostly by paintings that represent a subject from multiple overlapping viewpoints within a single picture plane. The resulting artworks had a fragmented, geometric and abstracted appearance. Artists Pablo …
What is “Anastole”? “Anastole” is the Greek name for a hairstyle originally made popular by Alexander the Great during his reign in the 4th Century BC. The style can be seen in the many sculptures and paintings of Alexander the Great, including: The hairstyle involves hair flipped up away from the forehead, and Alexander also …
What is Art Nouveau? Art Nouveau is the name that was later given to what emerged at the very end of the 19th century as an international style of art, architecture and design. Similarities in terms of aesthetics, origin and short duration—ending before the First World War began in 1914—were held by groups of artists, …
The Bauhaus was a school of design, architecture, and applied arts established by German architect Walter Gropius (1883 – 1969) in Weimar, Germany in 1919. The school was operational in three different cities (Weimar, Dessau, and Berlin) until 1933 when it was shut down by the Nazi regime. It was an enormously influential school that …
What is Byzantine Art? Byzantine Art refers to the artistic production from the Byzantine Empire, which lasted from the 4th to 15th century AD. Famed for its development of Early Christian art, Byzantine icons and models continue to influence religious artworks to this day. The artistic and architectural production of the Byzantine Empire is divided …
What is Chiaroscuro? Chiaroscuro, a portmanteau of the Italian words for light and dark, refers to the strong contrast in the application – or manipulation – of light and shadow. Used to achieve drama and dimensionality, the technique was popular across different media, including painting, sculpture, and print. Although it is now considered one of …
What is Conceptual Art? The term Conceptual Art (also Conceptualism) refers to art practices where the emphasis on the concept of the work prevails over other formal or visual instances of art-making. The materials and techniques are secondary to the artwork’s idea. Andrew Wilson, Senior Curator of Modern & Contemporary British Art at Tate, clarified …
Cubism was one of the most innovative and most influential art movements of the 20th century that forever changed the way visual reality is displayed in art. It was invented by Pablo Picasso and George Braque around 1907 in France and lasted until 1920s. Notable Cubist Artworks Pablo Picasso, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, 1907, The Museum …
