2/7/2013 0 Comments Long-Lost LoveIt's been nearly a year since I last posted something on this page. I glance at the title I had made up when I first created my MC website, and MAN do I have an artistic appetite right now! This sudden spike in my urge to consume something, anything art-related has to do with my past few weeks of doing nothing but studying accounting (I am taking other classes of course, including an art discussion class, but that art class is only two days/week as the accounting class requires much effort and time.) Although I have enjoyed learning what has been labeled as "the language of business," it's surely not the same as all the art history classes I had taken these past few years. So, I am taking the opportunity here on this "Artistic Appetite" page to write about my long-lost love, Art. I guess I can say that it's been a good thing that I my love's been taken away from me this quarter at UW, because without that I wouldn't have realized how much I love my art history major. Now I know for sure that art history is what I want my future career to center itself around. :) Anyway, this is a painting I have thought about from time to time these past few weeks: This is The Old Guitarist by the one and only Pablo Picasso, from 1903. A somber-toned piece from his Blue Period (which began after his friend's suicide), it is overtaken by a monochromatic blue that even penetrates the elderly man who we see here in an arching, enclosed pose. There is curvature in front of you, beginning with the contours of the man and continuing into the shape of the guitar. During this time, Picasso had just moved to Paris and was living in great poverty, so during this Blue Period he painted people he had identified with, such as prostitutes, beggars, and society outcasts.
Out of all these descriptions, I mostly love this painting because of how revolutionary it was at the time. Picasso was on the verge of Expressionism, one of many movements that counteracted the ancient tradition that demanded naturalism, reliance on shading to create volume, and allegorical images. But, Picasso and like-minded artists (Manet, Monet, Cezanne, etc.) pushed the boundaries of painting to make the viewer actively recognize the function of line versus color, in addition to the flatness and materiality of the canvas--notice how here in The Old Guitarist, the man looks completely flat and nearly pressed into the canvas. In other words, these Vanguard painters urged the viewer to concentrate and think deeply about the formal aspects of painting, the individual part that come together to become what people label "a painting." Instead of creating a new world that one is supposed to dive completely into, the viewer is meant to take in what's in front of him/her and realize how the painting relates to his/her own world. ...You can probably tell by now how much I have missed writing art history papers!
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7/16/2011 0 Comments Archaic, Classical, HellenisticEarlier today, while in the midst of one of my worrisome moments of trying to figure out exactly what type of art I want to specialize in for my Art History major, I began to search for answers by exploring my very first art history textbook I bought when I started college two years ago...And I explored the many and ever-evolving images of Greek statues.
And then I thought of a question that I am curious of your answer to...Which period of Greek sculpture do you admire most? First, there was the Archaic Period, where the Greeks implemented Ancient Near Eastern artistic traditions of rigidity and complete frontality, where interaction with the universe about the statues was kept at its minimal. Then there was the Classical Period which was filled with more lively sculptures, as I personally believe that these sculptures have been more publicized in society. It was the time when Greek sculptors and philosophers began to embrace and emphasize the ideas of movement and realism, as they used their tools to ignite them within the carved bodies. And as these great thinkers began to depart from the constraints of stillness held in the previous sculptures, revolutionary concepts like the contrapposto stance (according to dictionary.com, = a representation of the human body in which the forms are organized on a varying or curving axis to provide an asymmetrical balance to the figure...In other words, it's a principle of weight shift in the visual arts) began to shape and set themselves in stone. And finally, there was the Hellenistic Period of Greek sculpture, where not only the emotion and technique within the carved bodies heightened, but also the range of subjects that were carved. Instead of only creating models of philosophers and athletes that exhibited the ideal human body, many other types of people were portrayed such as lower-class citizens. And with the more accentuated lines and curves of the carving technique paired with the intensified emotions, the faces and gestures of the figures began to be presented much more dramatically and provokingly. With these sculptures that had evolved greatly from the motionless, emotionless pieces of work of the Archaic Period that had changed to the more realistically and smoothly rendered human bodies of the Classical Period, one can say that the ever-stretching minds of the Greek sculptors and thinkers had not stopped at pushing themselves through the barriers of societal expectations and ideas, even the expectations of people living today like us. I guess just by comparing the sizes of the last three paragraphs, you can easily figure out which period of Greek sculpture I prefer...And you are right, I do prefer to mostly admire the Hellenistic Period! But this is not to say that I don't appreciate the other two periods--I definitely love the way that sculpted figures of the Classical Period look as if they're about to come alive, as I admire the way the Archaic sculptures symbolize an unbreakable connection between the Greek civilization and the Near Eastern civilization that didn't allow any boundaries to counter it. As you ponder the differences between these three periods of Greek sculpture, which one of them seems to cause the greatest reaction from within you? Please share what you think; and even if you can't decide between them, feel free to share any ideas you may have on what you think of Greek sculpture in general. :) ~~MC What do you think an art museum should look like?
Perhaps it was my longing to become a museum curator that made me come up with this question, but it's also that I've been drawn lately by a curiosity to know what people think of art museums. There's the Getty Museum, Le Louvre, and the EMP (Experience Music Project, in Seattle Center) for instance. They exhibit various forms of art whose expressions last through time, but each museum does so in a distinct way. With the Getty's highly sophisticated look of a modern architectural style where the smoothly-rendered walls stretch far into the sky, one's eyes will linger over the paintings and sculptures with a strong sense of aesthetic appreciation. There is such a rich, dense history within each piece, and not just by the dates printed on the captions, but also by what is purely tangible, the little details that are at times easily overlooked--the delicate edges of the stone sculptures, so precious because they appear about to fragment mercilessly at any moment; the sweeping contours of brushstrokes projecting slightly out of the canvas, strokes left by a painter who had wished to leave us with this secret masterful technique that created his painting into what it's been all these years... Each tiny detail contributes to the grand statement of how infinitely valuable and worthy of preservation the museum's wisely aging pieces are. However, looking at Le Louvre, it has an even deeper and more recognizable history than the Getty. With its overwhelming size and decorative intricacy dictated by the traditional French palace architecture since the Renaissance, the entire building must be called a masterpiece all on its own. The pieces themselves have not only come from the Western world (Greek and Roman antiquities, furniture and objets d'art, etc.) that is so popular in art museums and the public eye, but also from the depths, rolling hills and seas of places that deserve just as much attention--Ancient Mesopotamian and Egyptian antiquities, as well as Islamic Art. What distinguishes the museum even more from the Getty is the fact that it houses the pieces that have over the years stood as uniquely ground-breaking definitions of memorable works of art, such as da Vinci's Mona Lisa and the beautiful and sensuous Venus de Milo statue. That said, it is undeniable that without the valuable piece of history Le Louvre stands for, the word "art" wouldn't have as much of the color of life and diversity that it's wrapped itself around through all the years. With the EMP, it is honestly difficult to compare it to the Getty and Le Louvre, because of the extreme shift to the type of art this museum exhibits. It does not show the highest successes by Michelangelo or the highlights of Picasso, but it instead declares the sure achievements of musical legends like Jimi Hendrix. When you walk into the museum, you will be instantly surrounded by a modern aura radiating through the towering and curving walls and the vivid, glowing colors, as well as technologically advanced ways to allow moving music to catch your attention (for example, having a giant projection screen in one room that shows videos with music blended with scenes of cityscapes). You will be led by stairs, ramps, and turning paths to various exhibits, one of which tells the history of guitar amplification through displaying a 1770s Italian guitar, and going all the way to guitars that were played as the main vehicles of rock 'n' roll. All these artifacts that you will encounter are precious remnants of the evolution and bottomless pool of music, where styles have mixed and blended into each other, while other colors of sound have spun and molded into what have become true definitions of music shared by the entire world. This is what I admire most by the EMP, which is why I decided in my mind to almost put the museum in a compartment of its own, separate from the visual world preserved by the Getty and Le Louvre. This is not to say that I don't admire the visual arts, because I definitely do! There is nothing better than to stand in front of a painting with wonder and awe, watch how the evident brushstrokes curve and overlap each other to blend the colors with ageless versatility, and try to answer the inevitable question of how this piece of work survived the hardships of time and now looks just as much of a masterpiece as it did in the beginning. And despite this drastic differences in art form between the three art museums, it is safe to say that all three state the same theme: that the big names like Picasso and Nirvana had used their unique visions and motivations to redefine the world around them, and in turn to redefine the art form they had immersed themselves in--and these museums are willing to take every little bit of their architecture, organization of the art, lighting, and all the other features, and turn it into the reenactment of the change that those names had created at the time. So if I were to answer the question, What do you think an art museum should look like?, I would say it can look like anything, because Nirvana's biggest hits were not meant for the same part of the outside world as Michelangelo's David statue. No two pieces of art (or genres of art) can interact with the outside world in one way; since an art museum is to mirror whatever painting/sculpture/guitar it wishes to exhibit, its final look would as a result be different with Nirvana versus Michelangelo. What do you think? How would you answer the question? Please let me know, because my curiosity is practically boiling over! :) I'm all (pig) ears... ~~MC 1/18/2011 0 Comments A Chill in the Spine...Earlier today, as I was reading my art history textbook (Primitive Art in Civilized Places, by Sally Price), I arrived upon a chapter that brought up the big question, an intense, almost life-risking dilemma that people of all sorts (curators, artists, critics, etc.) have tried to answer for the longest time...
And the inevitable question is: When a curious, open-minded (hopefully) audience wanders about an art museum and looks upon a range of objects laid out before them, should they evaluate these pieces of work based on their knowledge of the social, religious, and cultural components associated with that object? or, shall the viewer rely solely on their innate, sixth-sense-esque aesthetic eye? Some art historians believe strictly in one side, others in the other, while a number of historians believe that we can claim a middle ground, where a balance takes place between the lively, freedom-filled aspect, and the logical, very informative side. I found this "dilemma" to be very interesting, not only because it relates to art museums, and also to the relationship between the art piece and the viewer...Even more, it's interesting because it brings up the subject of human behavior into the art-themed picture. Before reading this chapter of the book, I never really considered that the two could be intertwined in the same sentences. It's fascinating because how we see art depends almost entirely on how we decide to look at it. It all depends on perception...Or, I guess your perception of an artwork can't always be decided, because there will be times where, for example, a painting will remind you so much of Monet's paintings that you cannot help but tie in that association in with your interpretation of the piece. But generally speaking, a human's mindset--his/her choice of whether or to be logical or aesthetic/visual--almost dictates how the Western world sees a piece of art. (And I say "Western world," and not the entire "world," because according to another chapter of this book, Westerners have claimed that "Primitive peoples" don't evaluate art in the contextualizing sense nor in the aesthetic sense--instead, they evaluate it on its level of usefulness). This kind of power we have over the impressions of canvases, sculptures, masks, and all other kinds of art has given me almost a chill in the spine! Even if you've never read an art history textbook or have studied art in general, I'm sure you've at least thought somewhat of this subject at times that you've walked into an art museum/exhibit, right? :) Enjoy your night!! ~~MC |
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