Essay on Art Criticism and Art History Words | 11 Pages. Art criticism and Art History Case Study: The use of assemblage and the found object in historical and contemporary art practice. The origins of the practice of assemblage can be traced back to its early twentieth century roots based on ideas presented by Dadaists The History of Art Essay Words17 Pages The History of Art Art was the first written language and to study the history of art is to study the history of civilizations and humankind Jun 14, · While Artforum, in its early history, had established a reputation as a generator for formalist theory, ARTnews had followed a decidedly more Rosenberg-ian course, emphasizing art as a practice for investigating the world. The January issue of the magazine was dedicated to “Women’s Liberation, Woman Artists, and Art History” and included an iconoclastic essay by Linda Nochlin titled “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?”Estimated Reading Time: 8 mins
Art History – The Writing Center • University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
This handout discusses a few common assignments found in art history courses. To help you better understand those assignments, this handout highlights key strategies for approaching and analyzing visual materials.
Evaluating and writing about visual material uses many of the same analytical skills that you have learned from other fields, such as history or literature, art history essays. In art history, however, you will be asked to gather your evidence from close art history essays of objects or images. Beyond painting, photography, and sculpture, you may be asked to write about posters, illustrations, coins, and other materials. Art history essays though art historians study a wide range of materials, there are a few prevalent assignments that show up throughout the field.
Some of these assignments and the writing strategies used to tackle them are also used in other disciplines, art history essays. In fact, you may use some of the approaches below to write about visual sources in classics, anthropology, and religious studies, to name a few examples.
This handout describes three basic assignment types and explains how you might approach writing for your art history class. Start by reading the prompt carefully, art history essays, and see our handout on understanding assignments for some tips and tricks, art history essays.
Visual analysis essays often consist of two components. First, they include a thorough description of the selected object or image based on your observations, art history essays. Second, they include an interpretation or argument that is built on and defended by this visual evidence. Formal analysis is one of the primary ways to develop your observations. Formal elements include everything from the overall composition to the use of line, color, art history essays, and shape.
This process often involves careful observations and critical questions about what you see. To assist you in this process, the chart below categorizes some of the most common formal elements.
It also provides a few questions to get you thinking. What do you notice when you see this image? First, you might observe that this is a painting. Next, you might ask yourself some of the following questions: what kind of paint was used, and what was it painted on? How has the artist applied art history essays paint? What art history essays the scene depict, and what kinds of figures an art-historical term that generally refers to humans or animals are present?
What makes these animals similar or different? How are they arranged? What colors are used in this painting? Are there any colors that pop out or contrast with the others? What might the artist have been trying to accomplish by adding certain details? What other questions come to mind while examining this work? Art history essays kinds of topics come up in class when you discuss paintings like this one? Consider using your class experiences as a model for your own description!
This process can be lengthy, so expect to spend some time observing the artwork and brainstorming. The image below shows how a sketch can reveal important details about the composition and shapes. Once you have your descriptive information ready, you can begin to think critically about what the information in your notes might imply.
What are the effects of the formal elements? How do these elements influence your interpretation of the object? Your interpretation does not need to be earth-shatteringly innovative, but it should put forward an argument with which someone else could reasonably disagree.
For more help in crafting a strong argument, see our Thesis Statements art history essays. Your thesis statement should be defended by directly referencing the formal elements of the artwork.
Try writing with enough specificity that someone who has not seen the work could imagine what it looks like. Your body paragraphs should explain how the elements work together to create an overall effect. Avoid listing the elements. Instead, art history essays, explain how they support your analysis. This example paragraph follows the 5-step process outlined in our handout on paragraphs.
The paragraph begins by stating the main idea, in this case that the artist creates a tranquil scene through the use of light and shadow. The following two sentences provide evidence for that idea. Because art art history essays value sophisticated descriptions, these sentences include evocative verbs e. The last sentence ties these observations together to make a larger point about the relationship between formal elements and subject matter.
There are usually different arguments that you could make by looking at the same image. You might even find a way to combine these statements!
Once you art history essays an argument, consider the significance of these statements. Why does it matter if this painting hints at the tranquility of farm life? Why might the artist have tried to achieve this effect? Briefly discussing why these arguments matter in your thesis can help readers understand the overall significance of your claims.
This step may even lead you to delve deeper into recurring themes or topics from class. Avoid generalizing about art as a whole, and be cautious about making claims that sound like universal truths. Would all people, everywhere, art history essays, from the beginning of human history to the present agree? How do you know? Double-check your prompt.
Do you need secondary sources to write your paper? Most visual analysis essays in art history will not require secondary sources to write art history essays paper. Rely instead on your close observation of the image or object to inform your analysis and use your knowledge from class to support your argument. Are you being asked to use the same methods to analyze objects as you would for paintings?
Be sure to follow the approaches discussed in class. Typically, a visual analysis essay may ask you to consider how form relates to the social, economic, or political context in which these visual materials were made or exhibited, whereas a formal analysis essay may ask you to make an argument solely about form itself.
Comparison essays often require you to follow the same general process outlined in the preceding sections. The primary difference, of course, is that they ask you to deal with more than one visual source. These assignments usually focus on how the formal elements of two artworks compare and contrast with each other.
Resist the urge to turn the essay into a list of similarities and differences. Comparison essays differ in another important way. Because they typically ask you to connect the visual materials in some way or to explain the significance of the comparison itself, they may require that you comment on the context in which the art was created or displayed. Both works are illustrated below. You can begin this kind of essay with the same process of observations and note-taking outlined above for formal analysis essays.
Consider using the art history essays questions and categories to get yourself started. As our handout on comparing and contrasting suggests, you can organize these thoughts into a Venn diagram or a chart to help keep the answers to these questions distinct. As you determine points of comparison, think about the themes that you have discussed in class.
You might consider whether the artworks display similar topics or themes. If both artworks include the same subject matter, for example, how does that similarity contribute to the significance of the comparison? How do these artworks relate to the periods or cultures in which they were produced, and what do those relationships suggest about the comparison?
The answers to these questions can typically be informed by your knowledge from class lectures. How have your instructors framed the introduction of individual works in class? What aspects of society or culture have they emphasized to explain why specific formal elements were included or excluded? Once art history essays answer art history essays questions, you might notice that some observations are more important than others.
When drafting your thesis, go beyond simply stating your topic, art history essays. To say more, art history essays, based on the notes in the chart above, you might write the following thesis statement:, art history essays. Now you have a place to start. Next, you can say more about your analysis. You might want to return to your class notes at this point.
Why did your instructor have you analyze these two works in particular? How does the comparison relate to what you have already discussed in class? Remember, comparison essays will typically ask you to think beyond formal analysis. While the comparison of a similar subject matter pig-like animals may influence your initial argument, you may find that other points of comparison e, art history essays. If your class has discussed how artists use animals to comment on their social context, for example, you might explore the symbolic importance of these pig-like animals in nineteenth-century British culture and in first-millenium Vicús culture.
What political, social, or religious meanings could these objects have generated? If you find yourself needing to do outside research, look over the final section on research papers below! The rest of your comparison essay should address the points raised in your thesis in an organized manner. Many titles are assigned by curators and collectors, in some cases years art history essays the object was produced. While the ceramic vessel is titled Bottle in the Form of a Pigthe date and location suggest it may depict a peccary, a pig-like species indigenous to Peru.
As you gather information about your objects, think critically about things like titles and dates.
AP Art History - Visual and Contextual Analysis Essay (Long Form)
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Jul 26, · Art History & the 21st. Words: Length: 9 Pages Document Type: Essay Paper #: Read Full Paper. His paintings were and are provocative because, instead of using personal confessions (like Dali), he uses irony and wit and intelligence to make his point hear The History of Art Essay Words17 Pages The History of Art Art was the first written language and to study the history of art is to study the history of civilizations and humankind The Met’s Timeline of Art History pairs essays and works of art with chronologies and tells the story of art and global culture through the collection
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