Category: Art

The foremost stylistic commonality between Matua, Abelam and Baining people’s masks account for the fact that all three of them emanate the unmistakable spirit of aesthetic primitiveness. In its turn, this spirit is being reflective of the designers’ of all three masks tendency to hypertrophy their masks’ facial features. For example, Matua mask features the unnaturally long and grotesquely protruding tongue.

In its turn, the design of Abelam mask appears to be subliminal of its creator’s deep-seated anxieties as to what he or she perceived as the ‘power of eyes’ – hence, the unnaturally enlarged eyes, featured on this particular mask. Baining people’s mask, on the other hand, places emphasis on the stylistic distinctiveness of both: eyes and lips.

The actual reason why the earlier mentioned aspects of all three masks’ stylistic distinctiveness appear to reflect the creators’ rather unrefined sense of aesthetics is quite apparent. Artist’s tendency to hypertrophy a particular facial feature, at the expense of paying lesser attention to other features, signifies his or her inability to mentally conceive its artistic creation as a whole, before it assumes any physical shape.

Apparently, those who designed all three masks experienced a certain cognitive difficulty, throughout the course of a creative process, because these masks’ appearance radiates the aura of a ‘creative impulsiveness’ – the concerned artists did not have much of a ‘plan’ as to what their masks’ exterior would end up being.

They simply acted on behalf of their animalistic anxieties. The foremost characteristic of a highly refined artistic style, however, is such a style’s detachment from ‘animalistic unconsciousness’.

Nevertheless, it would be wrong to suggest that this implies all three masks’ aesthetic sameness. Moreover, there can also be few doubts that, theoretically speaking, all three masks represent a certain artistic value. The validity of this statement is being specifically illustrative in regards to Matua mask.

After all, just as it is being the case with truly valuable pieces of art, this mask appears being capable of invoking a number of strong emotions in spectators. However, given this mask’s vicious appearance, we can hypothesize that these emotions would be necessarily fear-driven.

Essentially the same can be said about Abelam mask, in regards to how it is being capable of triggering strongly defined emotional responses in onlookers. Yet, there is a difference – whereas, Matua mask’s foremost aesthetic purpose is being concerned with its ability to intimidate, Abelam mask appears to have been designed to dazzle.

This is because, even though this mask’s unnaturally enlarged eyes are still being recognized by spectators as ‘eyes’ per se, their appearance emit a strong spirit of a bizarre strangeness.

Baining people’s mask also has the power of evoking a number of different emotions, in those who gaze upon it, which can be explained by the fact that this mask features disproportionally enlarged eyes and lips. And, it is in people’s very nature to pay attention to what their unconsciousness defines as ‘unnatural’.

Yet; whereas, the majority of mentally adequate individuals find the artistic emanations of ‘unnaturalness’ as being rather aesthetically distasteful, there many intellectually primitive people for whom these emanations do appeal.

Apparently, whoever created Baining mask, had a good reason believe that his/her creation’s appearance would correlate with the workings of people’s primeval psyche, which in turn tend to ‘subjectualize’ nature, as opposed to ‘objectualizing’ it, as it is being the case with the workings of intellectually advanced individuals’ psyche.

What has been said earlier about masks, applies to the Solomon island male sculpture, the Maori island sculpture and the Rapa Nui sculpture, as well. That is, all these three sculptures feature disproportionally enlarged body-parts – specifically, heads. This, of course, has to do with the fact that the creators of these sculptures have never even heard of what the concept of linear perspective stands for.

Therefore, it does not come as a particular surprise that all three sculptures emanate the clearly defined spirit of an aesthetic primitiveness. The grotesque subtleties of this impression are being strengthened even further by the fact that, unlike what it is being the case with Western practitioners of an ‘artistic primitivism’, those who created these sculptures did try to make them as realistically looking, as possible.

The validity of this suggestion can be illustrated in regards to the protruding penis, prominently displayed as a part of the Solomon island sculpture, for example.

Evidently, ensuring that spectators would be able to properly identify this sculpture’s gender-affiliation, was an integral part of its creator’s artistic agenda. This, of course, implies that that there was not much of an ‘art’ to this agenda, in the first place – just as there is not much of an ‘art’ to the drawings of three-year-old kids.

The observation of what accounts for the qualitative nature of all three sculptures’ facial expressions, supports the legitimacy of this suggestion even more. This is because there can be few doubts as to the fact that:

• these expressions were supposed to emanate emotional intensity (all three sculptures were supposed to look utterly angry/evil),
• artists lacked the basic understanding of what accounts for ensuring sculptures’ three-dimensional life-likeness.

Therefore; whereas, these sculptures may indeed appear ‘scary’ to the people who failed to evolve beyond the Stone Age, intellectually advanced Westerners, endowed with the well-developed sense of an artistic finesse, will experience a hard time trying not to laugh, while exposed to the sight of the earlier mentioned sculptural ‘masterpieces’.

Nevertheless, even though that the aesthetic primitiveness is the most easily identifiable feature of all three sculptures, there are variations to this primitiveness in each individual case. For example, the Solomon island male sculpture does not appear being decorated with any woodcarving ornamentations, whatsoever.

The same, however, cannot be said about the Maori sculpture – it is being richly decorated with a number of such ornamentations. This, of course, significantly increases the artistic value of this particular sculpture. Apparently, its creator was endowed with the rudimentary sense of aesthetics, after all.

Unfortunately, this clearly has not been the case with the creator of Rapa Nui sculpture. After all, even a brief glance at the concerned sculpture reveals the fact that its author did not only lack the sense of bodily proportions, but that he/she clearly thought of female breasts as such that serve solely functional purposes – hence, sculpture breasts’ utterly unsightly appearance.

This again points out to the spirit of aesthetic primitiveness, emanated by this particular sculpture – just as it is being the case with all primitive savages, the creator of Rapa Nui sculpture used to think of surrounding reality’s manifestations in terms of how they relate to the notions of usefulness, on the one hand, and non-usefulness, on the other.

What it means is that Rapa Nui sculpture cannot have any aesthetic value, by definition, because being intellectually primitive individual, its creator would never be able to understand the difference between the concepts of ‘beauty’ and ‘ugliness’, in the first place.

• Title: The stillness,
• Year: 2014
• Medium: Acrylic on wood and plexiglass
• Location: Gladstone Gallery, New York
• Author: Ugo Rondinone

From the first point of view, it is difficult to connect this image with an art. Only having assured that you are looking at another masterpiece of Ugo Rondinone, an artist “best known for his circular spray paintings and video environments that convey a sense of melancholy and alienation”, you start trying to understand the inner meaning of that artwork. The artist is famous for his unusual approach for art. Being strange and sometimes even absurd, they still serve to transfer an artists idea. What is painted in the picture and what it symbolises remains the secret and it is up for the viewer to solve it.

Bibliography

“Ugo Rodione,” Artnet, 2014. Web.

• Title: Camden Park,
• Year: 2014
• Medium: Oil and enamel on linen
• Location: Private Collection, Melbourne
• Author: Stephen Bush

Stephen Bush is famous for the series of the works, characterised by an unusual approach of mixing the emotions, real and surreal in one picture, creating some sort of the “psychedelic pictures”, which are, however, very beautiful and pretty to look at. In this picture the mixture of a quite real man and a completely surreal building, makes us think about some possible future, where this construction will be quite common. Bright palette only underlines the whimsicality of the picture. Stephen Bushs artworks have their own peculiar style and they are all connected “by their surreal sensibility”. Feelings play the most important part in the understanding of this picture. You should feel the mood of the picture, not just look at it.

Bibliography

Cris McAulife, “Stephen Bush”, Chris McAuliffe, 2014, Web.

“Artists. Stephen Bush,” Sutton Gallery, 2014. Web.

In the painting by Norwegian-born and academically trained (Harris)Danish Impressionist artist Peder Severin Krøyer (Temple and Gallery) Interior of a Tavern (Kroyer), the viewer in 1886 would have seen a familiar scene from daily life, probably drawn from the village of Skagen, but perhaps worked on in Copenhagen (Mednick). It is portrayed in an intimate and naturalistic way that was in tune with the previous dozen years of Impressionism (Moffett). The subject can be seen as a record of a moment or as a reflection on the joys and sorrows of drink, hard work, aging, and small-town life.

The artist portrays several people (all male) seated in a low ceilinged room with long tables and bottles and glasses in front of them. The room is lit by the low windows at the far end of the room. Advertising posters suggest that this is a drinking establishment rather than, for example, a union hall or a private home. The simple, heavy plank tables and benches are bare and shining from much use, reflecting the sunlight onto the walls. The air has the suggestion of smoke.

The living subjects fall into three categories. A solitary man is sitting in the foreground, accompanied only by a nearly empty pinch bottle and glass. A pair of men sit at the table behind him, with glasses in front of them. A larger group of men at the rear are in lively conversation under the sunny windows, with bottles and glasses at hand. The gentleman in the foreground smokes a long distinctive pipe, as do others in the background. Some of the men wear similar caps, and all seem to be wearing their outerwear indoors. All show evidence of years of outdoor work.

The man in the front also shows a cauliflower ear and a misshapen nose. Although his face is not seen straight on, there is the suggestion that he might have features resembling Laplanders. He looks as though he has emptied the pinch bottle himself since his lipsticks out, his eyelids droop, and he stares into nowhere. He is either very tired, or very intoxicated, or both.

There is a tradition of pictures of people drinking that includes even some paintings that are contemporary with Interior of a Tavern, such as Die Wurfspieler, by Claus Meyer (Meyer). It also includes some famous earlier drawings by Honore Daumier titled Physiology of the Drinker: The Four Ages (Daumier).

There was a definite moral lesson to be drawn from Daumier’s work, suggesting that drink isolates and destroys social and family life. It can be inferred from Kroyer’s painting, but it is subtle. The man in the foreground could be interpreted as being in a pleasant state rather than a destructive one.

Kroyer may be using symbolism, but it is low-key, if so. The pipe and the bottle are two symbols of addictions, as understood in the 19^th century. The tavern is a symbol of both a center for companionable interaction, as well as a place of dissolution, and a waste of time and money. The man sitting with a bottle all to himself is, perhaps significantly, by himself and not relating to anyone else. It could symbolize the need for moderation in all things, especially alcohol.

The picture quite likely represents a real tavern that the painter knew, probably in the village of Skagen. However, it is also possible that it was not painted in the tavern – this might have been cumbersome, although painting from life was becoming more the norm as one of the features of Impressionism. It is possible that the artist sketched his subjects on-site and painted them later in his studio. The notion of portraying real people in real settings was a feature of Realism, a movement of the latter half of the 19^th century.

Impressionism often included elements of Realism despite the apparent contradiction between the two (Venturi). Capturing the natural light, both indoors and outdoors, was a characteristic practice of Impressionism, a movement that was about a dozen years old at this point. As a “cosmopolitan” participant (The Skagen Museum) in an artistic trend that spread all across Europe, Kroyer was doubtless attempting similar techniques. He had been trained in the Danish Academy (Bénédite), and by Leon Bonnat (Temple and Gallery), (Online) and thus probably had the skills to achieve whatever effect he wished. This suggests that the effect he produced was entirely deliberate.

This painting portrays working for folk sympathetically, if realistically. There is no caricature or romanticizing in the depiction of the rough-edged fishermen and farmers. They are worn by their lives and fallible in their indulgence in liquor, but they are real, and they are the sole subjects in the picture. Kroyer’s career was notable for several paintings that depicted workers, including the Sardine Yard at Concarneau, and Fishermen hauling nets, North Beach, Skagen.

Kroyer’s emphasis on the dignity of the working man may be related to a contemporaneous trend spreading across Europe and the USA, and represented by the establishment of an early labor union: the burgeoning labor movement (AFL-CIO). The worst abuses of the capitalist system were being answered by the organizing of workers. Nearly the same room seems to be portrayed in his 1882 painting: In the Store When There is no Fishing, with the implied cautionary message about the insecurities of this occupation.

The composition of the painting involves a closely observed foreground figure, two figures in the left middle ground, and a group in the right-hand rear. The verticality of the figures is offset by the horizontality of the tables and benches. The light comes from the rear and bounces off the surfaces. The floor and ceiling are darkest but the viewer can nonetheless see them. The ceiling features are low and form a decorative backdrop in addition to the posters on the wall.

Kroyer uses short brush strokes to evoke the rough surfaces of the men’s skin and textiles that they wear. The figures are delineated but the brushwork is loose enough that the painting looks most effective from a slight distance.

He uses muted colors with a lot of white to provide a sense of the idiosyncratic light in the room. The lighting is a complex combination of smoke and sun from the rear windows and where it bounces off the walls, tables, and ceiling. The implication is that the sun is intense, because the windows are not very large, and are set low in the wall. Kroyer captures multiple areas of reflected light with a competence that was noted during his era (Bénédite).

He makes sure that everything is visible but maintains the strong, diffuse light in a way that his early critics described as mysterious (Bénédite). The artist creates a sense of depth that is believable. He uses techniques from classical painting to create the interior space, including showing beams and roof details that lead the eye to believe that the room stretches out behind the figure in the foreground.

The form of the painting is effective at portraying men in a manly setting, their features and clothes all roughened by wind, weather, and work. The light of the Skagen region is also a subject and invites the viewer to look outside the bright windows. The artist depicts even the bottle of liquor as a prism for this light. Although this is not a particularly “pretty” subject, it is compelling as Kroyer handles it. As an Impressionist and a leader among the Skagen School of Danish practitioners of this approach (Harris), Kroyer exemplifies in this painting the goals of capturing vivid impressions.

Works Cited

AFL-CIO. Our History. 2013. Web.

Bénédite, Léonce. Great painters of the XIXth century and their paintings, Volumes 1-3. London: Sir I. Pitman and sons, 1910. Web. 2013.

Daumier, Honore. Physiology of the Drinker: The Four Ages. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Web. 2013.

Harris, James C. “Summer Evening on the Beach at Skagen: The Artist and His Wife.” Archives of General Psychiatry 66.6 (2009): 580. Web.

Kroyer, Peter Severin. Interior of a Tavern. Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia. Web. 2013.

Mednick, Thor J. “Danish Internationalism: Peder Severin Krøyer in Copenhagen and Paris.” Nineteenth-Century Art Worldwide 10. 1 (2011): 15431002. Web.

Meyer, Claus. Die Würfelspieler. Privately held. Web. 2013.

Moffett, Charles S. Impressionist and Post-Impressionist Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1985. Web.

Online, Brittanica. “Leon Bonnat.” 2013. Brittanica Online. Web.

Temple, Alfred George and Guildhall Art Gallery. Catalogue of the exhibition of works by Danish painters. London: Art Gallery of the Corporation of London, 1907. Web.

The SKagen Museum. KRØYER – an international perspective. Skagen : The Skagen Museum, 2012. Web.

Venturi, Lionel. “The Aesthetic Idea of Impressionism.” The Journal Of Aesthetics and Art Criticism (1941). Web.

Abstract art has definitely shaken the world, reinventing people’s perception of what reality is (Walther, 2000); and, talking about abstract art, Kandinsky and his daring experiments should be mentioned first. By far the most famous, the most frequently researched and the most often misinterpreted, his Improvisation 28 deserves a close attention.

Despite the fact that the chaos depicted in the artwork is typically attributed to the horrors of the World War I, it can be assumed that the artist’s goal was to display not the pointless bloodbath that the WWI was, but the atmosphere of complete denial and total loss of hope that swung in the air since the World War I broke out.

Even being a specimen of an abstract art, Kandinsky’s work still has all the properties of a traditional artwork. However, some of these properties have been stretched to their furthest extremes, therefore, making the painting look almost grotesque and yet managing to convey the despair that the Improvisation 28 is shot through with. For example, the line is very smooth in the composition; neither or the elements has any sharp edges or simply looks clumsy – every single line is drawn in a nonchalant yet smooth manner.

Another formal element worth a discussion is the color cast. On the one hand, the work looks unusually colorful for expressing the despair and sorrow that gripped the world after the WWI. Indeed, taking a quick look at the painting is enough to see that Kandinsky’s choice of colors is very versatile.

With yellow, green and blue being the focus of the picture, and a touch of the red color to mark the edges and add the impression of flickers of fire, or, perhaps, a dawning day, the picture might seem rather optimistic. However, the gloomy, almost grayish shades that Kandinsky uses in his painting suck all the liveliness out of the picture, therefore, making one think of the hopes that used to be so daring and yet were killed so mercilessly.

Hence the use of another formal element, i.e., light, stems. With a number of spots left empty on the white canvas, Kandinsky managed to keep the light out of the picture as hard as possible therefore, hinting at the probable post-apocalyptic results of the WWI for the entire humankind (Aronov, 2006).

As a result, Kandinsky made a very wise use of space, cluttering the elements that are supposed to symbolize the outcomes of the WWI and leaving considerable white space at the bottom of the picture. Thus, the emptiness, which the bloodbath of the WWI resulted in, was shown to the audience.

The structure of the artwork is rather peculiar. On the one hand, there is no clear symmetry in the painting; every single element has its own unique shape and role in the artwork. However, together, these elements see, weirdly harmonic. For example, the two picture planes that the right prolonged elements split the artwork in, make the painting look especially organic.

The line drawn from the upper right side of the picture into the horizon also contributes to understanding the structure of the picture better. The texture of the picture is rather standard. By using oil on canvas, Kandinsky managed to create a truly outstanding work of art.

Finally, one must say a couple of words about the composition of the painting. As it has been stressed, the work is split into three parts, i.e., the cluttered left side, a more spacious right side and the horizon, which has been painted in blazing red. It seems that the aforementioned elements represent the chaos (the left side), the devastation and emptiness that the WWI has left the humankind to (the right side), and the unclear future (the upper right corner).

As it has been stressed above, the key historical context of the Impression 28 is the concept of the World War I as one of the most, if not the most devastating and horrendous events that have ever taken place in the world history. One of the key reasons why the given artwork differs so much from the rest of the portrayals of the WWI, especially the use of smooth lines, can be explained by Kandinsky’s life experience.

As Gardner and Kleiner explain, “Born in Russia, Vassily Kandinsky (1866– 1944) moved to Munich in 1896 and soon developed a spontaneous and aggressively avant-garde expressive style” (Gardner & Kleiner, 2009, 386).

Therefore, it can be assumed that the Slavic origin, combined with the experience in Germany and, therefore, resulting in both denial of the Nazi movement and the feeling that he was still a part of it, led to Kandinsky developing a very unusual, sharp and emotionally unstable, almost to the point where it turned into a grotesque, painting style: “Artists, Kandinsky believed, must express the spirit and their innermost feelings by orchestrating color, form, line and space” (Gardner & Kleiner, 2009, 692).

Improvisation 28, thus, seems the utter manifestation of the given style, Kandinsky’s most successful attempt at portraying his denial of the Nazi policy and the fear of the post-WWI world, with its devastation and the death of all hopes for further development. In some respect, however, Kandinsky’s work can be considered the product of its time. It would be wrong to claim that Kandinsky was the only artist who used the “lineless” and “shapeless” manner of painting at the beginning of the XX century. As Selz explained,

The first decade of the twentieth century saw European art moving along a number of fronts in the general direction of an art without representational imagery – toward an art purely of colors, lines and shapes that bore no direct relationship to the appearance of the outside world. (Selz, n. d., 421).

That being said, one must admit that there is much more to the artwork than most people see in it; the chaotic elements are supposed not to express a specific event in history, even such grandeur one, as the WWI, but to embrace something even more overwhelming, like the spirit of lost hopes that had been soaring in the air since the beginning of the XX century (Knapp, 2000).

These were not the acts of violence occurring during the WWI that Vassily Kandinsky focused on, but the moods in the society that drove people to committing these acts of violence.

In other words, Improvisation 28 is not supposed to express the artist’s idea about the tendencies in the society at the beginning of the XX century. The painting expresses the turmoil, the fears, the anxiety and the despair of the humankind at the beginning of the new century, making the audience experience every single emotion, which makes the painting unbearably true and amazingly grotesque at the same time.

Reference List

Aronov, I. (2006). Kandinsky’s quest: A study in the artist’s personal symbolism, 1866–1907. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

Gardner, H. & Kleiner, F. S. (2009). Gardner’s art through the ages: A concise global history. Stamford, CT: Cengage Learning.

Knapp, S. (2000). The contemporary thesaurus of search terms and synonyms: A guide for natural language computer searching. Phoenix, AZ: The Orys Press.

Selz, P. (n. d.). The aesthetic theories of Kandinsky and their relationship to the origin of non-objective painting. Web.

Walther, I. F. (2000). Art of the 20th century. Vol.1. Koln, DE: Taschen.

• Title: Kitchen looking west
• Year: 2010
• Medium: Oil on canvas
• Location: Artereal Gallery
• Author: Anna Sabadini

Looking at the picture we cannot but feel the cosy, home atmosphere, which lashes you and make you feel homesick. The painter uses warm colours to depict some cosy kitchen with a lot of saucepans, plates, and other kitchen implements. The great number of details helps to create the atmosphere of warmness. The painters attention and scrupulousness to the details amaze. Looking at the picture, you cannot get rid of feeling, that the warm wind is blowing through the opened window, the dishes has just been cleaned, and the mistress went shopping. Anna Sabadinis pictures “reflect the ideas of home filtered through intimacy and distance”. She totally succeed in it. Coming from an immigrant family, she can better than others understand the meaning of the place we call “home” and transfer it through her paintings.

Bibliography

“Anna Sabadini Artist Biography,” Artereal, 2014. Web.

Introduction

The development of technology led to the widespread of various gadgets and devices in all spheres of humans’ lives. Sometimes it becomes difficult to differentiate where virtual reality and real-life start. Is it good or bad? On one hand, technology helps people to work, communicate, collaborate, but sometimes it is quite frightening that people are devoted to the technological boom. Murray (2008, p. 16) articulates the concerns which digital art evokes in people but states that any change in artistic vision and performance raises many disputes and criticism.

The present exhibition will go further and reveal the concerns of people who cannot exist without technology but are afraid of being substituted by it. The theme of the exhibition can be enclosed in the following title: Building Virtual Path to Perfection: Where Can It Lead? These fears are still in the air, they are invisible, and, being a curator I will strive to reveal those concerns, since, as Youngman suggests (2009, p.30) the main goal of the curator to make the invisible things “visible”.

Curatorial Proposal Digital Arts

The opening artwork of the exhibition will be Net Flag (2002) by Mark Napier (Fig.1). This is a “Java applet”, a computer program that provides a certain interface for creating a visual object via Internet (Variable Media, 2010). This visual object is a flag with several stars. Any user can change the colors of stars or the flag itself pasting particular country flag colors. All changes are saved in the database and can be watched by other users.

At the exhibition, the visitor will observe a big screen and can have access to a mouse to participate in the interaction. In terms of this exhibition, this artwork will symbolize the vast possibilities of people to interact using contemporary technology. Of course, visitors will understand that far more than simple collaboration (changing colors) is possible due to the use of technology.

The next installation will show that the promised bigger collaboration is achieved by the use of technology. This is the work by Maurice Benayoun (in cooperation with Martin Matalon) The Tunnel Under the Atlantic (1995) (Fig.2). The installation is a huge cylinder (2m in diameter) which goes underground. It virtually connects two places in the world initially these were Montreal and Paris (Benayoun, 2010). The “Tunnel” at the present exhibition can unite London and New Delhi, for instance.

The visitors looking into the cylinder can see pictures from the history and contemporary life of the country on the other side. Moreover, they can communicate with each other surmounting huge areas that divide the two continents. In terms of the present exhibition, the artwork reveals the enormous potential in using technology which unites people and makes distance irrelevant.

The next installation will symbolize the same idea of no boundaries and endless interaction, but will also make visitors think whether the technology could substitute the real life, whether it has already absorbed us (Fig.3). This work is entitled the “Techno-Marriage” (1999) and created by Forest and Lavaud (in co-operation with Bruno Herbelin) (Web Net Museum, 2010). The artwork is a digital recreation of the marriage between Forest and Lavaud which took place in 1999 and many people could interact via the Internet (watching the ceremony, congratulating the couple, and commenting).

To exhibit this installation a big screen with good resolution will be necessary. The installation depicts the process of creation, what was happening in reality and what people (present at the ceremony and watching it online) could see. Some comments will also be provided in the film.

Another work presented at the exhibition will reveal the concerns of people who criticize using technology in art, claiming that no machine can make divine things which only a human being can create. Looking at this artwork the visitors will be able to see what exactly a machine can create, whether it is worth existing. Perhaps, some will praise such technological art and admit that machines can also create beauty, and others can condemn such kind of art.

Anyway, no one will stay distant. This is the work by Desmond Paul Henry created in 1964 (Fig.4). It is untitled but can be called a picture was drawn by a computer. The media is a mechanical pen, ink, and paper. The uniqueness of the drawing is that the machine was “operated electronically, but could not be programmed” (Victoria and Albert Museum, 2010).

Finally, the fifth installation to be presented at the exhibition is Ghostcatching (1999) by Downie, Eshka, and Kaiser (The open-ended Group, 2010). This astonishing artwork reveals the idea of collaboration not only between people but between people and technology (Fig.5). To exhibit the work it is necessary to install a big screen with a very good resolution. The installation is a reflection of a dancing man in a computer, virtual world.

Whereas it can seem that it is only a two-dimensional projection, it is something more. The music and exclamations of a dancer create an atmosphere of reality outside the screen, so the visitors will feel the collaboration between a human being on the screen, technology, and themselves. Of course, many questions will evoke in visitors’ minds, one of which: ‘Building Virtual Path to Perfection: Where Can It Lead?’

Thus, the present exhibition will take place in a gallery. There is no need in huge areas. Only one room has to be quite big to install The Tunnel Under the Atlantic. Even this installation will not occupy more than three-four square meters. Of course, each artwork should be presented in a different room or, at least, divided by curtain walls. Four installations require a big screen with good resolution, and a small laptop or PC.

Apart from this, the gallery should be equipped with the necessary technology for using the Internet which is essential for communication and collaboration. Each installation will have certain comments and/or instructions so that visitors can understand and participate in some artwork creation. Apart from this, it will be useful to start a database where the changes in the artworks will be stored, since storage of such data is extremely important for the development and history of art (Beyond productivity: information technology, innovation, and creativity, 2003, p. 182).

It can be useful to offer an audio guide for visitors. Thus, the visitors will be able to understand the aim of the exhibition, the vision of every artist, and, besides, will have the necessary instruction as for interactions. To develop/improve interactions between visitors and, perhaps, many other people it is possible to use some kind of social network, for instance, Twitter. It is also necessary that the gallery had its web site; otherwise, it could be beneficial to use an existing site or make a new one for the exhibition.

As far as visitors’ interactions are concerned, it is necessary to point out that everyone will be encouraged not only to observe but to take part and create something in real-time. First of all, visitors will be able to change the artwork (Net Flag or communicate with the help of the Tunnel). Thus, they will interact with each other and users of the Internet visiting the site of the exhibition or gallery.

Of course, the Tunnel will connect visitors to two different galleries, located on two different continents. Apart from this, the visitors will communicate with each other via social networks: they can comment on the works they see, invite their friends, and share opinions with others. Moreover, it can be a good idea to encourage the visitors to answer the questions raised by the exhibition about the role of technology, about their feelings about the role of technology in their lives, etc.

The visitors will be also welcome to express their opinion about the exhibition. Eventually, all this information will be processed and stored on the database and revealed on the website of the gallery or exhibition. Such kind of interaction will not distract people from the major of the exhibition but will underline it since technology will be excessively used for communication and collaboration. So, the visitors will be able to draw their conclusions on this disputable topic.

Reference List

Benayoun, 2010. The Tunnel Under the Atlantic. Web.

Youngman, P.A., 2009. We Are the Machine: The Computer, the Internet, and Information in Contemporary German Literature. Suffolk, UK: Boydell & Brewer Limited.

Murray, T., 2008. Digital Baroque: New Media Art and Cinematic Folds. Minneapolis, MN: U of Minnesota Press.

National Research Council (U.S.). Committee on Information Technology and Creativity, National Research Council (U.S.). Computer Science and Telecommunications Board, 2003. Beyond Productivity: Information Technology, Innovation, and Creativity. Washington: National Academies Press.

The OpenEnded Group, 2010. Ghostcatching. Web.

Variable Media, 2010. Mark Napier. Web.

Web Net Museum, 2010. Technomariage. Web.

Victoria and Albert Museum, 2010. Desmond Paul Henry. Web.

• Title: My Private Greens / Leaving
• Year: 2007-2014
• Medium: oil on canvas
• Location: White Cube, London
• Author: Franz Ackerman

The brightly painted picture at once attracts our attention with a chaotic gorge of the products of human activity in it. Franz Ackerman uses bright colours to make you dizzy, underlining the effect of total mess. The motif is not new for him, as he is known to make “exuberant paintings and installations centred on themes of travel, tourism, globalisation and urbanism”. Staying at the picture, the first thing your do is trying to distinguish all the objects, painted there. The plain makes the biggest part of the picture, but then the eyes tire and cannot fix the tiny details of it. Having surrendered, you just stay enjoing the pleasant colours an guessing what kind of message each of the distinguished details conveys. Franz Ackerman has been paintig this picture fo 7 years, constantly adding something new, paying attention to every special detail and it is now rather interesting to do the puzzle of his great artwork.

Bibliography

“Franz Ackermann,” White Cube, 2014. Web.

Introduction

Music has evolved over the centuries with a progression from elementary works of art to the complicated and more entertaining compositions of the present age. Music has been used for various purposes leading to the development of the numerous genres. Traditionally, love and romance were common themes in most works of art. Alongside them, the theme of beauty has evolved in a significant manner.

An essential period in the history of music is the 1600 where there was a transformation in Europe from the period of the renaissance to the Baroque era. The transformation was in all avenues of life including music. This period is presented in the change of composition between the two periods. Famous composers, performers, and musicians lived in this age. They are celebrated over the centuries.

Among them are famous composers such as George Frideric Handel, Antonio Vivaldi, Johann Sebastian Bach, and Claudio Monteverdi. They made changes in musical techniques, instrumentation, and themes. Moreover, opera emerged as a genre during this period of history.

With it came the theme of beauty represented in the dressing and musical compositions presented therein. The essay focuses on the changes taking place in the era of 1600, their significance in music, and the presentation of beauty in the music composed and played during this time.

Changes in the 1600s

The seventeenth century was part of the renaissance age, which was characterized as the reclamation of culture with a progression in art, music, literature, science, and education (Mendelssohn 1956, 24).

It stands out as a period that saw changes in music in terms of sound and composition with English composers breaking off from the tradition of dissonance that was the essence of music on the European continent at that time to more uniform lines that encouraged sonority above everything.

These changes in music composition brought up a new style, the English style, whose leading composer John Dunstable and his contemporaries used a technique called faburden (Walton 1988, 24). Other proficiencies such “as taking the chant melody and putting it in the superiors” (Mendelssohn 1956, 25) were also employed.

These changes in English music composition were a source of inspiration to composers all over Europe to raise their music to the next level of its development.

It was during this period that “music in particular was thought of as an expressive art to move the emotions and sway the senses” (Walton 1988, 24) bringing with it the senses of humanism. In his motet ‘O Rosa Bella’, Johannes Ciconia shows the humanistic approach to music, which made it elicit an emotional response besides appealing to the senses based on the sweet fragrance of a rose combined with its beauty.

It stands out as a song that inspired many composers to set poetry into music without excluding the famous John Dunstable. The end of the renaissance period saw the birth of several song genres including the Parisian chanson and the Italian madrigal, an all-voice piece, which sounded every phrase of music for one line of text, which had become famous by the late 1590s thus extending into the Baroque period (Krausz 1993, 54).

The term madrigal was in general a reference to a range of “poetical types including the sonnet, balata, canzone, or poems that were meant to be specifically composed as madrigals” (Mendelssohn 1956, 24). The late 1590s and early 1600s also saw the emergence of a new vocal technique in Italy, the Bel Canto, which means beautiful singing. Italian singers used this florid style of singing in art songs and operas.

It was developed in the search for divine vocal beauty. It was based on the Idea of ease, purity, evenness of tone production, and a skilled use of voice. This search led to the development of the opera, the first opera being the Euridice (Krausz 1993, 54).

Operas

Gesualdo’s madrigal is a marvellous example of representation of beauty in any piece of work in this period. Gesualdo used descriptive music to express the theme of beauty for a woman during his time (Schulenberg 2001, 23). He tried to bring out this theme alongside the theme of romance in his expression of love for the newfound love. He achieved this by his choice of words in the composition.

An opera is a class of prowess that was considered possibly the most complicated and beautiful, as it “combined singing, orchestral music, acting, costumes, and scenery and dancing” (Slonimsky 1965, 74). It uses the enormous capacity of music to communicate feeling since music is believed to convey feelings more profoundly than verbal lyrics.

Operas skilfully show how vocal and orchestral music can induce happiness, cause an individual to think ,or move one into sadness, a concept that makes it a more beautiful form of music. The initial operas such as those performed by the camerata consisted of Greek tragedies and Roman mythologies (Robinson 1998, 34). They were known as opera in musica. Opera was declared an artistic form during the Baroque period in 1600-1750.

The music during this period was characteristically elaborate and emotional (Slonimsky, 1965, p.74). This was a period known for its love for magnificence and splendour, as expressed in their music.

In the 1600s, the operas were performed such that the characters were able to convey their emotions and sentiments besides flaunting their vocal prowess, which was not only a beautiful but also a moving feat. This vocal artistry flourished in the 1600s.

Claudio Monteverdi’s first opera masterpiece, Orofeo, made Venice the centre of the opera in the 1600s. It was a forerunner of greater works to come. How was beauty represented in the music?

Beauty in the Music

The 17th century represents the last year of the renaissance period and one of the centuries with some of the greatest musicians to ever walk the earth. The 1600 also marks the beginning of the Baroque Era. Beauty in the 1600 was adequately presented in music by the various artists of the era. Various writers have referred the music in this era as classical and one that is full of emotional intrigues (Raffman 1993, 76).

In presenting emotions and feelings, the opera music was successful in presenting love and resentment. However, beauty also emerged as a popular theme for musicians in operas and concerts. In his article, Mendelssohn states that music in this century had a common theme of beauty that effectively represented the then field of music.

Opera music in this era was not just meant to represent beauty but also to evoke the feeling of beauty. In his book, Kendall Walton (1988) argues that music should evoke feelings beyond the anticipated effect, which include the feeling of beauty. Beauty is also a common theme in most works of art in this century, and is usually used to express emotion (Levingson 1990, c).

Although beauty is presented in the wording of the musical pieces done in this era, the performances in the operas were also a show of beauty. The Baroque era featured the use of ‘Basso Continuo’ that was an instrumental piece accompanying the music though independent of it but often requiring a chordal instrument.

This stood as an effective way of presenting beauty in complexity that resulted therein, as it allowed flexibility in the music. An example of a famous composer during this time is Handel. He was born in an age where people began to attach attention to proper behavior and physical appearance (Levinson 1990, 53).

The rich used clothing to make them beautiful by attaching gold and silver to their clothing and coats to display their wealth. Embroidered waistcoats were worn when slightly open. This would reveal their shirts made of sheer linen and expensive ruffles. Wigs were worn on the heads of fashionable men, a case that was closely defined in the music made at this time.

Most o the musicians including Handel and Gesualdo were drawn in this types of attire, and their music was consistent with it. Perruquiers were specialists who looked after these wigs, as they were precious to their owners (Shusterman 2000, 98). In Handel’s music, “a remarkable ointment for the scalp and hair called Pomatum were used to keep the wigs curly” (Slonimsky 1965, 77).

It is also in the music that one learns that thieves would steal the wigs from these famous men, as it would fetch a lot of money in the black market. Women in the songs were even outlandish than men, and were defined as having a high hair that towered above their heads. This made them appear taller in relation to men. In the music, taller and slim women with tiny waists were considered attractive with suitors going after them.

On their head was “a head cushion with large curls on each side, which was meant to give a decoration to the head as a hairstyle base” (Bowman 2005, 34). Hoops were more common in this age. Women wore them under their skirts to make them appear larger below the waist. The skirts would bulge out below the knee to make the umbrella appearance.

All these were the definition of beauty at this age, and a fair deal of music in operas was performed in these attires. The bulk of people who went to operas would enjoy the beauty of music and the outlandish clothing worn in them.

Although this was considered beautiful, it would be regarded otherwise in the present day era. Most of the women skirts would take up more space along the sidewalk. Behind them would be a long train of the dress, which would make the current-day streets hard to walk on.

Despite the above shortcomings, the representation of beauty in music in the 1600s was effectively done. This was a departure from the current-day operas and musical pieces. However, the makeup worn in the present era also finds a place in the 1600 operas (Bowman 2005, 34).

Women would prefer pale skin, as it was beautiful to them. Men also preferred women with pale skin. Handel described most of the beautiful women as having a pale skin. To achieve this, he described white lead as the ornament of choice. Lips would be covered with a colored plaster or red leather with a black lead covering the eyebrows if they had not been replaced with synthetic ones.

In most of the 1600 music and operas, people with patches on the face covering smallpox scars or at times expressing political opinions rather than beauty frequently wore false teeth. A distinctive accent was also common among women. This was because of the cork balls they put in the mouth to make their cheeks appear rounder and bigger (Bowman 2005, 35).

In one of the operas, wealthy “women would carry a case full of scent bottles with the rest carrying purses of their favorite scents” (Bowman 2005, 34). These, as they appeared in the musical pieces, would mask the smells that people had out of not showering. Music in this era was therefore an effective tool to represent beauty. The composers were adroit at the presentation.

Conclusion

In conclusion, 1600 was a momentous period in the development of music. The use of creative art to present the theme of beauty was evident in the music alongside other works of art. George Frideric Handel used his musical compositions to bring out this theme in an effective way.

The descriptions of beautiful women and heir suitors are evident in the operas at this age as seen above with the description of most linen and ornaments worn.

Another significant work presenting the theme of beauty was Gesualdo’s madrigal, which described the women he encountered besides his love life. In summary, the period under scrutiny can be described as the period that saw the dawn of beauty that is evident in virtually all classes of music today.

References

Bowman, Wayne. Five essay reviews of Gender and Aesthetics: An Introduction by Carolyn Korsmeyer. Action, Criticism, and Theory for Music Education. New York: Routledge, 2005.

Krausz, Michael. The Interpretation of Music. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.

Levinson, Jerrold. Music, Art, and Metaphysics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1990.

Mendelssohn, Felix. Letter to Marc-Andre Souchay. In S. Morgenstern (ed.), Composeys on Music: An Antholofly of Composeys’ Wyitinflsfyom Palestha to Copland. New York: Pantheon Books, 1956.

Raffman, Derrick. Lanpafle, Music, and Mind. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993.

Robinson, Jenefer. The Expression and Arousal of Emotion in Music. In P. Alperson (ed.), Musical Worlds: New Directions in the Philosophy of Music. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1998.

Schulenberg, David. Music of the Baroque: An Anthology of Scores. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Shusterman, Richard. Pragmatist Aesthetics: Living Beauty, Rethinking. Art. 2nd edn. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2000.

Slonimsky, Nicholas. Lexicon of Musical Invective: Critical Assaults on Composers since Beethoven’s Time. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1965.

Walton, K. (1988). “What is Abstract About the Art of Music?.” Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 46, no. 1 (1988): 351-64.

Introduction

For this assignment the chosen work of art is the piece Confrontation created by Spencer Fidler in 1993. This particular piece of art combines both the artistic and modern in its creation since Fidler utilized 6 burnished zinc plates along with the cooperation of a local printing group in order to create a large scale representation of his work embedded into 3 plates each. While line etching as a form of art has been around for quite sometime the distinctive style utilized by Spencer in this instance is unique in that the personally identifiable details of the subjects involved are omitted (i.e. face, body details etc.) except for the character in the middle which appears to be the focal point of the piece itself.

Description of Confrontation

From the point of view of an observer the painting is an experience in contrasts with the left most side showing two characters in black with a distinctly red backdrop while the right hand side shows a single character colored in red being placed under a white backdrop. A cursory glance can immediately inform a casual observer that the painting is meant to represent a scene of violence where the character on the right hand side represents a male character gripping the distinctly female characters on the left hand side.

The pose of the female character in the middle denotes a certain degree of pain and the “silent scream” effect often utilized by abstract artists when trying to represent a scene where pain is apparently denoted. In fact Fidler follows the exact same formula in denoting this particular effect as seen in other artistic works by having the head tilt backwards towards the right with the nose facing up. This particular similarity to other abstract artists may in fact be evidence of a certain degree of influence some abstract artistic works have had in the creations of Fidler.

Interpreting the Painting

While one obvious interpretation of the piece is to consider it a representation of violence being inflicted on a woman by a man another interpretation of this particular work can be that the female characters on the left represent lesbians while the man on the right is symbolic of society at the present which constrains, limits and inflicts psychological harm on individuals expressing a different form of sexuality.

One method of justifying this particular view is the fact that if Fidler merely wanted to create a representation of men inflicting violence against women then he wouldn’t have included the third figure in the piece and instead would have let it be composed of only two characters. While people may argue that the character in the far left could be a man a closer look at the painting reveals that the distinctly feminine shape of the hips on the left contrast with the distinctly manly hips on the right which justifies the observation that one represents a man and the other a woman.

Further more, the contrasting colors between the two namely dark red and black on the left and light red and white on the right can actually be considered symbolic of the way in which society views its thoughts on lesbians as being right (as symbolized by the color white and light red) while lesbianism itself is considered wrong (by using black and dark red).

It must also be noted that the emphasis on detail in the middle figure was probably utilized in order to place emphasis on the feminine aspect of the characters on the left and to drive the point that the characters on the left are female. The title Confrontation should also be taken into consideration since at times society literally confronts the ideals that lesbian community holds and tortures (figuratively) them through derision, mockery and the implied notion that the sort of love they express is not natural in the least.