Activity #10-Mediums and Techniques

The Voyage of Life: Manhood, 1842
Thomas Cole
oil on canvas

The Vintagers, 1878
Auguste Renoir
oil on canvas

The two Paintings (The Vintagers; The Voyage of Life: Manhood) I chose have the same medium. They are both oil on canvas. The first painting The Vintagers is an Impressionist piece of the late 19th century. In this painting, the paint used seems thick, due to the over lapping of colors particularly the yellows and greens of the feilds. The shadowing in the middle of the field and behind the trees mixes in with the rest of the painting, developing a feel of thick brush strokes. These thick brush strokes create an active quality to the painting, portraying the time of day by showing the villagers coming home and the shadow the trees make. A technique called alla prima, Italian for “all in one go,” seems to be used in this painting. This is a type of spontaneous approach, where bold slashing brush strokes are an important part of the piece. This can be seen in The Vintagers, in that there is no real detail at all, as if the painting was made quickly and without a stop. Many Impressionist paintings also follow this technique.
The other oil on canvas painting follows a different technique altogether. The Voyage of Life: Manhood has detail and visible characters in it. This technique is known as glazes, thin, translucent veils of color applied over a thicker layer of underpainting. There were no rash decisions made in the painting, like in The Vintagers, it was well thought out and planned exactly where everything was to go. There is a lot of detail because of the time consumed on this painting. The artist wanted there to be a main character, a focal point, and images hidden all to add to the overall feel and meaning to the painting.

Activity #8

I made this collage in the effort for everyone to get to know me a little bit better. Hope you enjoy!

Activity #9

The Effect of the Camera on Visual Arts






The invention of the camera had huge effects on visual arts when it started to become more widespread. This new medium could record an event on the spot it was considered to bare truth. Because of the truth baring “new realism” of photography visual artists were free to begin to explore more expressive ways of depicting their subjects. They expressed themselves by changing color, or subject matter, or presentation of subject matter. The main medium of photography was light, visual artists of the day knew this and as a result they became more interested in the effects of light on objects and colors. This became a new matter of content for their work. Cameras also made use of the landscape and still life as a popular subject, therefore visual artists also began to see the possibilities of a subject that before had been considered low art. In a movement called pictoralism, photographers used a variety of techniques to undercut his objectivity of the camera, producing gauzy, atmospheric images that seemed more like a painting, thus more like art. But an important American photographer did not agree with this way of photography. He came to the conclusion that for photography to be an art, it must be true to its own nature, it should not try to be painting. Abstract images were later created by Paul Strand, using close up views tat would obscure the subject of the picture and create something else. Artists such as Hannah Hoch used found images, basically anything, as a new kind of raw material for art. This type of art is know as collage, and has its roots from the art movement data. These and many more are examples of the effect the camera had on visual arts. The camera took ordinary, hum-drum life, and turned it into art.

Activity #7

American Pop Art

An artistic look into American Pop Art and one of its most famous artists was explored in this exhibition, which presents 9 objects associated with this theme. In America Pop artists reproduced, duplicated, combined, overlaid and arranged visual details that make up American society, introducing shifts and transformations and acting like commentaries. Pop Art attempted to show that a detached look at the over familiar objects of daily life could give them new meaning as visual symbols. Pop artists took material in the mundane, mass-produced objects and images of America’s popular culture- comic books, advertising, etc. and turned them into something exciting. In this exhibition shows all of that. All of these objects in this show are taken from one of the most famous and enigmatic Pop artists, Andy Warhol.

One of the leaders of the pop art movement, Andy Warhol produced paintings and silk-screen prints of commonplace images, such as soup cans and photographs of celebrities. Repetition was a key to Warhol's work, as evidenced by his many recurrent series Marilyn Monroe, Che Guevara, and Chairman Mao, among others. The use of photographic silkscreen gave the images a mechanical look. Warhol deliberately infused his work with a mechanical and impersonal character that intensified when he adopted silkscreen printing techniques in order to increase his production. The silkscreen process, which consists in the mechanical repetition of an image on fabric while reducing it to its essential outlines; stripped of its details, the form acquires a greater visual impact. This technique deriving from the advertising industry for which Warhol had worked, allows him to approach his ideal of objectivity, whereby perfection would be a matter of identical reproduction. This operation's effect would be to separate the image from the meanings attributed to it, preserving only its appearance, the pure image. Warhol attempted to keep his personal fascination with fame from showing through too clearly in his works, preferring to leave their meaning open to the interpretation of viewers. These 9 objects in this show exemplify all of the artistic talents Andy Warhol had. From paintings of the Campbell’s Soup can, to his famous mass produced silk screens such as the Marilyn Monroe.

American Pop art took me by surprise the first time I saw it. I was looking through our book and saw a picture of Andy Warhol, and thought this person looks very strange and interesting, so I read the little piece the book had on him. I saw some of his work in the Pop art theme and some work of others such as Roy Lichtenstein and Niki de Saint-Phalle and I enjoyed it very much. I found it so interesting how these artists took such simple things and turned them into art. What really intrigued me was why these artists constructed what they did, but a lot of them would not say why. Like Andy Warhol, they wanted to leave the interpretations up to its viewers. I look at these creations for long periods of time and have no idea what they mean or why they are there. But I realize it is up to me to develop a meaning behind the piece and I love that about Pop art. You can never be wrong about the interpretation, because it is your own.

Activity #6

American Pop Art

Andy Warhol
American 1928-1987
Che Guevara 1962
Silkscreen prints

Andy Warhol
American 1928-1987
Marilyn Monroe 1967
Screenprint on white paper

Andy Warhol
American 1928-1987
Campbell's Soup I (Chicken Noodle) 1968
Screenprint on white paper.

Andy Warhol
American 1928-1987
Mao 1973
Synthetic polymer print and silkscreen ink on canvas
Corcoran Gallery of Art

Andy Warhol
American 1928-1987
Mick Jagger 1975
Screenprint on Arches Aquarelle (Rough) paper

Andy Warhol
American 1928-1987

Double Mickey Mouse 1981
Screenprint on Arches 88 paper

Andy Warhol
American 1928-1987
Endangered Species: Siberian Tiger 1983
Screenprint on Lenox Museum Board

Andy Warhol
American 1928-1987
Ads: Life Savers 1985
Screenprint on Lenox Museum Board

Activity #5

Themes and Functions


The Voyage of Life: Manhood






When first viewing this piece, a theme that is very relevant is that of the sacred realm. There is an angel in the top left hand corner glowing in a bright light and gazing down at the man on the boat. The man on the boat is on his knees with his hands folded and staring upward, as if to show he is praying. This seems to be a very religious piece with the angel, the man praying, but if one were not religious they could see a theme of overwhelming fantasy and nature. From the dark red colors of the mountains and shy that dominate the painting, to the faces in the clouds, to the contorted trees, and finally the glowing figure in the top right can be depicted only be the viewer.


The Vintagers








The Vintagers is a great painting resembling the human experience through everyday life. A vintager is a harvester and producer of grapes, and in the painting you can see a grouping of vintagers walking home with bags on their backs filled with grapes.
Life for a vintager is their work. There are also homes in the background as well as a church to the right of the homes. These images add to the sense of human experience and the everyday routine of the villagers in the painting.