This first section is for you to show that you have an understanding about a wide range of artists and designers, I suggest you use artists from different times, countries and mediums (e.g painters, sculpters etc,)
you need to have examples of some of their work and use the following headings to discuss them and their work,
• subjects, themes, issues
• movements, styles
• context of work
• materials and processes
• events, trends
Ive created an example artist profile below, you will need to do this for 3 to 4 artists of your own choosing;
Pablo Picasso
1881-1973
Pablo Picasso was a Spanish artist who lived and produced most of his work in France. Picasso is regarded as the most famous artist of recent times.
• Subjects, themes, issues
The Painting the weeping woman by picasso Is a cubist portrait of Picasso's mistress Dora Maar, it is thematically linked the the Painting Guernica and represents universal suffering, The weeping woman is a direct development from the earlier painting Guernica, and while Guernica was inspired by an actual event by the time Picasso came to paint The Weeping woman he was interested in the general concept of tragedy and suffering. The picture I have chosen of the crying woman is the last of a series of ever more detailed pictures of a crying woman.
If the weeping woman was the starting point Guernica was the starting, It represents the bombing of Guernica by German and Italian warplanes at the behest of the fascist Spanish goverment of Franco. Guernica is about the tragedy of the bombing especially to innocent civilians , At the time the picture helped bring the Spanish civil war to the worlds attention, since then it has become a potent anti war symbol.
The three musicians by Picasso is an example of synthetic cubism. The Look of the painting is inspired by cut paper and it is clear from the finished piece that Picasso was trying to get the flat angular look of a collaged picture, this look was somewhat used in Guernica as Picasso has tried to simulate the look of newprint in once part of the picture to represent how he had first heard about the bombing.
Movements, styles
Picasso went throught many different styles in his life, these are generally refered to as 'periods' and they are often thought to represent the situation he was in or his general emotions and interests at the time, the most well known of his periods are the blue period which contains work making use of dark blues and containing thin sickly looking characters, it is generally the given thought that these images are a reflection of Picasso as a poor artist living in poverty at the begining of his carear. The Rose Period came next and heralds a change in direction with bright colours and warm colours being extensively used in his work, a feature often seen in Picasso's rose period work is the harlequin and other street entertainers. This period of Picassos's work charts his time in Paris as he was gaining success and the blossoming of a romance with an artist model.
His African inspired period came next and shows Picasso's interest in african culture and art, his work from this time shows many of the stylistic and symbolic conventions of tribal painting and sculpture, this eventually lead into his most recongnisable period, Cubism. The Cubist Period saw Picasso collaborate with other artists and push his style in ever more diverse and interesting ways. Cubism attempted to deconstruct how objects are viewed. The easiest way to understand cubism is to think about it as trying to look at an object from all directions and then demonstrate it in one image. What you are left with are slices of different view points reformed and next to each other, In the weeping woman it is clear to see this effect as we see two eyes as if viewed from the front and then the nose as viewed from the side. Picassos's use of cubism merges into the artistic style Surrealism and this was a style that Picasso was an influence on and influenced by Picasso. Guernica is a good example of Picasso's use of surrealism, It contains grey tonal symbolic imagery, the image of the minatour in Guernica is a feature that figures in several surrealist artists work. The hidden symbolism of Guernica is especially representative of the surrealist style, and was something Picasso clearly reveled in, especially as he refused to explain what the images mean't and stated quite clearly that it was his intention that people should come to their own conclusions about the meanings with it.
Context of work
Much of the context for Picasso's early work was his life circumstances at the time, as he became more successfull and gained the support of wealthy sponsors he gained more freedom so that he could allow the work of other cultures (inparticular African art) and other artists and trends to influence what he was doing. Towards the end of his life he was so successful and well known that the main context for his work was that he was Picasso and people expected the distorted imagery that he had become famous for. His later works are often criticised for being a miss mash of his previous styles, this is for me a clear example of how his fame had some what shackled him to having to keep returning to his 'greatest hits' for his customers.
Materials and processes
Picasso worked in a variety of different mediums during his life and he produced a vast amount of artwork.
By the time he died he was estimated to have produced 1,885 paintings; 1,228 sculptures; 2,880 ceramics, roughly 12,000 drawings, many thousands of prints, and numerous tapestries and rugs.
Picasso was classically trained by his father who was a painter himself who taught at a variety of art schools in Spain this is refelected in the materials and techniques used by the young Picasso who's materials of choice are charcoals, pencil and oils. As Picasso grew older and began to take an interest in different art work and cultures his processes and materials changed to meet the needs of his ever developing and evolving interests and artistic styles. The examples of Picasso's work I have chosen are all oil on canvass paintings, they would have been first sketched out with charcoal or pencil then painted on with Picasso building up layers of paint and thinning his paint down with turpentine and other thinning agents to get the right effect. The three paintings I have chosen are are influenced by cubism and surrealism, The technique calls for blocks of colours with only limited use of gradients, thick black lines and bold shapes are used to form shapes, the Three Musicians makes use of texture and pattern which is a key feature of cubism (Picasso is creditted with being one of the first artists to use collage in artwork) Many of Picasso's other cubist work makes use of cut up newspaper cuttings and fabric, this collage effect is simmulated well in the three musicians and defines it as a typical cubist picture.
Guernica and the Weeping woman are very similiar in how they are constructed and I would imagine that the process of constructing them was similiar. Guernica differes from the weeping woman
Events, trends
The Spanish civil war has a large impact on two of the paintings I have selected, it directly inspired Guernica and that in turn and the concepts of loss and suffering resonate in the Weeping woman.
The three musicians represents the Cubist movement that Picasso and Georgee Braque where leading lights of. Its shattered and reformed collage style reflects the Cubist movement among artists of the earliest 20th century
Painting Title: Three Musicians 1921
Oil on canvas
Painting Title: The weeping woman 1937
Oil on canvas
Painting Title: Guernica 1937
Oil on canvas
How I can use this artists work.
Im a big fan of much of Picasso's work, his surrealist influences are ones that appeal to me especially the symbolism represented in Guernica. The look of his characters have real potential for animation and im certain that the Chromaphobia by Raoul Servais is inspired directly from Picasso's work. The cut out look of the three musicians also has great potential for further work. I already animate using electronic cut out characters and the thought of using scanned in textures, newspapers and fabrics within my animation and illustration work is very appealing. I would like to develop a slightly cubist styled idea making use of collage style mixed media and my own drawings.
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