art history vocab

Tessera

A small block of tiles, glass, or stone used to make mosaics.

Value

The lightness or darkness of a tone or hue.

Oculus

A round, eye-like opening in a ceiling or roof.

Iconography

Images or symbols used to convey specific meanings in an artwork.

Icon

An image of a religious subject used for contemplation.

Rubbing

An image made by rubbing powdered ink onto a sheet of paper placed against a shallowly carved or textured surface.

Mandorla

(in religious art) A halo or frame that surrounds the entire body.

Lunette

A semicircular or arc-shaped space on a wall or ceiling, usually with a frame.

Basilica

A longitudinal building with multiple aisles and an apse, typically located at the east end.

Central Plan

A design for an architect structure, whether round, polygon, or cruciform, that features a primary central space surrounded by symmetrical areas.

Nave

The central aisle of a civic or church basilica.

Apse

A recess at the end of an interior space, often semi-circular, and typically reserved for someone or something important, such as the altar in a church or throne of a ruler.

Vault

An arched stone structure, usually forming a ceiling.

Transept

A section of a church perpendicular to the nave; transepts often extend beyond the side aisles, making the “arms” of a cruciform-shaped church.

Clerestory

The upper section of a wall that contains a series of windows allowing light to enter the building.

Minaret

A tower of a mosque; can be used to give the call to prayer and also functions as a visible marker of the mosque on the skyline.

Squinch

A support, typically at the corners of a square room, used to carry a dome or other superstructures.

Narthex

The entrance hall or vestibule of a church.

Pendentive

A curved triangular wall section linking a dome with a supporting vertical pier or wall.

Ambulatory

A place for walking, especially an aisle around a sacred part of a religious space.

Conch

A quarter spherical cupula, or dome, over an apse.

Iconoclasm

The intentional destruction or rejection of images on religious or political grounds.

Anticonism

Opposition to visual depictions of living creatures or religious figures.

Triskele

A tri-lobed design consisting of spirals within a circle.

Bilateral Symmetry

Symmetrical arrangement along a central axis so that the object or plan is divided into two matching halves.

Cloisonne

Decorative enamelwork technique in which cut gemstones, glass, or colored enamel pastes are separated into compartmented designs by flattened strips of wire.

Inlay

A decoration embedded into the surface of base material.

Illuminated Manuscripts

Book, document, or piece of music written by hand rather than typed or printed.

Illumination

Decorative designs, handwritten on a page or document.

Vellum

A writing surface originally made from calfskin.

Parchment

A writing surface prepared from the skin or certain animals that has been treated, stretched, and polished.

Carpet page

A decorative page resembling a textile; often used to introduce a gospel in early medieval manuscripts.

Repousse

Relief created by hammering malleable metal from the reverse side.

Sarcophagus

A container for human remains.

Atlantid

A monumental figural sculpture that supports a roof or other architectural element.

Atlatl

A thin stick with a notch to hold a spear in a way that allows the user to throw the spear faster and farther.

Zoomorphic

Having an animal-like form.

Kero

An Andean decorated drinking cup used in feasts.

Tapestry Weave

A process in which patterns are woven directly into the textile, not sewn on or otherwise added later in the process.

Warp & Weft

In textile weaving, warp threads are the stationary vertical threads held taut to the loom and weft refers to the yarn that is woven horizontally over and under the warp threads to make cloth.

Hanging scroll

A format of East Asian painting that is typically taller than it is wide; generally, hanging scrolls are displayed temporarily and may be rolled up and stored easily.

Handscroll

A format of East Asian painting that is much longer than it is high; it is typically viewed intimately and in sections, as the viewer unrolls it from right to left.

Rule-Lined Painting

Painting that renders architecture and other complex, engineered structures with meticulous care, often with the aid of rulers and compasses.

Literati Painters

Educated artists, including scholar officials, who brought literary values into painting, and pursued abstraction and self-expression in their art.

Album Leaf

Format of two-dimensional artwork, such as painting, calligraphy, or photography, in which individual leaves, or pages, may be bound together like a book to form an album.

Fan Painting

A format of East Asian painting in which the image is painted on an oblong, round, or folded fan.

Pingdan

An aesthetic sensibility promoted by the literati, pingdan is reserved in style, mild in taste.

Celedon

(also known as green ware) A wide range of ceramics with a common greenish hue.

Emaki

The Japanese term for a handscroll painting typically viewed in sections, from right to left. It is wider than it is tall, and when rolled up, it is easily stored and portable.

Nio

(also known as kongo rikishi) Paired guardian statues often found at Buddhist temples in Japan.

Yosegi-Zukuri

A Japanese technique for making wood sculptures by joining multiple blocks together.

Psalter

A book of psalms used for liturgical purposes.

Relic

The bodily remains of saints or items believed to have come into physical contact with the divine.

Reliquary

A container for holy relics (items associated with a deceased sacred individual), which is often elaborately decorated.

Pieta

Italian for 'pity'; an artwork depicting the Virgin Mary holding the dead body of her son, Jesus Christ.

Buttress

An extreme support to an architectural structure, usually made of brick or stone.

Flying Buttress

In architecture, a supporting pier that extends or 'flies' from an external wall, with an arch that provides additional support to the wall while allowing space for windows.

Tracery

Ornamental stonework, often carved in a pattern of vines and/or other organic decorative forms.

Perspective

The two-dimensional representation of a three-dimensional object or volume of space.

Illusionism

Making objects and space in two dimensions appear real; achieved using such techniques as foreshortening, shading, and perspective.

Foreshortening

In two-dimensional artwork, the illusion of a form receding into space: the parts of an object or figure closest to the viewer are depicted as largest, those farthest as smallest.

Atmospheric Perspective

A means of representing distance based on the way the atmosphere affects the human eye, where details are lost, outlines are blurred, colors become paler, and color contrasts less pronounced.

Linear Perspective

A system of representing three-dimensional space or objects on a two-dimensional surface by means of geometry and one or more vanishing points.

Vanishing Point

When discussing perspective in two dimensions, the point on the horizon at which parallel lines seem to converge and disappear.

Orthogonal Lines

When creating perspective in two dimensions, the diagonal parallel lines that recede from an object in the foreground or midground to a vanishing point on the horizon line.

Relief Printing

A printing technique where lines are cut out of a surface so that the surrounding area is recessed; the lines are then inked to create an image, in contrast to intaglio printing.

Monogram

A motif made from letters often overlapping or formed in a distinctive way to create a symbol.

Intaglio Printing

A printing technique where lines are incised into a surface and the incised lines hold the ink, in contrast to relief printing.

Engraving

A printmaking technique where the artist gouges or scratches the image into the surface of the printing plate; the engraved lines are filled with ink, which is transferred to the paper during the printing process.

Burin

Tool used for metal engravings.

Hatching

Short parallel lines used in drawings or engraving to represent light and shadow.

Etching

A printmaking process that uses the action of acid to make a design scratched into a coating on a metal plate.

Mural

A painting made directly on the surface of a wall.

Sfumato

An Italian term meaning 'toned-down smokiness' that refers to an atmospheric haziness in painting.

Baldachin

A canopy over an altar or throne.