Art Fundies Artists

Pliny the Elder (23-79 CE)

sought to analyze historical and contemporary art in his text Natural History

Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574)

Italian painter and art historian (1511-1574); wrote The Lives of the Artists.

Johann Joachim Winckelmann (1717-1768)

- First to approach the subject of ancient art from a developmental point of view

- The artifact's temporal context mattered

- aka switch to focuses on contextual+formal analysis

Giotto di Bondone

- Florentine painter

- frescoes

- simple perspective

- powerful gestures and emotions

- transitioned from Gothic to the Renaissance

Lorenzo Ghiberti (1381?-1455)

- won Florence competition(1401) to make Gates of Paradise, depicted the sacrifice of Issac

- Gates of Paradise: bronze doors for baptistery, took 25 years to complete second set of panels

Filippo Brunelleschi (1377-1446)

Florentine architect who was the first great architect of the Italian Renaissance; built first double-shelled dome over Cathedral of Florence

- develop theory of linear perspective

Masaccio (1401-1428)

- Renaissance Florence painter who first put Brunelleschi's theory of linear perspective into practice

- used aerial perspective

Donatello (1386?-1466)

- Renaissance artist

- David (1420-60s): contrapposto

- father of modern sculpture

Botticelli (1444?-1510)

- Florence painter; Renaissance

- Birth of Venus: est. standard of female beauty, first full length nude female model since antiquity

Lenardo da Vinci (1452-1519)

- inventor, engineer, painter, architect, sculptor, scientist, musician

- designed lock system for canals, helicopters, and submarines

- Mona Lisa(1503): develop sfumato

- The Last Supper(1495-1498)

Michelangelo di Buonarotti (1475-1564)

- "David"(1504): represent the republican spirit of Florence, of flawed marble

- sculpted "Moses", "the Dying Slave", "the Bound Slave" for Pope Julius II's tomb but project cancelled, great disappointment

- Sistine Chapel: ceiling took 4 years to paint 700yd^2, commissioned by Pope Julius II

Raphael Sanzio (1483-1520)

- @Rome Renaissance painter

- pupil of Perugino

- Pope Julius II commissioned him to do things

- learned from Michelangelo, though they rivals

- hired many assistants

- School of Athens(1508-11)

- Sistine Madonna(1513-1514): est. image of Mary

Perugino

- Italian Renaissance painter

- brought Renaissance to Rome

- Sistine Chapel (1481-82): fresco, perspective

Giorgione (1477/78-1510)

- Venetian Renaissance painter

- The Tempest (1508): 1st to make background the main subject

Titian Vecelli (1488-1576)

- Venetian Renaissance painter

- greatest colorist of the Renaissance

- painted portraits of his patrons

- put things like a curtain or column in the background rather than some atmospheric shade

- influence seen up to the 21st century

Tintoretto (1518-1594)

- Venetian Renaissance painter

- often linked with Mannerism(late 1500s): distorted perspective/scale, acidic colors, twisted positions of subjects

- use small models to find most dramatic poses

- chiaroscuro

- later works were spiritual

Dominikos Theotokopoulos (El Greco)

- was a disciple a Titian for a time

- closely related to the Counter-Reformation: dramatic elongated figures

- Mannerism: strongly influenced by Tintoretto

- moved to Toledo, Spain in 1576

Matthais Grunewald (1475?-1528)

- Northern Renaissance

- 10 works survived

- Isenheim Altarpiece (1510-1515): depicts the crucifixion of Christ on 9 panel, 2 folding wings

Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528)

- Northern Renaissance; Reformation Germany

- Gothic inspired

- extremely naturalistic detail

- use and wrote on theoretical ideas of Italian Renaissance

- studied in Italy

- bronze and woodcuts

- The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

- Veronica: engraving, hatching

Hans Holbein the Younger (1497-1543)

- one of the greatest Renaissance portraitists

- German court painter for English King Henry VIII

- great at details and psychological character of his subjects

- model for English painting up to 1800s

Caravaggio (1571-1610)

- 1st Baroque

- extreme light and dark

- depicted Mary and the apostles in poor drab

Artemisia Gentileschi (1593?-1652?)

- daughter of a artist

- adopted Caravaggio's techniques

- depicted Old Testament women

- painted self-portraits

Gianlorenzo Bernini (1598-1680)

- son of a sculptor

- child prodigy, recognized by Pope at 17

- architect, draftsman, theater, painter

- Ecstasy of Saint Teresa(1647-1652): Cornaro chapel, stone look like real fabric or clouds, gold lighting

Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640)

- Baroque Flanders artist

- huge workshop

- great energy and color

Rembrant van Rijn (1606-1669)

- Baroque, Dutch painter, printmaker, great draftsman

- place people for most energy/flow rather than who paid the most

- died in poverty

- made many great self-portraits later in life

- The Night Watch (1642) = Sortie of the Captain Cocqs Company of the Civic Guard

Diego Velazquez (1684-1721)

- contemporary of Bernini

- court painter of Spanish King Philip IV

- build up from patches of color, which influenced Impressionists

Jean-Antoine Watteau (1684-1721)

innovator of fete galante which depicted the nobility in elegant contemporary dress enjoying leisure time in the countryside

Francois Boucher (1703-1770)

- Rococo artist

- favorite court painter of Madame Pompadour

- converted classical myths into court gallantry

- painted nubile nudes

Jean-Honore Fragonard (1732-1806)

- Rococo artist

- studied with Boucher

- promoted by Pompadour

Jacque Louis David (1748-1825)

- Neo-Classicism painter

- art reflect republican ideals and became the master of ceremonies for the new French government(after the revolution)

- Oath of Horatii(1784)

- became the court painter of Napoleon; propaganda

Jean Dominique Ingres

- French Neoclassical artist

- pupil of David

- sharp outline, emotional, geometric, rational order

Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863)

- French Romantic painter

- focused on exotic themes, foreign settings, historical material, and violence involving animals

Theodore Gericault (1791-1824)

- French Romantic painter

William Blake (1757-1827)

- English Romantic poet, painter, and printmaker

Gustave Courbet (1819-1877)

- French painter

- led the Realist movement

- flamboyant and outgoing personality outraged audiences

- The Stonebreakers: depict workers repairing road at the Salon

Honore Daumier (1808-1879)

- French Realist painter, sculptor, and printmaker

Jean Francois Millet (1814-1875)

- French Realist artist

- contained element of Romantic sentimentality

Edouard Manet (1832-1883)

- French painter

- many consider him the 1st Impressionist; he wouldn't like this

- juxtaposed contrasting, bright colors

- Le Dejeuner sur L'herbe/Luncheon on the Grass(1863): included in the Salon des Refuses, hadnude woman with contemporary people on a picnic

Claude Monet (1840-1926)

- French painter

- led Impressionist movement

- encouraged outside painting, aided by new portable paints/brushes

- painted directly on canvas

- shaded with not just grey, new scientific dicovered

- Impression, Sunrise(1872): critics insult 'impression'

Camille Pissarro (1830-1903)

- French Impressionist painter

Alfred Sisley (1839-1899)

- Impressionist painter

- British citizen, lived in France

Paul Cezanne (1839-1906)

- French painter

- wanted more form than Impressionism had

- believed objects could be broken down to their underlying forms; influenced Cubism

- clear background, middle ground, and foreground

Georges Seurat (1859-1891)

- French Post-Impressionist painter

- optical mixing: dots of color that the eye blends together

- focus on technique made for static composition

- A Sunday on La Grande Jatte

Vincent Van Gogh (1853-1890)

- Dutch Post-Impressionist

- used contrasting colors, paint directly to canvas, vigorous brushwork, swirling forms, and arbitrary color

- Night Cafe(1888): Van Gogh thought the cafe was a place of vice and colors show that (red, yellow, green); southern France

Paul Gauguin (1848-1903)

- French Post-Impressionist painter

- was a successful stockbroker, but left his family to pursue more vibrant colors and art in Tahiti

- worked for a short time with von Gogh

- depicted tropical environment through a lens of colonialism

Edgar Degas (1834-1917)

- French Impressionist painter and sculptor

- adapt snapshot, slightly above the subject perspective of Japanese prints

Henri Matisse (1869-1954)

- French artist

- intense and arbitrary colors that violated audiences

- leader of the fauves or "wild beasts"

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)

- Spanish painter and sculptor

- broke objects up and overlapped different perspectives

- inspired by African art since they thought it was closer to nature than European art

- brought collages to high art

- Les Demoiselles d'Avignon(1907): included in Armory Show, challenge approach to figure and space

- Bull's Head(1943): ready-made

Georges Braque (1882-1963)

- French painter, collagist, draughtsman, printmaker, sculptor

- broke objects up and overlapped different perspectives

- inspired by African art since they thought it was closer to nature than European art

- brought collages to high art

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (1880-1938)

- German Expressionist, Die Brucke painter

- used brilliant bright colors

Emil Nolde (1867-1956)

- German Expressionist, Die Brucke painter

- brilliant arbitrary color

Edvard Munch (1863-1944)

- Norwegian painter

- depiction of intense emotions inspired Die Brucke

Vasily Kandinsky (1866-1944)

- Russian-born Der Blaue Reiter painter

- pioneer of total abstraction, started in 1913

- some of his work was displayed in the Armory Show

Kazimir Malevich (1872-1944)

- Polish-Ukrainian Russian painter

- pioneer of total abstraction

- De Stijl: flat fields of primary color

Piet Mondrian (1872-1944)

- Dutch painter

- pioneer of total abstraction

- De Stijl: flat fields of primary color

Brancusi (1876-1957)

- Romanian sculptor, painter, photography

- The Kiss

Jacob Lawrence (1917-2000)

- artist inspired by the Harlem Renaissance

Romare Bearden (1911-1988)

- artist inspired by the Harlem Renaissance

Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968)

- French-American Dada artist, sculptor, writer

- made ready-mades, challenged and mocked what can be considered art

- Nude Descending a Staircase (1912)

- LHOOQ (1919)

- Fountain (1917)

Salvador Dali (1904-1989)

- Spanish Surrealist painter

Rene Magritte (1898-1967)

- Belgian Surrealist artist

Joan Miro (1893-1983)

- Spanish Surrealist painter, sculptor, ceramicist

Josef Albers (1888-1976)

- well-known German-born Bauhaus designer, printer, graphic artist

- moved to the US to teach after the Nazis closed the Bauhas facility in 1933

- Color Field painting

Harold Rosenberg (1906-1978)

- art critic that dominated ideas of art during 1950s

Clement Greenburg (1904-1994)

- art critic that dominated ideas of art during 1950s

- encouraged abstraction

Willem de Kooning (1904-1997)

- Dutch-American Abstract Expressionist

- emphasis on dramatic colors and sweeping brushstrokes

Lee Krasner (1908-1984)

- American Abstract Expressionist

Franz Kline (1910-1962)

- American Abstract Expressionist

Jackson Pollock (1912-1956)

- New York-based American Abstract Expressionist

- Action Painting: dramatic brushstrokes and dripped paint onto canvas

Mark Rothko (1903-1970)

- Russian-born American Abstract Expressionist

- Color Field painting: broad areas of color, simple geometric forms

Jasper Johns (1930-Present)

- American naturalist painter, sculptor, printmaker

- focused on ordinary consumer objects: flags, numbers, maps, and letters

Robert Rauschenberg (1925-2008)

- American painter and graphic artist

- combines aka ready-mades with a new name

- Bed(1955): used his own bed sheets as canvas

- Monogram(1959): stuffed goat, tennis ball, police barrier, tire, heel of a shoe, paint

- mixed media: silkscreen + paint

Andy Warhol (1928-1987)

- American Pop art painter and film maker

- extremely popular

- Pop art mock what is considered art

- created with factory-like silkscreen approach

- included soup cans, Brillo boxes, images of movie stars

Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997)

- American Pop artist

- enlarge comic strips so much you can see the dots of the print

Robert Indiana (1928-2018)

- American Pop artist

- used stencils previously used for commercial purposes

Frank Stella (1936-2024)

- American Minimalist painter, sculptor, and printmaker

- large non-objective paintings, very precise lines, often monochromatic

David Smith (1906-1965)

- American Abstract Expressionist, Minimalist sculptor and painter

- sculpted with stainless steel, large

Dan Flavin (1933-1996)

- American minimalist artist

- sculpted with neon tubing, large

Chuck Close (1940-Present)

- American photorealist painter, visual artist, and photographer

- known for his portraits

Duane Hanson (1935-1996)

- American photorealist artist and sculptor

- known for his witty sculptors of contemporary, ordinary people

Christo (1935-Present) and Jeanne-Claude (1935-2009)

- Earthworks artists, romantic partners

- introduced idea that land and buildings could be packaged

- 24 cloth fence in CA, 11 Florida islands wrapped, orange fabric gate in NYC

- JC organised, C designed

Michael Heizer (b.1944)

- American Earthworks artist

Robert Smithson (1938-73)

- American Earthworks artist

Guerilla Girls(founded 1985)

- NY: all female, wore guerrilla masks

- pasted posters, flyers, and gave speeches with guerrilla tactics

- protested the domination of white males in art world

Philip Johnson (1906-2005)

- American Post-Modernist architect

- led International Style at the time

- thought decoration was a function of art (1970s)

- AT&T building(550 Madison Ave.): finial top of standard office building

Diego Rivera (1886-1957)

- famous Mexican painter

- used fresco secco for murals in Mexico and US

Joseph Cornell (1903-1972)

- filled open boxes with objects of metaphorical/symbolic meaning