European Art Facts
The phrase "European Art" refers to paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures, photographs--and more--made in Europe from the time of the Renaissance to the 21st century. Though earlier European-made objects stand as "art" in contemporary museums and galleries, the makers of pre-Renaissance objects did not have the same concept of art that modern societies hold. Medieval artisans, for example, made icons for worship purposes.
During and after the Renaissance, Europe developed ideas of art that upheld the value of objects made solely for aesthetic purposes; that is, objects whose function is for display and visual enjoyment rather than for religious or utilitarian purposes.
Brunelleschi and Linear Perspective
Filippo Brunelleschi developed linear perspective (sometimes called scientific perspective). A geometric procedure for representing three-dimensional space on a two-dimensional plane, linear perspective depends on the fact that objects appear smaller when they are far away. Paintings and drawings in linear perspective have a vanishing point placed on the horizon line, and all horizontal lines (called "orthogonals") converge at that vanishing point. Lines parallel to the picture plane (called "transversals") remain parallel, but get closer together towards the vanishing point.
Though previous artists experimented with representing three-dimensional space in two dimensions, Brunelleschi's "discovery" led to a systematic method for projecting space using mathematics and geometry. In 1435, Leon Battista Alberti described Brunelleschi's discovery in "On Painting," the first Renaissance treatise on the subject. The combination of science and math with painting and drawing supported arguments that painters were not craftsmen but philosophers. Such arguments led to a change in the status of the artist that emerged full-fledged in the High Renaissance with Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphael, and Titian.
Neoclassicism
"Classicism" refers to later art inspired by ancient Greek and Roman aesthetics and history. Though Renaissance artists were avowed classicists, the emergence of Neoclassicism in mid-18th to early 19th century Europe revived and redefined the importance of classical art.
In 1764, Johann Joachim Winckelmann published "The History of Ancient Art Among the Greeks," which contained a novel approach to art in that Winckelmann delineated the history of Greek art as well as of Greek culture. One of the most widely-read books of its day, Winckelmann's text influenced European artists. With the early archaeological excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum, Neoclassical artists enjoyed a much deeper knowledge of classical art then their Renaissance predecessors.
Jacques-Louis David's canonical painting "The Oath of the Horatii" from 1784, displays David's deep knowledge of the Roman culture he depicted. David painted the three Horatii brothers swearing that they will defend Rome to the death. David lifted this story from an ancient Roman text by Livy describing the wars between Rome and Alba in the 7th century. David researched 7th century Roman dress and architecture to stay accurate to the historical period. (see reference 2)
Invention of Photography
Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre presented the daguerreotype to members of the French Académie des Sciences on January 7, 1839. A daguerrotype is a metal plate prepared with light-sensitive chemicals. When placed in an unlit box with a small aperture (a camera obscura), the plate records the scene outside of the camera.
Daguerre explained the process to a joint session of the Académie des Sciences and the Académie des Beaux-Arts in August of the same year. One eyewitness wrote: "One of the audience staggered out, was mobbed with questions and said, as one with authority, 'bitumen and oil of lavender' . . . when at last the session ended and I knew the real secret, I ran to buy iodine and cursed the setting sun for putting off my experiments until the morrow . . . In a day or so cameras were being focused on public buildings everywhere."
The daguerrotype's popularity for its unprecedented naturalism (adherence to the appearance of the natural world), later fell to the more efficient technologies developed by William Henry Fox Talbot. The daguerrotype records a scene once. It is a negative, where light and dark values are reversed. The high polish of the silver surface reflects the negative and makes the recorded image appear with lights and darks in their proper places.
Talbot's invention of a negative image from which the photographer can make multiple positives proved a cheaper and faster way to take pictures.
Impressionism
Photography's ability to quickly and accurately record the natural world challenged painters in the latter half of the 19th century. Impressionist painters of the 1870s and 1880s turned away from naturalism and grew interested in the optical properties of color and light.
The quick and broad brushstrokes that characterize Impressionist paintings emerged from an emphasis on painting en plein air (an artistic term for painting outside). With but a few hours to record a scene, Impressionists like Claude Monet concentrated on capturing light and surface effects.
The term "Impressionism" comes from Monet's 1872 painting "Impression - Sunrise," satirized by the French critic Louis LeRoy, who wrote: "Impression---I was certain of it. I was just telling myself that, since I was impressed, there had to be some impression in it ... and what freedom, what ease of workmanship! Wallpaper in its embryonic state is more finished than that seascape." LeRoy inadvertently coined the movement's name, as Impressionist painters adopted the term as a joke.
Post-Impressionism
"Post-impressionism" does not define a particular artistic style, it is a blanket term for the painters working after the Impressionist movement. Post-impressionist artists like Van Gogh, Gauguin, Cézanne and Seurat all painted in different styles.
Gauguin started as a stockbroker, was married and had five children. After befriending Impressionist painter Camille Pissarro, Gauguin dedicated himself to art and eventually separated from his family.
Gauguin achieved little success during his lifetime. Poor and frustrated, Gauguin left for Tahiti in 1891 where he made many of his most famous works. Exotic and filled with bold and unnaturalistic colors, Gauguin's paintings are highly individualistic and thus pose particular difficulties for interpretation. Nevertheless, his use of symbolic color and exotic subject matter inspired later artists interested in the art of non-European cultures, like Picasso.
