Maestà by Duccio di Buoninsegna, 1308-1311, tempera on wood, 214 x 412 cm, Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Siena, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
Maestà (noun) Italian for “majesty,” a maestà is an image type that depicts the Virgin and Child enthroned with angels surrounding them. Perhaps the best known maestà is by Duccio, who painted the subject for the Siena Cathedral. Duccio’s rendition of … Continue reading
Wassily Kandinsky, Composition No. 4, 1911, oil on canvas, 62 ⅞
“Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammer, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul.” Wassily Kandinsky, Concerning the Spiritual … Continue reading
Head of a Persian Guard from Persepolis, Iran, c. 486-465 CE, limestone, 21.26" x 24.41" x 4.72", Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Photo by Marie-Lan Nguyen, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
Bas-relief (noun) A sculpture in which the figures project only slightly from the background. A Persian bas-relief dating from the first century CE, that looks very similar to the one shown above, is among the most recent art heists. The … Continue reading
Limbourg Brothers, "The Procession of the Flagellants" from the Belles Heures of Jean de France, Duc de Berry, c. 1405-1408/9, ink, tempera, and gold leaf on vellum, 9⅜" x 6⅝”, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
Book of Hours (noun) A book used for private prayer, popular from the tenth through the sixteenth century in Europe, that has devotions to the Virgin Mary that are performed at specific hours of the day. These books were bestsellers … Continue reading
Joseph Cornell, Taglioni's Jewel Casket, 1940, wood box with velvet, glass cubes, blue glass, and glass jewlry, ¾” x 11⅞” x 8¼”, Museum of Modern Art, New York, Photo by istolethetv - Flickr, Creative Commons Attribution license.
Assemblage (noun) A work of art, either two-dimensional or three-dimensional, created with found objects. Joseph Cornell made assemblage sculptures that normally were boxes in which he arranged photographs and bric-à-brac to create new ideas with them. His Taglioni’s Jewel Casket … Continue reading
Thomas Hart Benton, The Ballad of the Jealous Lover of Lone Green Valley, 1934, oil and tempera on canvas, 41.3
Regionalism (noun) A school of American artists who focused upon specific regions of the United States in an effort to celebrate ordinary Americans and their regional culture. In his painting The Ballad of the Jealous Lover of Lone Green Valley, … Continue reading
Rembrandt van Rijn, Adam and Eve, 1638, etching, 6.4" x 4.6", Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
Etching (noun) A technique of printmaking in which an artist scratches a waxy resin from the surface of a metal plate and the plate is then dipped in acids to “carve” the exposed metal to create the image on the … Continue reading
Auguste Rodin, The Thinker, 1879-1887, bronze, 27½” high, Musée Rodin, Paris, Photo by Gertjan R., Creative Commons Attribution license via Wikimedia Commons.
Patina (noun) A colored film on the surface of a metal sculpture. Sometimes the patina appears over time as a result of the oxidation process and other times artists create the color with a wash of chemicals. Rodin developed his … Continue reading
Christo and Jeanne-Calude, Wrapped Reichstag, 1995, Berlin, Photo by jotefa - Flickr
Environmental Art (noun) Art in the natural or man-made environment that draws attention to forces and processes in nature or human relationships with their physical surroundings. When Christo and Jeanne-Claude wrapped the Reichstag in Berlin with over one million square … Continue reading
Jan Vermeer, The Milkmaid, c. 1660, oil on canvas, 18" x 16", Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
Camera Obscura (noun) A device made of a box with a lens that artists used for centuries to project a perfect, yet upside-down repilca of the subject before it. One can tell that Jan Vermeer used a camera obscura because … Continue reading
Katsushika Hokusai, The Great Wave, Edo Period, c. 1831, woodblock print, 9⅞” x 14⅝”, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
Ukiyo-e (noun) Click here for pronunciation. Japanese for “pictures of a floating world,” a Ukiyo-e is a type of woodblock print that was produced by an artist, a woodblock carver, and a printer. Katsushika Hokusai designed many popular Ukiyo-e, of … Continue reading
Giotto, The Nativity, 1305-1306, fresco, Arena (Scrovegni) Chapel, Padua, Italy, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.
Fresco (noun) Italian word for “fresh,” fresco is a technique of painting in which an artist mixes ground pigments with water and paints them onto wet plaster. Giotto’s beautifully expressive fresco paintings are actually part of the wall of the … Continue reading