essays about art

Essays About Art: Top 5 Examples and 9 Prompts

Essays about art inspire beauty and creativity; see our top essay picks and prompts to aid you.

Art is an umbrella term for various activities that use human imagination and talents. 

The products from these activities incite powerful feelings as artists convey their ideas, expertise, and experience through art. Examples of art include painting, sculpture, photography, literature, installations, dance, and music.

Art is also a significant part of human history. We learn a lot from the arts regarding what living in a period is like, what events influenced the elements in the artwork, and what led to art’s progress to today.

To help you create an excellent essay about art, we prepared five examples that you can look at:

1. Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists? by Linda Nochlin

2. what is art by writer faith, 3. my art taught me… by christine nishiyama, 4. animals and art by ron padgett, 5. the value of art by anonymous on arthistoryproject.com, 1. art that i won’t forget, 2. unconventional arts, 3. art: past and present, 4. my life as an artist, 5. art histories of different cultures, 6. comparing two art pieces, 7. create a reflection essay on a work of art, 8. conduct a visual analysis of an artwork, 9. art period or artist history.

“But in actuality, as we all know, things as they are and as they have been, in the arts as in a hundred other areas, are stultifying, oppressive, and discouraging to all those, women among them, who did not have the good fortune to be born white, preferably middle class, and above all, male. The fault lies not in our stars, our hormones, our menstrual cycles, or our empty internal spaces, but in our institutions and our education–education understood to include everything that happens to us from the moment we enter this world…”

Nochlin goes in-depth to point out women’s part in art history. She focuses on unjust opportunities presented to women compared to their male peers, labeling it the “Woman Problem.” This problem demands a reinterpretation of the situation’s nature and the need for radical change. She persuades women to see themselves as equal subjects deserving of comparable achievements men receive.

Throughout her essay, she delves into the institutional barriers that prevented women from reaching the heights of famous male art icons.

“Art is the use of skill and imagination in the creation of aesthetic objects that can be shared with others. It involves the arranging of elements in a way that appeals to the senses or emotions and acts as a means of communication with the viewer as it represents the thoughts of the artist.”

The author defines art as a medium to connect with others and an action. She focuses on Jamaican art and the feelings it invokes. She introduces Osmond Watson, whose philosophy includes uplifting the masses and making people aware of their beauty – he explains one of his works, “Peace and Love.” 

“But I’ve felt this way before, especially with my art. And my experience with artmaking has taught me how to get through periods of struggle. My art has taught me to accept where I am today… My art has taught me that whatever marks I make on the page are good enough… My art has taught me that the way through struggle is to acknowledge, accept and share my struggle.”

Nishiyama starts her essay by describing how writing makes her feel. She feels pressured to create something “great” after her maternity leave, causing her to struggle. She says she pens essays to process her experiences as an artist and human, learning alongside the reader. She ends her piece by acknowledging her feelings and using her art to accept them.

“I was saying that sometimes I feel sorry for wild animals, out there in the dark, looking for something to eat while in fear of being eaten. And they have no ballet companies or art museums. Animals of course are not aware of their lack of cultural activities, and therefore do not regret their absence.”

Padgett recounts telling his wife how he thinks it’s unfortunate for animals not to have cultural activities, therefore, can’t appreciate art. He shares the genetic mapping of humans being 99% chimpanzees and is curious about the 1% that makes him human and lets him treasure art. His essay piques readers’ minds, making them interested in how art elevates human life through summoning admiration from lines and colors.

“One of the first questions raised when talking about art is simple — why should we care? Art, especially in the contemporary era, is easy to dismiss as a selfish pastime for people who have too much time on their hands. Creating art doesn’t cure disease, build roads, or feed the poor.”

Because art can easily be dismissed as a pastime, the author lists why it’s precious. It includes exercising creativity, materials used, historical connection, and religious value. 

Check out our best essay checkers to ensure you have a top-notch essay.

9 Prompts on Essays About Art

After knowing more about art, below are easy prompts you can use for your art essay:

Is there an art piece that caught your attention because of its origin? First, talk about it and briefly summarize its backstory in your essay. Then, explain why it’s something that made an impact on you. For example, you can write about the Mona Lisa and her mysterious smile – or is she smiling? You can also put theories on what could have happened while Leonardo da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa.

Rather than focusing on mainstream arts like ballet and painting, focus your essay on unconventional art or something that defies usual pieces, such as avant-garde art. Then, share what you think of this type of art and measure it against other mediums.

How did art change over the centuries? Explain the differences between ancient and modern art and include the factors that resulted in these changes.

Are you an artist? Share your creative process and objectives if you draw, sing, dance, etc. How do you plan to be better at your craft? What is your ultimate goal?

To do this prompt, pick two countries or cultures with contrasting art styles. A great example is Chinese versus European arts. Center your essay on a category, such as landscape paintings. Tell your readers the different elements these cultures consider. What is the basis of their art? What influences their art during that specific period?

Like the previous prompt, write an essay about similar pieces, such as books, folktales, or paintings. You can also compare original and remake versions of movies, broadway musicals, etc.

Pick a piece you want to know more about, then share what you learned through your essay. What did the art make you feel? If you followed creating art, like pottery, write about the step-by-step process, from clay to glazing.

Visual analysis is a way to understand art centered around what the eyes can process. It includes elements like texture, color, line, and scale. For this prompt, find a painting or statue and describe what you see in your essay.

Since art is a broad topic, you can narrow your research by choosing only the most significant moments in art history. For instance, if you pick English art, you can divide each art period by century or by a king’s ruling time. You can also select an artist and discuss their pieces, their art’s backstory, and how it relates to their life at the time.

If you are interested in learning more, check out our essay writing tips !

Maria Caballero is a freelance writer who has been writing since high school. She believes that to be a writer doesn't only refer to excellent syntax and semantics but also knowing how to weave words together to communicate to any reader effectively.

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Essay on Art

500 words essay on art.

Each morning we see the sunshine outside and relax while some draw it to feel relaxed. Thus, you see that art is everywhere and anywhere if we look closely. In other words, everything in life is artwork. The essay on art will help us go through the importance of art and its meaning for a better understanding.

What is Art?

For as long as humanity has existed, art has been part of our lives. For many years, people have been creating and enjoying art.  It expresses emotions or expression of life. It is one such creation that enables interpretation of any kind.

It is a skill that applies to music, painting, poetry, dance and more. Moreover, nature is no less than art. For instance, if nature creates something unique, it is also art. Artists use their artwork for passing along their feelings.

Thus, art and artists bring value to society and have been doing so throughout history. Art gives us an innovative way to view the world or society around us. Most important thing is that it lets us interpret it on our own individual experiences and associations.

Art is similar to live which has many definitions and examples. What is constant is that art is not perfect or does not revolve around perfection. It is something that continues growing and developing to express emotions, thoughts and human capacities.

Importance of Art

Art comes in many different forms which include audios, visuals and more. Audios comprise songs, music, poems and more whereas visuals include painting, photography, movies and more.

You will notice that we consume a lot of audio art in the form of music, songs and more. It is because they help us to relax our mind. Moreover, it also has the ability to change our mood and brighten it up.

After that, it also motivates us and strengthens our emotions. Poetries are audio arts that help the author express their feelings in writings. We also have music that requires musical instruments to create a piece of art.

Other than that, visual arts help artists communicate with the viewer. It also allows the viewer to interpret the art in their own way. Thus, it invokes a variety of emotions among us. Thus, you see how essential art is for humankind.

Without art, the world would be a dull place. Take the recent pandemic, for example, it was not the sports or news which kept us entertained but the artists. Their work of arts in the form of shows, songs, music and more added meaning to our boring lives.

Therefore, art adds happiness and colours to our lives and save us from the boring monotony of daily life.

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

Conclusion of the Essay on Art

All in all, art is universal and can be found everywhere. It is not only for people who exercise work art but for those who consume it. If there were no art, we wouldn’t have been able to see the beauty in things. In other words, art helps us feel relaxed and forget about our problems.

FAQ of Essay on Art

Question 1: How can art help us?

Answer 1: Art can help us in a lot of ways. It can stimulate the release of dopamine in your bodies. This will in turn lower the feelings of depression and increase the feeling of confidence. Moreover, it makes us feel better about ourselves.

Question 2: What is the importance of art?

Answer 2: Art is essential as it covers all the developmental domains in child development. Moreover, it helps in physical development and enhancing gross and motor skills. For example, playing with dough can fine-tune your muscle control in your fingers.

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Purdue Online Writing Lab Purdue OWL® College of Liberal Arts

Writing Essays in Art History

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Copyright ©1995-2018 by The Writing Lab & The OWL at Purdue and Purdue University. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, reproduced, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without permission. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our terms and conditions of fair use.

These OWL resources provide guidance on typical genres with the art history discipline that may appear in professional settings or academic assignments, including museum catalog entries, museum title cards, art history analysis, notetaking, and art history exams.

Art History Analysis – Formal Analysis and Stylistic Analysis

Typically in an art history class the main essay students will need to write for a final paper or for an exam is a formal or stylistic analysis.

A formal analysis is just what it sounds like – you need to analyze the form of the artwork. This includes the individual design elements – composition, color, line, texture, scale, contrast, etc. Questions to consider in a formal analysis is how do all these elements come together to create this work of art? Think of formal analysis in relation to literature – authors give descriptions of characters or places through the written word. How does an artist convey this same information?

Organize your information and focus on each feature before moving onto the text – it is not ideal to discuss color and jump from line to then in the conclusion discuss color again. First summarize the overall appearance of the work of art – is this a painting? Does the artist use only dark colors? Why heavy brushstrokes? etc and then discuss details of the object – this specific animal is gray, the sky is missing a moon, etc. Again, it is best to be organized and focused in your writing – if you discuss the animals and then the individuals and go back to the animals you run the risk of making your writing unorganized and hard to read. It is also ideal to discuss the focal of the piece – what is in the center? What stands out the most in the piece or takes up most of the composition?

A stylistic approach can be described as an indicator of unique characteristics that analyzes and uses the formal elements (2-D: Line, color, value, shape and 3-D all of those and mass).The point of style is to see all the commonalities in a person’s works, such as the use of paint and brush strokes in Van Gogh’s work. Style can distinguish an artist’s work from others and within their own timeline, geographical regions, etc.

Methods & Theories To Consider:

Expressionism

Instructuralism

Postmodernism

Social Art History

Biographical Approach

Poststructuralism

Museum Studies

Visual Cultural Studies

Stylistic Analysis Example:

The following is a brief stylistic analysis of two Greek statues, an example of how style has changed because of the “essence of the age.” Over the years, sculptures of women started off as being plain and fully clothed with no distinct features, to the beautiful Venus/Aphrodite figures most people recognize today. In the mid-seventh century to the early fifth, life-sized standing marble statues of young women, often elaborately dress in gaily painted garments were created known as korai. The earliest korai is a Naxian women to Artemis. The statue wears a tight-fitted, belted peplos, giving the body a very plain look. The earliest korai wore the simpler Dorian peplos, which was a heavy woolen garment. From about 530, most wear a thinner, more elaborate, and brightly painted Ionic linen and himation. A largely contrasting Greek statue to the korai is the Venus de Milo. The Venus from head to toe is six feet seven inches tall. Her hips suggest that she has had several children. Though her body shows to be heavy, she still seems to almost be weightless. Viewing the Venus de Milo, she changes from side to side. From her right side she seems almost like a pillar and her leg bears most of the weight. She seems be firmly planted into the earth, and since she is looking at the left, her big features such as her waist define her. The Venus de Milo had a band around her right bicep. She had earrings that were brutally stolen, ripping her ears away. Venus was noted for loving necklaces, so it is very possibly she would have had one. It is also possible she had a tiara and bracelets. Venus was normally defined as “golden,” so her hair would have been painted. Two statues in the same region, have throughout history, changed in their style.

Compare and Contrast Essay

Most introductory art history classes will ask students to write a compare and contrast essay about two pieces – examples include comparing and contrasting a medieval to a renaissance painting. It is always best to start with smaller comparisons between the two works of art such as the medium of the piece. Then the comparison can include attention to detail so use of color, subject matter, or iconography. Do the same for contrasting the two pieces – start small. After the foundation is set move on to the analysis and what these comparisons or contrasting material mean – ‘what is the bigger picture here?’ Consider why one artist would wish to show the same subject matter in a different way, how, when, etc are all questions to ask in the compare and contrast essay. If during an exam it would be best to quickly outline the points to make before tackling writing the essay.

Compare and Contrast Example:

Stele of Hammurabi from Susa (modern Shush, Iran), ca. 1792 – 1750 BCE, Basalt, height of stele approx. 7’ height of relief 28’

Stele, relief sculpture, Art as propaganda – Hammurabi shows that his law code is approved by the gods, depiction of land in background, Hammurabi on the same place of importance as the god, etc.

Top of this stele shows the relief image of Hammurabi receiving the law code from Shamash, god of justice, Code of Babylonian social law, only two figures shown, different area and time period, etc.

Stele of Naram-sin , Sippar Found at Susa c. 2220 - 2184 bce. Limestone, height 6'6"

Stele, relief sculpture, Example of propaganda because the ruler (like the Stele of Hammurabi) shows his power through divine authority, Naramsin is the main character due to his large size, depiction of land in background, etc.

Akkadian art, made of limestone, the stele commemorates a victory of Naramsin, multiple figures are shown specifically soldiers, different area and time period, etc.

Iconography

Regardless of what essay approach you take in class it is absolutely necessary to understand how to analyze the iconography of a work of art and to incorporate into your paper. Iconography is defined as subject matter, what the image means. For example, why do things such as a small dog in a painting in early Northern Renaissance paintings represent sexuality? Additionally, how can an individual perhaps identify these motifs that keep coming up?

The following is a list of symbols and their meaning in Marriage a la Mode by William Hogarth (1743) that is a series of six paintings that show the story of marriage in Hogarth’s eyes.

• Man has pockets turned out symbolizing he has lost money and was recently in a fight by the state of his clothes.
• Lap dog shows loyalty but sniffs at woman’s hat in the husband’s pocket showing sexual exploits.
• Black dot on husband’s neck believed to be symbol of syphilis.
• Mantel full of ugly Chinese porcelain statues symbolizing that the couple has no class.
• Butler had to go pay bills, you can tell this by the distasteful look on his face and that his pockets are stuffed with bills and papers.
• Card game just finished up, women has directions to game under foot, shows her easily cheating nature.
• Paintings of saints line a wall of the background room, isolated from the living, shows the couple’s complete disregard to faith and religion.
• The dangers of sexual excess are underscored in the Hograth by placing Cupid among ruins, foreshadowing the inevitable ruin of the marriage.
• Eventually the series (other five paintings) shows that the woman has an affair, the men duel and die, the woman hangs herself and the father takes her ring off her finger symbolizing the one thing he could salvage from the marriage.

Art Essay Examples

Art Essay Examples to Get You Inspired - Top 10 Samples

Published on: May 4, 2023

Last updated on: Jan 30, 2024

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Are you struggling to come up with ideas for your art essay? Or are you looking for examples to help guide you in the right direction? 

Look no further, as we have got you covered!

In this blog, we provide a range of art writing examples that cover different art forms, time periods, and themes. Whether you're interested in the classics or contemporary art, we have something for everyone. These examples offer insight into how to structure your essay, analyze art pieces, and write compelling arguments.

So, let's explore our collection of art essay examples and take the first step toward becoming a better art writer!

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Good Art Essay Examples

In the following section, we will examine a selection of art essay examples that are inspiring for various academic levels.

College Art Essay Examples

Let’s take a look at college art essay examples below:  

The Intersection of Art and Politics: An Analysis of Picasso's Guernica

The Role of Nature in American Art: A Comparative Study

University Art Essay Examples

University-level art essay assignments often differ in length and complexity. Here are two examples:

Gender and Identity in Contemporary Art: A Comparative Study

Art and Activism: The Role of Street Art in Political Movements

A Level Art Essay Examples

Below are some art paper examples A level. Check out: 

The Use Of Color In Wassily Kandinsky's Composition Viii

The Influence of African Art on Pablo Picasso's Les Demoiselles D'avignon

A Level Fine Art Essay Examples

If you're a student of fine arts, these A-level fine arts examples can serve as inspiration for your own work.

The Use Of Texture In Vincent Van Gogh's Starry Night

Exploring Identity Through Portraiture: A Comparative Study

Art Essay Examples IELTS 

The Impact of Art on Mental Health

The Effects of Technology on Art And Creativity

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AP Art Essay Examples

A Comparison of Neoclassical and Romantic Art

An Examination Of The Effects Of Globalization On Contemporary Art

Types of Art Essay with Examples

Art essays can be categorized into different types. Let's take a brief look at these types with examples:

Art Criticism Essay : A critical essay analyzing and evaluating an artwork, its elements, and its meaning.

The Persistence of Memory" by Salvador Dali: A Critical Analysis

Art History Essay: A comprehensive essay that examines the historical context, development, and significance of an artwork or art movement.

The Renaissance: A Rebirth of Artistic Expression

Exhibition Review: A review of an art exhibition that evaluates the quality and significance of the artwork on display.

A Review of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Exhibition

Contemporary Art Essay: An essay that explores and analyzes contemporary art and its cultural and social context.

The Intersection of Technology and Art in Contemporary Society

Modern Art Essay: An essay that examines modern art and its significance in the development of modernism.

Cubism and its Influence on Modern Art [insert pdf]

Art Theory Essay: An essay that analyzes and critiques various theories and approaches to art.

Feminist Art Theory: A Critical Analysis of its Impact on Contemporary Art [insert pdf]

Additional Art Essay Example

Let’s take a brief look at some added art essay samples:

Artwork Essay Example

Artist Essay Example

Advanced Higher Art Essay Example

Common Art Essay Prompts

Here are some common art essay topics that you may encounter during your coursework:

• Describe a piece of artwork that has inspired you.
• A comparative analysis of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa and Michelangelo's David.
• Analyze the cultural significance of a particular art movement.
• Discuss the relationship between art and politics.
• Compare and contrast two works of art from different time periods or cultures.
• The representation of identity in art
• The Evolution of Artists' Paintings:
• From Traditional to Contemporary Art
• The representation of identity in Frida Kahlo's self-portraits.
• The significance of oil on canvas in the history of art.
• The significance of the Mona Lisa in the Italian Renaissance

Art Essay Topics IELTS

Here are some art essay topics for IELTS students. Take a look: 

• The value of art education.
• The role of museums in preserving art and culture.
• The impact of globalization on contemporary art.
• The influence of technology on art and artists.
• The significance of public art in urban environments.

Tips For Writing a Successful Art Essay

Here are some tips for writing a stand-out art essay:

• Develop a clear thesis statement that guides your essay: Your thesis statement should clearly and concisely state the main argument of your essay.
• Conduct thorough research and analysis of the artwork you are writing about : This includes examining the visual elements of the artwork, researching the artist, and considering the historical significance.
• Use formal and precise language to discuss the artwork: Avoid using colloquial language and instead focus on using formal language to describe the artwork.
• Include specific examples from the artwork to support your arguments: Use specific details from the artwork to back up your analysis.
• Avoid personal bias and subjective language: Your essay should be objective and avoid using personal opinions or subjective language.
• Consider the historical and cultural context of the artwork: Analyze the artwork in the context of the time period and cultural context in which they were created.
• Edit and proofread your essay carefully before submitting it: Ensure your essay is well-organized, coherent, and free of grammatical errors and typos.
• Use proper citation format when referencing sources: Follow the appropriate citation style guidelines and give credit to all sources used in your essay.
• Be concise and focused in your writing: Stick to your main thesis statement and avoid going off-topic or including irrelevant information.
• Read your essay aloud to ensure clarity and coherence: Reading your essay out loud can help you identify inconsistencies or any other mistakes.

The Bottom Line!

We hope that the art essay examples we've explored have provided you with inspiration for your own essay. Art offers endless possibilities for analysis, and your essay is a chance to showcase your unique opinions.

Use these examples as a guide to craft an essay that reflects your personality while demonstrating your knowledge of the subject.

Short on time? Let CollegeEssay.org help you! All you have to do is to ask our experts, " write college essay for me " and they'll help you secure top grades in college.

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Home Essay Samples

Essay Samples on Art

While it may seem easy to compose essays about art, it’s not really so because you have to offer background information in your introduction part and explain why some exhibition or a school of thought is important. This should go to your first paragraph because your purpose is to inspire your readers and provide enough background information. When you already have a prompt that must be followed, determine what kind of essay must be written. It can be a descriptive essay, which is great for a description of the works of art or photography. Some other cases may require working with an explanatory tone where you have to explain why an artist has chosen certain palettes or what has been an inspiration. See various free art essay examples below for inspiration. It also helps to learn how to structure your writing and implement quotes or footnotes that are used to highlight the images. Remember to focus on the ways how to cite images and multimedia elements, depending on the chosen style. Your writing should address every image that you have by checking twice with the grading rubric to ensure that you use the sources that may have already been specified.

What Does Creativity Mean to You

Creativity, an intricate tapestry of imagination and innovation, holds a unique significance for each individual. It is a concept that transcends the boundaries of convention, sparking curiosity and igniting the flames of inspiration. In this essay, we embark on a journey to unearth the meaning...

Censorship of Art and Artists: The Complex Discourse

The intersection of creativity and expression often finds itself entangled in a contentious debate: the censorship of art and artists. This complex issue has sparked discussions across societies and cultures, raising questions about freedom of speech, cultural preservation, and the power dynamics between creators and...

Why I Want to Study Architecture: the Power of Design

The world around us is a tapestry of structures, spaces, and designs that shape our lives and experiences. From towering skyscrapers to quaint houses, every architectural marvel carries a story and a vision. The allure of architecture, with its blend of artistic expression, technical precision,...

• Architecture

The Impact of Technology on Art: A Modern Renaissance

Introduction The influence of technology on art is an evolving narrative that reflects the symbiotic relationship between human creativity and innovative tools. From the early use of simple tools to create cave paintings to the digital art technologies of today, the integration of technology in...

• Art History
• Impact of Technology
• Renaissance

Exploring Feminist Literary Criticism: Unveiling Mona Lisa Smile

Introduction Self-assessment and criticism help us improve our skills and the ways in which we communicate our ideas and perspectives with others. In this feminist literary criticism essay, I will be critiquing and analysis of the movie Mona Lisa Smile. Firstly, I will explain why...

• Literary Criticism

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Frida Kahlo: Exploring Her Biography Through the Film 'Frida'

In the 2002 film “Frida” directed by Julie Taymor, illustrates the life of Frida Kahlo based on the book Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera. Who is Frida Kahlo? Her biography in this essay is explored with the help of the film...

• Film Analysis
• Frida Kahlo

Debate Surrounding Graphic Novel and Relation to Literature

Introduction In the past years, the noise about graphic novels has been constantly increasing. A graphic novel is basically a novel in comic-strip format, a book made up of comics’ content. However, they are not the same as comics. Unlike comic books, graphic novels are...

• Graphic Novel
• Visual Arts

Depicting Trauma: Symbolism in Graphic Novels

Introduction I must confess that I never read a graphic novel prior to this course. I think I’ve developed and expressed my opinion of graphic novels frequently over the course of the semester, and I think I would be remiss if I did not close...

Understanding Graphic Novels: Context and Analysis for Reading

Introduction Graphic novels are stories illustrated in comic form but have the length of a novel. “The term graphic novel was invented in 1970 however, the time of its origin is not concluded yet” (“Levitz”). Graphic novels have been debated for decades since some readers...

Jhene Aiko: Exploring the Artistry and Emotions in her Music

The artist I have chosen to write about is Jhene Aiko who is categorized in the R&B and Hip-Hop genre. Jhene Aiko is a popular singer who writes her music under the influence of cannibis, under the influence of therapeutic instruments and while having a...

• Famous Person
• Music Industry

The Joy of Painting: Exploring the Life and Legacy of Bob Ross

Who is Bob Ross, or rather, who was he? During the 80s and 90s, he was an artist who specialized in painting, hosting an instructional painting show on PBS called The Joy of Painting. Though Bob Ross has long since passed on, one will find...

The Uniqueness of Australian Artwork: Exploring Artists' Perceptions

Australian artists provide a unique way of displaying the Australian landscape. John Olsen is one of these artists, who uses symbolism to create a sense of movement. This is conveyed through his spontaneous linear line work as seen in Onkaparinga Hill, blue wren and fox...

Artistic World of Peter Doig: an Insight Into His Life and Work

Peter Doig is a contemporary Scottish artist I found that peaked my interest from his art work to his personal life. I’d like to start off by giving a brief background of the artist seeing that a lot of his work is landscapes from where...

• Contemporary Art

Being an Artist: My Passion, Place of Freedom and Courage

I remember constantly wondering if there was a way that I could make my life meaningful or if it even had meaning. I was just a thirteen year old starting to figure out her own self. My life revolved around wanting to please the people...

• About Myself

Sculpture From Dura Europas: the Head of a Bearded God

One of the artworks in the Yale art gallery is the Head of a Bearded God. This sculpture of bearded man that looks old and wise. This piece has curly hair, bushy eyebrows, and very wide/big eyes. The piece is is classified as a sculpture,...

Kashimiri Papier Mache Art: a Unique Dying Art Form

Kashmir has been wrought in conflict and upheaval for decades now, but its wonderful valleys give us a unique gift of native craftsmanship – Papier Mache art. Kashmir’s rich cultural past is often overlooked due to its troublesome political past. Its handicrafts and shawls (from...

The Art of the Meddah: Exploring Turkish Forms of Storytelling

Culture is the conglomeration of the beliefs and art forms of societiesm across places, along a long-time frame. And quite evidently, the Republic of Turkey has an extremely long history and a resultantly rich diversity in its culture. Throughout its history, the Turkish land was...

The Way Technologies Transform Already Existing Art Forms

Compelling games are not the consequences of accidents, any more than are riveting novels, movies, or music. Creators for all these medias draw on well-established set of strategies and techniques to create a particular emotional experience. Musicians, for example, may create tension through reiteration and...

How Shemistry Influenced the History and Presentation of Art

Chemistry is everywhere in our life. Of course, chemistry is also closely related to art. There are many forms of art, such as oil painting, gouache, watercolor and so on. These painting forms are inseparable from products such as pigments and watercolors, which are based...

Critical Understanding of the Sculptural Art of Alexander Calder

Calder was an American sculptor from Pennsylvania. His father, Alexander Stirling Calder was a sculptor and his mother a painter. Him and his family were constantly on the move around the country throughout Calder’s childhood due to his dads work. And through this Calder was...

Discussion on the Relationship Between Intelligence and Creativity

The relationship between intelligence and creativity has been subjected to research for many years. Unfortunately, there is yet no consensus on how these constructs are related. The connection between intelligence and creativity is that they are functions of the brain that handle data to determine...

• Intelligence

Do Schools Kill Creativity: the Issues of Music Education

In the TEDx video entitled, 'Do schools kill creativity?' Sir Ken Robinson discusses what he believes to be the main problem with our education system, providing a series of funny anecdotes and facts appropriate for his argument. After watching this video about 'Do schools kill...

Creative and Critical Thinking: Combining the Achievements of Thought

Creative, one word that can be interpreted in many ways whether in thoughts which is include ways of thinking and actions and also in verbal form. Critical, on the other side refers to the ability to analyse information objectively and make a reasoned judgment. It...

• Critical Thinking

Culture, Art and Creativity: the Way They Are Related

Art is a reflection of your thinking, your ideas, and your surroundings, the artist adopts his or her surroundings and then by using their imagination, outside thinking and their perspective they present a new face of it in front of the world. Art and creativity...

• Cultural Anthropology

Accessing the World of Theatre: Musicals and Music Theatre

Goodwin (2019) states music theatre is a type of stage performance using music from various forms such as ballets, operas, cabarets, and contemporary music. Musical theatre uses different techniques (e.g. music, dance, songs, acting as well as spoken dialogue) to tell a story to the...

Drawing for Architecture: A Key to Understanding Complex Designs

Architecture the word from Latin is called “architectura” originally from the Greek “arkhitekton”. Architectural drawing has never been taken for granted. All things we design and sketch are from our thinking to our hands. Therefore, drawings are the main development to architectural projects. When designing,...

Architecture: Bridging Vision into Reality

Architecture can be defined in various ways, but if I were to define it, I would simply use these following words, ‘Architecture is an abstract language that bridges a vision into reality.’ I think everyone would agree that architecture is best paired with great effort...

• Interior Design

The Development of Nationalism & Regionalism in Australian Architecture

Introduction From the 1880s, “nationalism” and “regionalism” had been started to be two of the keywords on the Australian development of architecture. These two words point toward the nation’s sake of rejecting foreign architectural approaches and seeking of the local architectural characteristics in Australia. During...

• Modern Architecture

Architecture: A Means to Improve People's Quality of Life

Introduction  “Architecture is about finding imaginative, creative solutions to improving people’s quality of life.” - Alejandro Aravena Architecture was born approach back in the prehistoric age, once the first man determined to come back up with shelters made up of twigs and bones. architecture isn't...

• Quality of Life

Architecture and its Role in Nation Building: A Critical Review

Brief introduction on architecture and how its spaces are perceived The universal definition of architecture as a synthesis of ‘art’ and ‘science’ is inadequate in the present democratic, globalized, and information world of the 21st century. Many modern good-looking buildings with sound structures have been...

Romanticism Paintings Analysis: The Raft of Medusa and Liberty Leading the People

I will be focusing on romanticism that is based on emotions and sublimity. I will be displaying the features of romantic art by analysing two paintings from the 19th century. These are The Raft of Medusa by Theodore Gericault (1819; Louvre Museum, Paris), oil on...

• Romanticism

The Ideas Behind The Persistence of Memory and Pillars of Society

George Grosz, Pillars of Society (1926) George Grosz was born in Berlin on July 26, 1893, he studied at Dresden Art Academy and began his career as a cartoonist. He later joined a Dada movement in 1917. And he was a famous figure in Neue...

• Salvador Dali

The Persistence of Memory, Starry Night and Analysis of Other Paintings

Dreams are something that everyone is or was able to have at one point in their life. Dreams are defined as, 'a series of thoughts, images, and sensations occurring in a person's mind during sleep.' Many artists create their artworks from their dreams or other...

• Vincent Van Gogh

The System Of Education: If I Could Change The World

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• Importance of Education

Expressive Art: Is Graffiti Art Or Vandalism

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Why Is Art Important For Human

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The Doll`s House" By H. Ibsen: Nora Helmer Character Analysis

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• A Doll's House

Why Is Graffiti Are Not Vandalism

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My Take On Comedy: From Tartuffe To Sylvia And Cards Against Humanity

Defining comedy is extremely difficult. When something happens that makes you laugh, whether that is in a play or in real life, it’s difficult to pin down why you laughed, to begin with. I find myself defining comedy as a series of events that went...

Attitudes Towards Consumerism in Contemporary Art

In this essay I will be using information gathered from my own personal research, studio research and relevant topics discussed throughout the lectures. Whilst also, considering social, economic, and cultural factors. I will be discussing and analyzing attitudes towards consumerism in Contemporary Art. Built from...

• Consumerism

One of the Most Common Forms of Theatre

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The Practice of Art Forgery and Monet's Aesthetic Flaws

A forgery is a work that is not genuine to its proclaimed origins, however, is presented as a genuine article, and is so acting with the intention to deceive. The practice of art forgery is as well established and mature as the practice of creating...

• Claude Monet

Visual Verbal Essay on Wilfred Owen and Franz Marc

This essay explores two artists, Franz Marc, Brett Whitely and two of their artworks depicting animal scenes. Franz Marc’s ‘Tiger’, ‘Blue Horse 1’ and Brett Whitley’s Giraffe and Hyena. These four artworks will be compared and contrasted using the structural and the subjective frame. In...

• Wilfred Owen

The Role of Creative Industries in the United Kingdom

In this essay I will go over and talk about the creative industries and the role they play in the United Kingdom, I will look at the history and the development of the Creative Industries and their sectors. I will then look at the wider...

• Great Britain

African Art: West African Sculpting 

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• African Art

Caravaggio's Sacrifice of Isaac by Abraham Due to Divine Intervention

First of all, there are several juxtapositions present throughout the painting. For example, there is a dichotomous relationship between the cold sensuality in the foreground and the pastoral beauty in the background. Secondly, Caravaggio manages to convey the sensational struggle present between the unconditional loyalty...

Greetings From the 1970s Contemporary Photography

The term contemporary refers to things happening in the same period of or in the style of the present or recent times so when referring to contemporary photography that is only basic modern 21st-century pictures or videos.. Over the past years, something called 'the medium'...

• Photography

Claude Monet and Modern Art Today

“Claude Monet” was a famous French painter who used to catch his everyday life's best minutes on canvas. “Claude Monet” was born on 14 November 1840 and His father was a businessman and his mother was a singer. He is one of the most praised...

The World’s Wife Borrowed From Other Texts

It is often that literature, whether being a poem or a book, often provides a voice for those who lack one. The work by Carol Ann Duffy is an accumulation of poems titled 'The World's Wife', first published in 1999 and the present works through...

• Drama (Play Genre)

Typography: From Billboards to Street Signs

Typography is everywhere we look, in the books we read on the websites we visit even in everyday life, from billboards to street signs, product packaging and even on your mobile phone. It is the art and technique of designing and arranging type. Today the...

• Advertising

Rebellious Aspect to Monet’s Personality

Claude Monet is an artist who continues to be adored and held in high esteem even to this day. There may be many who perhaps are not familiar with the name, yet still at least recognise one piece of his work. His paintings are a...

Edgar Degas and His Way of Critics

Mary Cassatt was born in 1844. She was born in what is now known as Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and died on June 14, 1926 at her French home right outside of Paris. Mary was raised in Philadelphia where she spent her childhood with a social privilege...

• Edgar Degas
• Impressionism

The Principles of Art: Movement, Unity, Harmony, Variety

If you were to ask someone “what is art essay”, the majority of people in the world would think of art and immediately their mind would shoot to a painting. The truth is, art is so much more than just a painting. There are thousands...

• Art Movement

Fairy Tale Black Swan Is a Story of a Ballerina

“Black Swan” is not the fairy tale of “swan lake” but a story of a ballerina, Nina. The story begins with the change of the company, the old lead dancer Beth is about to leave. The stage needs a new lead dancer who can act...

The Book Caesar's Commentarii de Bello Calico

One may call war a side effect of human civilization. Nevertheless, it is in a war that people show their best virtues: courage, loyalty, strength, perseverance, and honesty. Nothing is surprising in the fact that texts on this subject have existed since the writing appeared....

Comparing Two Great Pieces by Pablo Picasso and by Francisco Goya

Today I will be comparing and contrasting two great pieces called “GUERNICA” by Pablo Picasso and “THE THIRD OF MAY” by Francisco Goya.The “GUERNICA” by Pablo Picasso was hard to understand at first but the longer you look at it you understand it is a...

• Pablo Picasso

Black Swan is About Destructive Nature of Ballet

Nina Portman is a ballerina in a New York City ballet company whose life, like all those in her profession, is completely consumed with dance. She lives with her obsessive former ballerina mother Erica who exerts a suffocating control over her life. When artistic director...

The Development of Islamic Art

Islamic art is created not only for the Muslim faith, but it consists of artworks such as textiles, architecture, paintings and drawings that were produced in the regions that were once ruled by Muslim empires. Artists from various disciplines take part in collaborative projects and...

• History of Islam
• Islamic Art

Role of Cultural and Religious Pluralism

Cultural pluralism is a term used when smaller groups within a larger society maintain their own unique cultural identities. Migration is a key process that makes significant contribution to the growth of urbanism. Often immigrants belonging to particular region, language, religion ,tribe etc tend to...

• Art and Religion
• Religious Pluralism

John Berger: Understanding His Artwork

John Berger is a remarkable man who enlighten us with his knowledge using one of his brilliant essays “Ways of Seeing.” Berger has concurred the ability to fully understand any artwork and to recognize what is visible before him. He clarifies that there is a...

• John Berger

America’s Contemporary Multimedia Artist Jeff Koons

Jeff Koons is one of America’s most popular contemporary multimedia artists, who believes that art can change lives, give vastness and expand your parameters. Koons was born in York, Pennsylvania in 1955. He studied at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore and the...

• American Culture

The Sistine Chapel Ceiling by Michelangelo

The Sistine Chapel Ceiling (Italian: Volta Della Cappella Sistina), painted by Michelangelo somewhere in the range of 1508 and 1512, is a foundation work of High Renaissance craftsmanship. The Creation of Adam' is one of the nine ceiling boards in the Sistine Chapel portraying scenes...

• Michelangelo

History of Medieval And Byzantine Art Movements

A painting wealthy in color typical for St.George on a rearing white horse, shown against a rocky landscape, slaying the winged monster as it appears before him. An angel crowns St.George with a martyr’s crown, symbolizing the triumph of good over evil. The tower on...

• Byzantine Empire

The Power Of Photography: Capturing Emotions With Camera

Photographs help people preserve memories with its technology, but what is actually happening is much more interesting when thought about in more depth. A moment in time is captured forever, so long as the photograph is kept in good shape. It is the closest people...

Jackson Pollock as an Influential America Artist

The painter Jackson Pollock was an influential America painter and a key person to the abstract expressionist movement. He was born in Cody , Wyoming in 1912 and he was the youngest of 5 brothers. He grew up in Arizona and Chico, California he moved...

• Jackson Pollock

The Girl Who Loved Caravaggio by Belle Ami

The Girl Who Loved Caravaggio by Belle Ami is a romantic suspense thriller and the second book in the Out of Time series. High on the success of finding a centuries-old Leonardo da Vinci painting, Angela Renatus, and her fiance Alex Caine are on a...

The Portrayal of the Culture of Death and Afterlife in Art

Throughout history, different cultures dealt with the concept of death and afterlife according to their beliefs, and developed different perspectives about what happens after the body dies. These ideas were often reflected in their art, literature, and their lifestyle as well. Most cultures produce art...

Art Nouveau and Modernist Movements in Art

Art Nouveau is originated in England. William Morris collaborated with other artists so Art Nouveau was created. It has a wide range of different decorative arts, like architectural, painting, graphic art, and jewelry. It was most popular during the 1890s. Its popularity came to a...

• Art Nouveau
• William Morris

The Famous Michelangelo Merisi Da Caravaggio

The famous Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio produced original paintings, criticizing those who imitated other artists creative styles. He even accused the great Giovanni Baglione and Guido Reni for imitating his uniquely developed techniques. Caravaggio was the building block for modern art and followed by many....

Art of Theatre and French Figure Joan of Arc

Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) is an irish playwright, critic, and political activist. His influence on Western theatre started from the 1880s till after his death. He won the Nobel Prize in literature in 1925 becoming the leading dramatist of his generation. Shaw's first play to bring...

• Joan of Arc

The Beauty and Skill of Ansel Adams’ Photography

Ansel Adams was born in San Francisco, California on February 20, 1902. As a child, Adams had many freedoms and lots of energy. He was an unattractive child, with big dark circles under his eyes, a crooked nose, and large ears. He was often teased...

• Ansel Adams

Holi Festival and Vibrant Celebration of Colors

Holi is a very vibrant celebration of colors. We have to wait for a whole year. So we can enjoy the festival of color. Although, Holi is fun and joyous. It's also immensely damaging to your skin. The colors are not extracted from flowers but...

• Holi Festival

The Struggle of the Graphic Designers and Social Media

Graphic designers relied heavily on word-of-mouth for their works to become popular and to be seen by the public, it was close to impossible to grow an organic dedicated fanbase to follow your work, nowadays with the rise of the internet and social media, you...

• Graphic Design

Some Interesting Facts About Salvador Dali

Salvador Dali was one of the most, if not the most celebrated artist of the 20th century. His art is iconic, his personality, eccentric, his fashion sense, interesting, his style, unique, his showmanship, unforgettable. All these combined to make him an interesting human and a...

Salvador Dali's Biography: Main Topics

 Salvador Dali was born on May 11, 1904 in Figueres, Catalonia, Spain. His father was an atheist lawyer who was very strict in Dali’s upbringing. Dali’s mother, on the other hand, was loving and encouraged him to be artistic. He has an older brother named...

Caravaggio’s Artwork Judith Beheading Holofernes

For this essay, you needed to decide on a painting, Sculpture and other selected types of art work by which ever artist that created them before the 1900’s.Select a topic out of the selection given to do research about the topic and art work to...

William Morris: Arts and Crafts Movement

William Morris was a famous artists who mainly focused on his wallpaper and fabric designs. While he was mainly known for his art, even today, he had many other notable careers and accomplishments, One of them being that he founded the Arts and crafts movement....

Breaking The Parametr In Red Wheelbarrow: Analysis

The most conspicuous element of modernist poetry is the invention and experimentation of new forms of representation. It featured movements such as imagism and symbolism and moved consciously away from naturalism and realism. Ezra Pound was one of the first to delve into this new...

The Importance Of Paying Attention To Detail In Architecture

The architectural detailing process of a project is a long process that includes a lot of steps and patterns to consider. The designing issue is not consecutive for making a theoretical plan for the entire structure, the detailing, and construction of a building. It is...

Depiction Of Revolution In Les Miserables And Musical Theatre

This essay will deliberate the framework of genre, and investigate Musical Theatre, a genre within performing arts. What is Genre? Genre has been around for centuries, it commenced with the Greek philosophers Aristotle and Plato, they created a classification system that would separate literature into...

• Les Miserables

The Concepts Of Love And Hate With Loyalty In "Romeo And Juliet"

Loyalty is a virtue that most people strive for as seen in the play, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, which is about two feuding families, the Montagues and the Capulets. Romeo, a Montague and Juliet, a Capulet fall in love. Throughout...

• Romeo and Juliet
• William Shakespeare

Romeo And Juliet: The Decision Between Choice And Fate

“God gave us free will, and we may choose to exercise it in ways that end up hurting other people”-Francis Collins. Romeo and Juliet is a tragic play written by Shakespeare, that follows the lives of two star-crossed lovers. The setting of Romeo and Juliet...

Societal Views On Graffiti: Street Art Or Vandalism

When you think of graffiti what’s the first thing that comes to mind? Vandalism or street art? Most would say vandalism, but what makes the distinction between the two? The intention of the piece. There’s a difference between defiling the back of a building and...

Portrayal Of Love And Hate In Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet

Shakespeare’s exploration of themes through tragic conventions make the play, Romeo and Juliet, of enduring relevance to modern audiences. Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet (1595) captures audiences through the thrill of lovers from feuding families racing together to their tragic demises. This play explores themes understood...

Graffiti And Street Art As An Act Of Vandalism

It is difficult to apply a single definition to what is considered Art. Whether it can or should be defined has been constantly debated. “The definition of art is controversial in contemporary philosophy. Whether art can be defined has also been a matter of controversy....

Passionate Pursuit: Being Passionate About Art

Different pieces of artwork inspire people all around the world. Artists use a wide variety of techniques to make their work unique. While creating new pieces of art, it is common to look at other artists' work for inspiration. While evaluating their artwork you can...

Andy Warhol's Album Artwork: Don't Judge A Book By Its Cover

As the saying goes, don't judge a book by its cover, or in this case an album, but sometimes it cannot be helped. Custom packaging is an extremely important with any kind of product but despite this album cover art has not always been used...

• Andy Warhol

The Role Of Other Characters In Death Of Romeo And Juliet

Romeo and Juliet is such a tragic love story. It is sad that their lives ended, but that doesn’t mean their love for eachother did; their love may still live on with them in the after life. There are many characters who had a role...

The Presentation Of Love In Romeo And Juliet

Romeo and Juliet is a play written by Shakespeare in the 1500’s. It tells us the tragedy of two young lovers named Romeo and Juliet who fall in love at first sight but can never be together due to their two families conflict which ends...

The Importance Of Different Types Of Love In Romeo And Juliet

Romeo and Juliet is a play written by William Shakespeare during the 16th century that mainly follows the themes of love and tragedy. The intense passion the two lovers from both households have for one another causes the deaths of their friends, family and themselves....

The Use Of Hyperbole And Symbolism In "The Doll's House"

A Doll's House delves into the lives of a young couple living in Victorian era Norway. The play follows Nora through her journey, from her previously unexamined life of domestic, wifely comfort, to questioning the very foundation of everything she used to believe in. Having...

Realism In A Doll's House Play

Realism as a literary movement emerged in the late nineteenth century and extended to the twentieth century, the most important factors that led to the emergence of the period of realism is the horrors that happened to people after the World War, which made the...

20th Century Art: Representational Abstract Art

One of the most influential and significant periods in the history of the arts is the 20th century. It was a period that consisted of many rapid and radical artistic changes that gave birth to endless ideas, possibilities, experiences, and visions. Not only were ideas,...

• Abstract Art

The Opposite Concepts Of Realism Versus Idealism

 Introduction When comparing realism and idealism, the concepts must be understood historically, theoretically and practically. In this essay, a number of steps will be taken to present a thorough overview of the two schools of thought. Firstly, the epistemological and metaphysical questions of philosophy will...

The Abstract Art And Pop Art Artists And Movements

Pop art emerged in the mid 1950s in Britain, then later in the 1950s in the United States of America. Pop art still influences designers and artists to this day, was against abstract expressionists, pop artists saw abstract artists as intense. The art was a...

Romanticism & Realism: Changing Landscapes 

In my essay I will be looking at the contrast between romanticism and photo-realism, how light controls the image and how photographers are able to control how the picture will look like, by the time of day, the angle and being able to change the...

• Romantic Era

The Abstract Art And Expressionism In World War 2

In World War 2, many countries were destroyed by Hitler and his army. There were allies which were the U.S., Britain, France, USSR, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Denmark, Greece, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, South Africa, and Yugoslavia and the axis powers, which were...

Coriolanus: Plutarch's And William Shakespeare's Versions

Two of the greatest contributors to the “Struggle of the Orders” between Plebeians and Patricians were the Patricians’ fears of Plebeian power overshadowing their influence on Roman politics, as well as the issues of grain pricing and distribution. Plutarch’s “Coriolanus” within his Parallel Lives work...

The Definition Of Fate And Free Will In Macbeth

Throughout time, it has been believed that fate has the power to forge one’s destiny. On the other hand though, I believe these choices can defy fate and that fate only manipulates one's mind into choosing their own path. In the play Macbeth, Shakespeare messes...

Reality Of Romanticism And Realism Under The Umbrella Of Gothic Genre

Two of the most common genres of writing that is found in literature belongs to either the Romanticism movement or the Realist/Naturalism movement. While these two movements might seem like they are related to each other, they are very opposite from one another in the...

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By Will Fenstermaker

June 14, 2017

There has never been a time when art critics held more power than during the second half of the twentieth century. Following the Second World War, with the relocation of the world’s artistic epicenter from Paris to New York, a different kind of war was waged in the pages of magazines across the country. As part of the larger “culture wars” of the mid-century, art critics began to take on greater influence than they’d ever held before. For a time, two critics in particular—who began as friends, and remained in the same social circles for much of their lives—set the stakes of the debates surrounding the maturation of American art that would continue for decades. The ideas about art outlined by Clement Greenberg and Harold Rosenberg are still debated today, and the extent to which they were debated in the past has shaped entire movements of the arts. Below are ten works of criticism through which one can trace the mainstreaming of Clement Greenberg’s formalist theory, and how its dismantling led us into institutional critique and conceptual art today.

The American Action Painters

Harold Rosenberg

Harold Rosenberg, a poet who came to art through his involvement with the Artist’s Union and the WPA, was introduced to Jean-Paul Sartre as the “first American existentialist.” Soon, Rosenberg became a contributor to Sartre’s publication in France, for which he first drafted his influential essay. However, when Sartre supported Soviet aggression against Korea, Rosenberg brought his essay to Elaine de Kooning , then the editor of ARTnews , who ran “The American Action Painters” in December, 1952.

RELATED: What Did Harold Rosenberg Do? An Introduction to the Champion of “Action Painting”

Rosenberg’s essay on the emerging school of American Painters omitted particular names—because they’d have been unfamiliar to its original French audience—but it was nonetheless extraordinarily influential for the burgeoning scene of post-WWII American artists. Jackson Pollock claimed to be the influence of “action painting,” despite Rosenberg’s rumored lack of respect for the artist because Pollock wasn’t particularly well-read. Influenced by Marxist theory and French existentialism, Rosenberg conceives of a painting as an “arena,” in which the artist acts upon, wrestles, or otherwise engages with the canvas, in what ultimately amounts to an expressive record of a struggle. “What was to go on the canvas,” Rosenberg wrote, “was not a picture but an event.”

Notable Quote

Weak mysticism, the “Christian Science” side of the new movement, tends … toward easy painting—never so many unearned masterpieces! Works of this sort lack the dialectical tension of a genuine act, associated with risk and will. When a tube of paint is squeezed by the Absolute, the result can only be a Success. The painter need keep himself on hand solely to collect the benefits of an endless series of strokes of luck. His gesture completes itself without arousing either an opposing movement within itself nor the desire in the artist to make the act more fully his own. Satisfied with wonders that remain safely inside the canvas, the artist accepts the permanence of the commonplace and decorates it with his own daily annihilation. The result is an apocalyptic wallpaper.

‘American-Type’ Painting

Clement Greenberg

Throughout the preceding decade, Clement Greenberg, also a former poet, had established a reputation as a leftist critic through his writings with The Partisan Review —a publication run by the John Reed Club, a New York City-centered organization affiliated with the American Communist Party—and his time as an art critic with The Nation . In 1955, The Partisan Review published Greenberg’s “‘American-Type’ Painting,” in which the critic defined the now-ubiquitous term “abstract expressionism.”

RELATED: What Did Clement Greenberg Do? A Primer on the Powerful AbEx Theorist’s Key Ideas

In contrast to Rosenberg’s conception of painting as a performative act, Greenberg’s theory, influenced by Clive Bell and T. S. Eliot, was essentially a formal one—in fact, it eventually evolved into what would be called “formalism.” Greenberg argued that the evolution of painting was one of historical determinacy—that ever since the Renaissance, pictures moved toward flatness, and the painted line moved away from representation. Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso were two of the landmarks of this view. Pollock, who exhibited his drip paintings in 1951, freeing the line from figuration, was for Greenberg the pinnacle of American Modernism, the most important artist since Picasso. (Pollock’s paintings exhibited in 1954, with which he returned to semi-representational form, were regarded by Greenberg as a regression. This lead him to adopt Barnett Newman as his new poster-boy, despite the artist’s possessing vastly different ideas on the nature of painting. For one, Greenberg mostly ignored the Biblical titles of Newman’s paintings.)

Greenberg’s formalist theories were immensely influential over the subsequent decades. Artforum in particular grew into a locus for formalist discourse, which had the early effect of providing an aesthetic toolkit divorced from politic. Certain curators of the Museum of Modern Art, particularly William Rubin, Kirk Varnedoe, and to an extent Alfred Barr are credited for steering the museum in an essentially formalist direction. Some painters, such as Frank Stella , Helen Frankenthaler , and Kenneth Noland, had even been accused of illustrating Greenberg’s theories (and those of Michael Fried, a prominent Greenbergian disciple) in attempt to embody the theory, which was restrictive in its failure to account for narrative content, figuration, identity, politics, and more. In addition, Greenberg’s theories proved well-suited for a burgeoning art market, which found connoisseurship an easy sell. (As the writer Mary McCarthy said, “You can’t hang an event on your wall.”) In fact, the dominance of the term “abstract expressionism” over “action painting,” which seemed more applicable to Pollock and Willem de Kooning than any other members of the New York School, is emblematic of the influence of formalist discourse.

The justification for the term, “abstract expressionist,” lies in the fact that most of the painters covered by it took their lead from German, Russian, or Jewish expressionism in breaking away from late Cubist abstract art. But they all started from French painting, for their fundamental sense of style from it, and still maintain some sort of continuity with it. Not least of all, they got from it their most vivid notion of an ambitious, major art, and of the general direction in which it had to go in their time.

Barbara Rose

Like many critics in the 1950s and 60s, Barbara Rose had clearly staked her allegiance to one camp or the other. She was, firmly, a formalist, and along with Fried and Rosalind Krauss is largely credited with expanding the theory beyond abstract expressionist painting. By 1965, however, Rose recognized a limitation of the theory as outlined by Greenberg—that it was reductionist and only capable of account for a certain style of painting, and not much at all in other mediums.

RELATED: The Intellectual Origins Of Minimalism

In “ABC Art,” published in Art in America where Rose was a contributing editor, Rose opens up formalism to encompass sculpture, which Greenberg was largely unable to account for. The simple idea that art moves toward flatness and abstraction leads, for Rose, into Minimalism, and “ABC Art” is often considered the first landmark essay on Minimalist art. By linking the Minimalist sculptures of artists like Donald Judd to the Russian supremacist paintings of Kasimir Malevich and readymades of Duchamp, she extends the determinist history that formalism relies on into sculpture and movements beyond abstract expressionism.

I do not agree with critic Michael Fried’s view that Duchamp, at any rate, was a failed Cubist. Rather, the inevitability of a logical evolution toward a reductive art was obvious to them already. For Malevich, the poetic Slav, this realization forced a turning inward toward an inspirational mysticism, whereas for Duchamp, the rational Frenchman, it meant a fatigue so enervating that finally the wish to paint at all was killed. Both the yearnings of Malevich’s Slavic soul and the deductions of Duchamp’s rationalist mind led both men ultimately to reject and exclude from their work many of the most cherished premises of Western art in favor of an art stripped to its bare, irreducible minimum.

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

Philip Leider

Despite the rhetorical tendency to suggest the social upheaval of the '60s ended with the actual decade, 1970 remained a year of unrest. And Artforum was still the locus of formalist criticism, which was proving increasingly unable to account for art that contributed to larger cultural movements, like Civil Rights, women’s liberation, anti-war protests, and more. (Tellingly, The Partisan Review , which birthed formalism, had by then distanced itself from its communist associations and, as an editorial body, was supportive of American Interventionism in Vietnam. Greenberg was a vocal hawk.) Subtitled “Art and Politics in Nevada, Berkeley, San Francisco, and Utah,” the editor’s note to the September 1970 issue of Artforum , written by Philip Leider, ostensibly recounts a road trip undertaken with Richard Serra and Abbie Hoffman to see Michael Heizer’s Double Negative in the Nevada desert.

RELATED: A City of Art in the Desert: Behind Michael Heizer’s Monumental Visions for Nevada

However, the essay is also an account of an onsetting disillusion with formalism, which Leider found left him woefully unequipped to process the protests that had erupted surrounding an exhibition of prints by Paul Wunderlich at the Phoenix Gallery in Berkeley. Wunderlich’s depictions of nude women were shown concurrently to an exhibition of drawings sold to raise money for Vietnamese orphans. The juxtaposition of a canonical, patriarchal form of representation and liberal posturing, to which the protestors objected, showcased the limitations of a methodology that placed the aesthetic elements of a picture plane far above the actual world in which it existed. Less than a year later, Leider stepped down as editor-in-chief and Artforum began to lose its emphasis on late Modernism.

I thought the women were probably with me—if they were, I was with them. I thought the women were picketing the show because it was reactionary art. To the women, [Piet] Mondrian must be a great revolutionary artist. Abstract art broke all of those chains thirty years ago! What is a Movement gallery showing dumb stuff like this for? But if it were just a matter of reactionary art , why would the women picket it? Why not? Women care as much about art as men do—maybe more. The question is, why weren’t the men right there with them?

Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?

Linda Nochlin

While Artforum , in its early history, had established a reputation as a generator for formalist theory, ARTnews had followed a decidedly more Rosenberg-ian course, emphasizing art as a practice for investigating the world. The January 1971 issue of the magazine was dedicated to “Women’s Liberation, Woman Artists, and Art History” and included an iconoclastic essay by Linda Nochlin titled “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?”

RELATED: An Introduction to Feminist Art

Nochlin notes that it’s tempting to answer the question “why have there been no great women artists?” by listing examples of those overlooked by critical and institutional organizations (a labor that Nochlin admits has great merit). However, she notes, “by attempting to answer it, they tacitly reinforce its negative implications,” namely that women are intrinsically less capable of achieving artistic merit than men. Instead, Nochlin’s essay functions as a critique of art institutions, beginning with European salons, which were structured in such a way as to deter women from rising to the highest echelons. Nochlin’s essay is considered the beginning of modern feminist art history and a textbook example of institutional critique.

There are no women equivalents for Michelangelo or Rembrandt, Delacroix or Cézanne, Picasso or Matisse, or even in very recent times, for de Kooning or Warhol, any more than there are black American equivalents for the same. If there actually were large numbers of “hidden” great women artists, or if there really should be different standards for women’s art as opposed to men’s—and one can’t have it both ways—then what are feminists fighting for? If women have in fact achieved the same status as men in the arts, then the status quo is fine as it is. But in actuality, as we all know, things as they are and as they have been, in the arts as in a hundred other areas, are stultifying, oppressive, and discouraging to all those, women among them, who did not have the good fortune to be born white, preferably middle class and above all, male. The fault lies not in our stars, our hormones, our menstrual cycles, or our empty internal spaces, but in our institutions and our education.

Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief

Thomas McEvilley

One of the many extrapolations of Nochlin’s essay is that contemporary museum institutions continue to reflect the gendered and racist biases of preceding centuries by reinforcing the supremacy of specific master artists. In a 1984 Artforum review, Thomas McEvilley, a classicist new to the world of contemporary art, made the case that the Museum of Modern Art in New York served as an exclusionary temple to certain high-minded Modernists—namely, Picasso, Matisse, and Pollock—who, in fact, took many of their innovations from native cultures.

RELATED: MoMA Curator Laura Hoptman on How to Tell a Good Painting From a “Bogus” Painting

In 1984, MoMA organized a blockbuster exhibition. Curated by William Rubin and Kirk Varnedoe, both of whom were avowed formalists, “‘Primitivism’ in 20th Century Art: Affinity of the Tribal and the Modern” collected works by European painters like Paul Gaugin and Picasso with cultural artifacts from Zaire, arctic communities, and elsewhere. McEvilley takes aim at the “the absolutist view of formalist Modernism” in which MoMA is rooted. He argues that the removal tribal artifacts from their contexts (for example, many were ritual items intended for ceremonies, not display) and placement of them, unattributed, near works by European artists, censors the cultural contributions of non-Western civilizations in deference to an idealized European genius.

The fact that the primitive “looks like” the Modern is interpreted as validating the Modern by showing that its values are universal, while at the same time projecting it—and with it MoMA—into the future as a permanent canon. A counter view is possible: that primitivism on the contrary invalidates Modernism by showing it to be derivative and subject to external causation. At one level this show undertakes precisely to coopt that question by answering it before it has really been asked, and by burying it under a mass of information.

Please Wait By the Coatroom

Not content to let MoMA and the last vestiges of formalism off the hook yet, John Yau wrote in 1988 an essay on Wifredo Lam, a Cuban painter who lived and worked in Paris among Picasso, Matisse, Georges Braque, and others. Noting Lam’s many influences—his Afro-Cuban mother, Chinese father, and Yoruba godmother—Yau laments the placement of Lam’s The Jungle near the coatroom in the Museum of Modern Art, as opposed to within the Modernist galleries several floors above. The painting was accompanied by a brief entry written by former curator William Rubin, who, Yau argues, adopted Greenberg’s theories because they endowed him with “a connoisseur’s lens with which one can scan all art.”

RELATED: From Cuba With Love: Artist Bill Claps on the Island’s DIY Art Scene

Here, as with with McEvilley’s essay, Yau illustrates how formalism, as adapted by museum institutions, became a (perhaps unintentional) method for reinforcing the exclusionary framework that Nochlin argued excluded women and black artists for centuries.

Rubin sees in Lam only what is in his own eyes: colorless or white artists. For Lam to have achieved the status of unique individual, he would have had to successfully adapt to the conditions of imprisonment (the aesthetic standards of a fixed tradition) Rubin and others both construct and watch over. To enter this prison, which takes the alluring form of museums, art history textbooks, galleries, and magazines, an individual must suppress his cultural differences and become a colorless ghost. The bind every hybrid American artist finds themselves in is this: should they try and deal with the constantly changing polymorphous conditions effecting identity, tradition, and reality? Or should they assimilate into the mainstream art world by focusing on approved-of aesthetic issues? Lam’s response to this bind sets an important precedent. Instead of assimilating, Lam infiltrates the syntactical rules of “the exploiters” with his own specific language. He becomes, as he says, “a Trojan horse.”

Black Culture and Postmodernism

Cornel West

The opening up of cultural discourse did not mean that it immediately made room for voices of all dimensions. Cornel West notes as much in his 1989 essay “Black Culture and Postmodernism,” in which he argues that postmodernism, much like Modernism before it, remains primarily ahistorical, which makes it difficult for “oppressed peoples to exercise their opposition to hierarchies of power.” West’s position is that the proliferation of theory and criticism that accompanied the rise of postmodernism provided mechanisms by which black culture could “be conversant with and, to a degree, participants in the debate.” Without their voices, postmodernism would remain yet another exclusionary movements.

RELATED: Kerry James Marshall on Painting Blackness as a Noun Vs. Verb

As the consumption cycle of advanced multinational corporate capitalism was sped up in order to sustain the production of luxury goods, cultural production became more and more mass-commodity production. The stress here is not simply on the new and fashionable but also on the exotic and primitive. Black cultural products have historically served as a major source for European and Euro-American exotic interests—interests that issue from a healthy critique of the mechanistic, puritanical, utilitarian, and productivity aspects of modern life.

Minimalism and the Rhetoric of Power

Anna C. Chave

In recent years, formalist analysis has been deployed as a single tool within a more varied approach to art. Its methodology—that of analyzing a picture as an isolated phenomena—remains prevalent, and has its uses. Yet, many of the works and movements that rose to prominence under formalist critics and curators, in no small part because of their institutional acceptance, have since become part of the rearguard rather than the vanguard.

In a 1990 essay for Arts Magazine , Anna Chave analyzes how Minimalist sculpture possesses a “domineering, sometimes brutal rhetoric” that was aligned with “both the American military in Vietnam, and the police at home in the streets and on university campuses across the country.” In particular, Chave is concerned with the way Minimalist sculptures define themselves through a process of negation. Of particular relevance to Chave’s argument are the massive steel sculptures by Minimalist artist Richard Serra.

Tilted Arc was installed in Federal Plaza in lower Manhattan in 1981. Chave describes the work as a “mammoth, perilously tilted steel arc [that] formed a divisive barrier too tall to see over, and a protracted trip to walk around.” She writes, “it is more often the case with Serra that his work doesn’t simply exemplify aggression or domination, but acts it out.” Tilted Arc was so controversial upon its erecting that the General Services Administration, which commissioned the work, held hearings in response to petitions demanding the work be removed. Worth quoting at length, Chave writes:

A predictable defense of Serra’s work was mounted by critics, curators, dealers, collectors, and some fellow artists…. The principle arguments mustered on Serra’s behalf were old ones concerning the nature and function of the avant-garde…. What Rubin and Serra’s other supporters declined to ask is whether the sculptor really is, in the most meaningful sense of the term, an avant-garde artist. Being avant-garde implies being ahead of, outside, or against the dominant culture; proffering a vision that implicitly stands (at least when it is conceived) as a critique of entrenched forms and structures…. But Serra’s work is securely embedded within the system: when the brouhaha over Arc was at its height, he was enjoying a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art…. [The defense’s] arguments locate Serra not with the vanguard but with the standing army or “status quo.” … More thoughtful, sensible, and eloquent testimony at the hearing came instead from some of the uncouth:

My name is Danny Katz and I work in this building as a clerk. My friend Vito told me this morning that I am a philistine. Despite that I am getting up to speak…. I don’t think this issue should be elevated into a dispute between the forces of ignorance and art, or art versus government. I really blame government less because it has long ago outgrown its human dimension. But from the artists I expected a lot more. I didn’t expect to hear them rely on the tired and dangerous reasoning that the government has made a deal, so let the rabble live with the steel because it’s a deal. That kind of mentality leads to wars. We had a deal with Vietnam. I didn’t expect to hear the arrogant position that art justifies interference with the simple joys of human activity in a plaza. It’s not a great plaza by international standards, but it is a small refuge and place of revival for people who ride to work in steel containers, work in sealed rooms, and breathe recirculated air all day. Is the purpose of art in public places to seal off a route of escape, to stress the absence of joy and hope? I can’t believe this was the artistic intention, yet to my sadness this for me has become the dominant effect of the work, and it’s all the fault of its position and location. I can accept anything in art, but I can’t accept physical assault and complete destruction of pathetic human activity. No work of art created with a contempt for ordinary humanity and without respect for the common element of human experience can be great. It will always lack dimension.

The terms Katz associated with Serra’s project include arrogance and contempt, assault, and destruction; he saw the Minimalist idiom, in other words, as continuous with the master discourse of our imperious and violent technocracy.

The End of Art

Arthur Danto

Like Greenberg, Arthur Danto was an art critic for The Nation . However, Danto was overtly critical of Greenberg’s ideology and the influence he wielded over Modern and contemporary art. Nor was he a follower of Harold Rosenberg, though they shared influences, among them the phenomenologist Maurice Merleau-Ponty. Danto’s chief contribution to contemporary art was his advancing of Pop Artists, particularly Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein .

In “The End of Art” Danto argues that society at large determines and accepts art, which no longer progresses linearly, categorized by movements. Instead, viewers each possess a theory or two, which they use to interpret works, and art institutions are largely tasked with developing, testing, and modifying various interpretive methods. In this way, art differs little from philosophy. After decades of infighting regarding the proper way to interpret works of art, Danto essentially sanctioned each approach and the institutions that gave rise to them. He came to call this “pluralism.”

RELATED: What Was the Pictures Generation?

Similarly, in “Painting, Politics, and Post-Historical Art,” Danto makes the case for an armistice between formalism and the various theories that arose in opposition, noting that postmodern critics like Douglas Crimp in the 1980s, who positioned themselves against formalism, nonetheless adopted the same constrictive air, minus the revolutionary beginnings.

Modernist critical practice was out of phase with what was happening in the art world itself in the late 60s and through the 1970s. It remained the basis for most critical practice, especially on the part of the curatoriat, and the art-history professoriat as well, to the degree that it descended to criticism. It became the language of the museum panel, the catalog essay, the article in the art periodical. It was a daunting paradigm, and it was the counterpart in discourse to the “broadening of taste” which reduced art of all cultures and times to its formalist skeleton, and thus, as I phrased it, transformed every museum into a Museum of Modern Art, whatever that museum’s contents. It was the stable of the docent’s gallery talk and the art appreciation course—and it was replaced, not totally but massively, by the postmodernist discourse that was imported from Paris in the late 70s, in the texts of Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, Jean Baudrillard, Jean-François Lyotard, and Jacques Lacan, and of the French feminists Hélène Cixous and Luce Irigaray. That is the discourse [Douglas] Crimp internalizes, and it came to be lingua artspeak everywhere. Like modernist discourse, it applied to everything, so that there was room for deconstructive and “archeological” discussion of art of every period.

Editor’s Note: This list was drawn in part from a 2014 seminar taught by Debra Bricker Balken in the MFA program in Art Writing at the School of Visual Arts titled Critical Strategies: Late Modernism/Postmodernism. Additional sources can be found here , here , here (paywall), and here . Also relevant are reviews of the 2008 exhibition at the Jewish Museum, “Action/Abstraction: Pollock, de Kooning, and American Art, 1940–1976,” notably those by Roberta Smith , Peter Schjeldahl , and Martha Schwendener .

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ARTS - Herzberg: Writing Essays About Art

• Art History
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• Citation Help

What is a Compare and Contrast Essay?

What is a compare / contrast essay.

In Art History and Appreciation, contrast / compare essays allow us to examine the features of two or more artworks.

• Comparison -- points out similarities in the two artworks
• Contrast -- points out the differences in the two artworks

Why would you want to write this type of essay?

• To inform your reader about characteristics of each art piece.
• To show a relationship between different works of art.
• To give your reader an insight into the process of artistic invention.
• Use your assignment sheet from your class to find specific characteristics that your professor wants you to compare.

How is Writing a Compare / Contrast Essay in Art History Different from Other Subjects?

You should use art vocabulary to describe your subjects..

• Find art terms in your textbook or an art glossary or dictionary

You should have an image of the works you are writing about in front of you while you are writing your essay.

• The images should be of  high enough quality that you can see the small details of the works. 
• You will use them when describing visual details of each art work.

Works of art are highly influenced by the culture, historical time period and movement in which they were created.

• You should gather information about these BEFORE you start writing your essay.

If you describe a characteristic of one piece of art, you must describe how the OTHER piece of art treats that characteristic.

Example:  You are comparing a Greek amphora with a sculpture from the Tang Dynasty in China.

If you point out that the color palette of the amphora is limited to black, white and red, you must also write about the colors used in the horse sculpture.

Organizing Your Essay

Thesis statement.

The thesis for a comparison/contrast essay will present the subjects under consideration and indicate whether the focus will be on their similarities, on their differences, or both.

Thesis example using the amphora and horse sculpture -- Differences:

While they are both made from clay, the Greek amphora and the Tang Dynasty horse served completely different functions in their respective cultures.

Thesis example -- Similarities:

Ancient Greek and Tang Dynasty ceramics have more in common than most people realize.

Thesis example -- Both:

The Greek amphora and the Tang Dynasty horse were used in different ways in different parts of the world, but they have similarities that may  not be apparent to the casual viewer.

Visualizing a Compare & Contrast Essay: 

Introduction (1-2 paragraphs) .

• Creates interest in your essay
• Introduces the two art works that you will be comparing.
• States your thesis, which mentions the art works you are considering and may indicate whether the focus will be on similarities, differences, or both. 

Body paragraphs 

• Make and explain a point about the first subject and then about the second subject 
• Example: While both superheroes fight crime, their motivation is vastly different. Superman is an idealist, who fights for justice …… while Batman is out for vengeance. 

Conclusion (1-2 paragraphs) 

• Provides a satisfying finish 
• Leaves your reader with a strong final impression. 

Downloadable Essay Guide

• How to Write a Compare and Contrast Essay in Art History Downloadable version of the description on this LibGuide.

Questions to Ask Yourself After You Have Finished Your Essay

• Are all the important points of comparison or contrast included and explained in enough detail?
• Have you addressed all points that your professor specified in your assignment?
• Do you use transitions to connect your arguments so that your essay flows into a coherent whole, rather than just a random collection of statements?
• Do your arguments support your thesis statement?

Art Terminology

• British National Gallery: Art Glossary Includes entries on artists, art movements, techniques, etc.

Lee College Writing Center

Writing Center tutors can help you with any writing assignment for any class from the time you receive the assignment instructions until you turn it in, including:

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Other Compare / Contrast Writing Resources

• Southwestern University Guide for Writing About Art This easy to follow guide explains the basic of writing an art history paper.
• Purdue Online Writing Center: writing essays in art history Describes how to write an art history Compare and Contrast paper.
• Stanford University: a brief guide to writing in art history See page 24 of this document for an explanation of how to write a compare and contrast essay in art history.
• Duke University: writing about paintings Downloadable handout provides an overview of areas you should cover when you write about paintings, including a list of questions your essay should answer.
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• Last Updated: Jun 19, 2023 4:30 PM
• URL: https://lee.libguides.com/Arts_Herzberg

Writing About Art

• Introduction

This text is intended to help students improve their ability to write about visual things.  I explain the most common types of analysis used by art historians and a little bit about how these methods developed.  This is not a history of art history, however, nor is it an introduction to the theory and methods of art history.  Major scholars are not mentioned and complicated ideas have been presented only in terms relevant to their practical application.  It also is not a guide to learning how to look at art.  For that, Joshua Taylor’s Learning to Look remains unsurpassed. 3

Almost all of my examples come from texts written in English.  Translations change exactly what is of greatest interest here: the words and concepts used by good writers about art. Furthermore, there is a history to the language used in English by art historians.  Sometimes this has shaped the meaning of a term, occasionally in significant ways.  A few examples will be discussed below.  Even in their use of ordinary words, however, these writers can serve as models.  Their vocabulary and ideas offer a wealth of contributions to the internal resources upon which we all draw when we write.  The more developed these resources are, the more fluent and expressive writing based upon them will be.

Painting, sculpture, and architecture have been considered the major forms of the fine arts during much of the Western tradition.  They have attracted many of the most ambitious artists and, consequently, more attention from art historians.  Architecture, however, like video and electronic mediums, requires a specialized descriptive and analytical vocabulary.  Just as the art historical methods I explain are the ones most commonly used, so the forms of art discussed in the passages I have selected are those most frequently covered in art history courses.  For the same reason, most of the art analyzed in the text comes from the West.

I have not included any reproductions, in the hope that more attention will be given to the passages quoted.  Glancing at a picture and then skimming text about it is not the same as trying to create a mental image of something from words alone.  The absence of illustrations also should make it easier for each reader to decide which words seem particularly effective in communicating information about visual things.  However, I have given enough information about each work so that a picture of it can be found without difficulty. Many of them will be familiar from art history surveys.

Another editorial decision I made was to cite the names of the authors quoted within my text.  The normal practice of putting that information in the notes makes it easier for the reader, who is given a smoothly flowing argument instead of one constantly interrupted by names and book titles.  Here, however, since my subject is writing, identifying the writer with the passage seemed useful.  The most important art historians of the past have birth and death dates in parentheses after the first mention of their names.

This is a guide to writing about art, not to writing itself.  It is no substitute for a book like The Elements of Style , the classic but still inspiring text by William Strunk, Jr. and E.B. White. 4 Nonetheless, I would like to begin with a few fundamental principles.  Paragraphs should be the basic organizing unit of any essay.  Each one should develop a single idea, introduced at the beginning of the paragraph by a topic sentence.  The paragraphs should be organized so that the ideas follow one another in a logical sequence. This means that the topic sentences should form an outline of what the writer intends to express.  Sentences should be complete, and grammar and spelling must be correct.  Words should convey the writer’s meaning as directly as possible.

The choice of which verb tenses to use must be consistent throughout a single piece of writing.  My personal choice is to use the present tense for anything that still exists, like a work of art or a book, and the past tense for a completed action.  In other words, Michelangelo sculpted David (because he did it centuries ago), but David shows Michelangelo's interest in the Classical conception of the nude male body (because it still does).  This seems to me the most logical approach, although sometimes it leads to awkward phrasing.  Many people use the present tense for both cases.  In other words, Michelangelo uses the Classical conception of the nude male body in his sculpture David .  Whatever the choice, it must be adhered to throughout any particular essay.

To be effective, a paper must be directed toward a single goal.  The purpose matters to the writer and it matters to the reader, who will have expectations about what comes next based on what has been promised.  Writing intended to evoke a vivid impression of a work of art has to present very different information from an interpretation of the subject that depends upon detailed historical arguments.  For this reason, it is important to let the reader know as soon as possible what kind of analysis will follow.  Every aspect of the paper should contribute to it.

Success is measured by how well the intended meaning has been communicated to the intended reader.  There is no substitute for having someone read a draft, or for putting a paper aside and returning to revise it later.  Even before that, though, a writer should try to assess the clarity and logic of the presentation.  Underlining topic sentences to see if they really do outline the argument is helpful. Quickly sketching elements mentioned in a visual description is another revealing exercise. If there is no place in the drawing for a particular detail, it has been introduced at the wrong point in the essay or essential elements have been neglected. Most of all, the writer should be prepared to revise and revise and revise.  Good papers never just happen.

• Formal Analysis
• Personal Style
• Period Style
• "Realistic"
• The Biography
• Iconographic Analysis
• Historical Analysis
• Bibliography
• Appendix I: Writing the Paper
• Appendix II: Citation Forms
• Visual Description
• Stylistic Analysis
• Doing the Research
• The First Draft
• The Final Paper
• About the Author

© Marjorie Munsterberg 2008-2009

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• OWL Purdue - Chicago Style The OWL Purdue is a great resource for writing and citation help. Chicago Style is the preferred citation format for art history. The OWL also includes citation help for other styles include APA and MLA.

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Write about Art

• Last Updated: Oct 20, 2023 7:31 AM
• URL: https://guides.lib.utexas.edu/art

Introduction to Art 30,000 years of human creativity

The history of art is a vast story of human creativity, a record of our passions and struggles from before written history through today. Obelisk is a free, online art history textbook, sharing the wild, tragic and inspiring stories of artists and their work from 30,000 BCE through Modern Art. Obelisk is designed for discovery, a cross-linked web of artworks, biographies and writings, a choose-your-own-adventure where every path leads you to something new and interesting.

Meet the artists , discover artwork , or explore the timeline . But if you'd like to learn more about how to look at and understand art, the next few pages describe the visual language of art, the ways we can understand it, and why art is important. So dig in!

Defining ‘Art’

Categorizing Art

Can we make sense of it all?

Is there such a thing as Bad Art?

Yes, but it's complicated

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Beyond the Mainstream: Essays on Modern and Contemporary Art

Abstract:  This selection of essays by a prominent art historian, critic and curator of modern art examines the art and artists of the twentieth century who have operated outside the established art world. In a lucid and accessible style, Peter Selz explores modern art as it is reflected, and has had an impact on, the tremendous transformations of politics and culture, both in the United States and in Europe. An authoritative overview of a neglected phenomenon, his essays explore the complex relationship between art at the periphery and art at the putative center, and how marginal art has affected that of the mainstream. Author:  Peter Selz Publication date:  January 28, 1998 Publication type:  Book

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Books about Art writing

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• Last Updated: Nov 16, 2023 12:55 PM
• URL: https://libguides.sjsu.edu/ART100W

University of Iowa Press

Art Essays is a passionate collection of the best essays on the visual arts written by contemporary novelists. This vibrant and diverse selection includes essays by award-winning writers such as Zadie Smith, Chris Kraus, Teju Cole, Orhan Pamuk, and Jhumpa Lahiri. From the art of Sonia Delaunay to contemporary photography, from the docks of Malaysia to Leonora Carrington’s home in Mexico City, and from reflections on modern Black British paintings to meditations on the female gaze, these essays bring together blazing insights to the visual world, with personal, intimate reflections. With an introduction by literary critic and editor Alexandra Kingston-Reese, Art Essays is an enthralling vision of a new wave of literary essays shaping contemporary culture.

“As joyous as it is intelligent,  Art Essays  proves once and for all that the best essays enchant us with the same splendor and humor and passion as the best novels or the most striking paintings.”—Merve Emre, University of Oxford

“This brilliantly stimulating book canonizes the art essay as the form of the moment and shows what it makes possible. Boldly claiming that the novel is now a satellite orbiting the essay, it gathers essays by exciting contemporary novelists on art and watches the critical, creative, and formal sparks fly.”—Kathryn Murphy, University of Oxford 

Chloe Aridjis Tash Aw Claire-Louise Bennett Teju Cole Geoff Dyer Sheila Heti Katie Kitamura Chris Kraus Jhumpa Lahiri Ben Lerner Orhan Pamuk Ali Smith Zadie Smith Heidi Sopinka Hanya Yanagihara

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Angel De Cora, Karen Thronson, and the Art of Place

Playful Letters

Art Quilts of the Midwest

Writing Center

Strategic enrollment management and student success, writing about art.

"Writing about art may seem like a paradox: to translate into words works that were created to say what words cannot." Catherine Rickets

Introduction

Writing about art, especially your own art, might be intimidating and even seem nonsensical.

The reality for professional artists is that writing is part of the job , no matter what their preferred medium.

Unfortunately, it’s not sustainable to just love art .

Any artist who wants to sell their work or live off the craft they love so much will need to be able to write about their art and articulate their artistic vision.

We hope this brief guide will help you discover strategies for writing effectively about your art.

Applications

Let's take a look at some real-world applications of when you might be asked to write (or even talk) about your art:

• AFO Major Declaration This is coming up near the end of your AFO year at VCU!
• Artist's Website Great for marketing and promotion.
• Job/Internship Applications Staples for getting work.
• Artist Statements The foundational piece of writing for the artist.
• Cover Letters Often the first impression during the interviewing process.
• Narrative Art Develops the storytelling of your work.
• Exhibitions/Shows Provides context for your viewers.

Tips and Tricks

Here are some general suggestions to follow when writing about your artistic vision and ideas:

• Instead, take your reader on a journey.  Remember that art is an interactive experience! Think about the little experiences that lead to growth and breakthroughs. Focus on your current work rather than your past, or talk about where you find joy in your art and how that connects to what you want to do with your work.
• Instead, focus on substance.  Consider the needs of your reader and what they would find enjoyable or frustrating. Play to your strengths! Favor clarity and relatability over a thesaurus.
• Instead, use confident language.  Active verbs like explores , examines , questions  or challenges can be more engaging and talk about what your art actually does, rather than what it wants to do.
• Instead , utilize your own voice.  Your audience wants to get to know you through your art and the things you have to say about your art, not someone else's ideas.

A Note on Accessibility of Language

Focus on using language that accommodates people of all ages and abilities, including those with cognitive disabilities, low literacy skills, and those whose first language is not the same as yours.

Consider the following:

• Use an active voice instead of a passive voice
• Avoid filler phrases
• Write out any acronyms you need to use
• Use examples or analogies to convey more complicated ideas

Let's take a look at some examples of writing about an artist's work:

Artist Statement

• “When people ask me what my work is about, I can only answer “everything!” My paintings come from my daily life, and are attempts to make sense of the world. They express my wishes and dreams for a better world, they celebrate happy occasions, my sadness and frustration, as I explore life’s dualities.”  Mary Edwards

Email Pitch to a Gallery

“My name is Kelsey Rodriguez and I’m a young, emerging abstract artist in Minnesota. My work is inspired by the brilliant colors and motions of the universe and the ongoing discoveries of extrasolar planets. I typically work in fluid acrylics on round wood panels of various sizes. I would love the opportunity to be represented by your gallery. My work typically retails for around $100-$600 depending on size.” Kelsey Rodriguez

About the Artist (Promotional Website)

• “Sheona Hamilton-Grant is a graphite artist who works exclusively in black and white, creating photorealist works whose subjects are domestic animals and their interaction with humans. For her, the power of the pencil is its simplicity, and its effectiveness as a vehicle for applying the philosophy less is more. Throughout her work, Sheona reveals a deep appreciation for animals and their relationship with humans. The intricate detail and anatomical precision of the work, more than just an attempt to duplicate reality, serve to explore the whole context of domestication." Adam Eisenstat

Museum Label

• “Idelle Weber is associated with the Photorealists. In the early 1970s she became interested in studying and depicting the piles of cast-off objects lying along city gutters and sidewalks. Weber searched city streets for accidental arrangements of litter that she found evocative in terms of color, shape and texture." The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art

Practice writing about your preferences, artistic work, and life experiences by responding to the following prompts:

• Look at your latest project. Write out a list of specific adjectives that describes your work. Connect these adjectives to your senses.
• You have a chance to mentor an incoming AFO student at VCU. What would you share with them about your experience?
• What do you consider to be uninteresting in your chosen field of study? Why did you choose these aspects or elements?
• How have you changed as an artist from your Freshman year of high school to now? Describe at least one major transition or turning point in your artistic or educational experience.

The following activities might help you to engage with more writing about art:

• Go to a local museum. Spend time experiencing the art and reading the labels attached to each piece you come across. Talk to the staff about the art.
• Browse the internet for different artists' websites or social media pages. Read each artist's biography or "About Me" section. Explore the use of adjectives and narratives in these descriptions.
• Pull out an art history textbook or a printer art magazine or journal. Find descriptions of the art and the featured artists.
• Draft your own artist statement, biography, or major declaration essay. Visit the VCU Writing Center and discuss your work with a writing consultant.

By following these tips, guidelines, and activities, we hope that you will feel more confident in your ability to effectively write about your artistic process and vision.

Remember that writing is a practice like any other: the more you try your hand at it, the more comfortable and skilled you will become. Make use of your teachers, peers, and campus resources. We are here to help!

Best of luck to you as you continue on in your personal and professional development. Stay curious, passionate, and dedicated.

Happy writing!

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Art » Photography

Rachel cohen on writing about art.

Bernard Berenson: A Life in the Picture Trade by Rachel Cohen

Good writing about visual experience allows us to see things we otherwise wouldn't, says Rachel Cohen . The author picks some of her own favourite books about art.

Interview by Sophie Roell , Editor

The Ongoing Moment by Geoff Dyer

Poets on Painters: Essays on the Art of Painting by Twentieth-Century Poets by J. D. McClatchy

Still Life With A Bridle by Zbigniew Herbert

Tiepolo Pink by Roberto Calasso

Dreaming by the Book by Elaine Scarry

1 The Ongoing Moment by Geoff Dyer

2 poets on painters: essays on the art of painting by twentieth-century poets by j. d. mcclatchy, 3 still life with a bridle by zbigniew herbert, 4 tiepolo pink by roberto calasso, 5 dreaming by the book by elaine scarry.

W hat role does writing about art play, in an age when it’s relatively easy to see an image directly – whether it’s via the Internet or going to a museum?

Let’s talk about the books you’ve chosen, starting with Geoff Dyer’s book about photography , The Ongoing Moment .

Yes, Geoff Dyer is a devotee of John Berger , who is another person who I could definitely have included. I chose mostly to bring together books that I’m currently engaged with, in trying to write about visual experience myself for the notebook I keep online. One of the things that’s really striking about Geoff’s book — and all of these books — is that “ways of seeing,” in Berger’s phrase, are so idiosyncratic. Different individuals see so particularly and part of the joy of reading a book like this is getting to encounter his way of seeing. He sees things in these photographs that I would never have noticed, and his way of assembling them allows you to have a new vision of these images.

Part of what I love in the book is that it’s beautifully structured, it’s built around certain ideas or content that recurs through different photographs. So there’s a long loop on the hat, there’s another one on benches, there’s ones on bodies. As you read through them, you have this sense of the way photographers themselves feel images in their mind. They see an earlier photographer’s picture of a hat, and then that becomes part of their own understanding, so that when they photograph hats they’re always alluding to the earlier images. This is maybe a property peculiar to photography — the incredible liquidity with which this referentiality happens —  and Geoff, who also loves jazz, has a very fine eye and ear for this kind of cross-referencing that the artists themselves are doing. I think that really helps you to see photography in a different way and to experience these pictures as the photographers experienced them. You feel as if you’re entering into the way that photographers themselves are working and thinking.

Is it Geoff’s interpretation of the way they’re working and thinking or are the photographers consciously thinking that way?

You can’t know that. But the images are very striking in their resemblances, you feel their connectedness. It doesn’t have to be a conscious reference, or an acknowledged one, in order for it to be valuable for a viewer. That’s a thing about visual work in general, that’s like writing. In writing, you’re always learning from other writers, you’re always redoing things that other writers have done. So are painters and photographers. Even if it’s far back in the mind of the practitioner, it can still be very interesting for a viewer to see. We assume in painting that painters are conscious of the whole history of art and that they will have seen many of the great works of art and will have thought about them. The same is true in photography. I know that photographers are avid consumers of photographs, but I just hadn’t thought about it in quite the way that Geoff does.

So would you say that he is writing about photography in a very unusual way?

Yes, it’s a very brilliant and unusual way of entering this material. People tend to isolate photographers and write monographs about one at a time. If they’re writing about groups of photographers, they tend to write about them like a group that all existed together at the same chronological moment, and not to trace these kinds of lineages that descend over time and loop around.

I have a soft spot for Geoff Dyer because when his first novel, The Colour of Memory, came out he used one of my brother’s paintings on the front cover. This is before he was famous, so now when I see how well he’s doing, I feel pleased.

Your next choice is a collection of essays by famous poets, including Ted Hughes and W.B. Yeats, called Poets on Painters . Tell me a bit more what it’s about.

This is a wonderful anthology edited by J.D. McClatchy. It brings together roughly a century of Anglo-American poets writing about painting. It starts with Yeats and goes all the way up through Richard Howard and John Ashbery. It has a very quirky sensibility. McClatchy says that he wanted to bring together an Anglo-American tradition of poets writing about painting. It’s sort of hard to say what the tradition might be, and he lets the different pieces speak for themselves. He says they all have an interest in style and that’s definitely true. You can really feel the individual voices of the poets in the things they’ve chosen to talk about and in the way they’ve chosen to talk about them.

“What there is to see in most images changes a lot over time”

I love the book for its surprises, it’s like a little treasure chest. Every time I go back to it, I find some essay that I didn’t pay attention to before that’s somehow revelatory, or just gets my interest going, my attention sharply drawn in one direction or another. This is actually a book that a student of mine gave me, a lovely writer calling Corinne Manning and that’s also nice. I teach writing about the arts , but this wasn’t a book I knew, until this student gave it to me. One of my favourite pieces in it is a piece by Frank O’Hara about Jackson Pollock. That’s an essay I’ve quoted in my own work and returned to repeatedly. It really manages — through both its poet’s sensibility and the proximity of O’Hara to Pollock, he really knew Pollock, and really understood what Pollock’s project was — to bring out a lot of the different dimensions in Pollock’s work that are somewhat subsumed in his current, gigantic status. It’s easy just to be told he’s great painter and not really think about what his project was. For its specificity I really appreciate that essay and many of the essays in that collection.

And the idea is that a poet has a different approach than an art historian?

Your next book is Still Life with a Bridle , the title of a 17th century Dutch painting, and indeed the book, by Zbigniew Herbert, is all about 17th century Dutch painters…

Zbigniew Herbert is a great Polish poet and essayist of the 20th century. I love a lot of his work, and this essay collection is an old favourite. It’s one I’ve read many times and taught many times. He has a few qualities that are unusual in trying to bring a reader into contact with visual material. He doesn’t often describe, in detail, the paintings, although sometimes he does. The pictures are not reproduced in the book, so you don’t see them. But he comes at it through a combination of a wonderful documentation of what material life was like in the 17th century — what people sat on, what they ate, what their rooms were like, what the goods were that were traded and valued — and a propensity to make a strange myth out of what’s known of the biographical details of the lives of the individual painters. So you feel as if you’ve been told fairy tales, at the same time that you feel immersed in the economic history of the moment. That combination is wonderfully evocative for what the paintings themselves are like, although he’s relying on you to carry some images that you may have seen yourself and bring those to bear on the inquiry.

I think it’s really a very unusual and beautiful book. When I’ve taught it to students they’ve been very excited about the way that you think you’re learning about one thing and gradually a picture is emerging in the back of your mind about something else. His control of the different levels of your engagement with the material is really amazing.

So what do you think he’s trying to do in the book?

Let’s go on to your next choice, about the Venetian Rococco painter, Giambattista Tiepolo. It’s called Tiepolo Pink and it’s by Roberto Calasso.

Roberto Calasso is one of the few writers working today where I just read everything he writes. If he writes something, I read it. I think he’s extraordinary.

He is an Italian and his books are translated into English, is that right?

Yes, I read them in English. I think they’re quite well translated. Calasso is somebody with a passion for large mythological structures, like the whole of Greek mythology , the whole of the Vedas . He’s enormously classically educated and has a wonderful book on Kafka also, that treats Kafka’s stories as a kind of inter-connected set of myths. So I was really curious to see what he would do with a painter. It didn’t seem obvious to me that he would be able to bring the same kind of structures to bear on the work of a painter, and I hadn’t paid much attention to Tiepolo until I read this book. But when I did read it I was astonished to see how much of Tiepolo I had missed and also to see how well Calasso’s particular way of approaching material worked with this painter. The book is a structured in a kind of musical scherzo structure —  an A-B-A form — so there’s a middle section that’s got a different melody from the outer sections. That allows you to move from light to dark to light, which is a wonderful metaphor for Tiepolo’s work which is all about light. He looks at groups of pictures, and the way Tiepolo keeps using the same figures in the same kinds of poses and the same props as if he were portraying a kind of travelling company of players. That is really effective, it really allows you to see what Tiepolo was after. So it’s a case of where the particular way of seeing of the writer really is revelatory of what the painter is doing. I went to the Met not long ago to look at Tiepolo under the influence of Calasso and was kind of uplifted by how much better I felt I was seeing. That’s maybe the best measure of whether a book about visual experience is working, whether it returns you to the world with clearer eyes for the particular subject.

Yes, he’s not one of the most well-known of the Italian painters…

Your last choice is a little bit different from the other books you selected. Tell me about Dreaming by the Book , by Elaine Scarry.

This is a book I just read and was very struck by. I wanted to include it because it seemed like an interesting companion to the other books. Elaine Scarry is not writing about painting or photography, she’s writing about novels or poetry in which there is a strong visual experience for the reader. When you’re reading Homer or Wordsworth or Thomas Hardy you have a sharp visual image in your mind. She’s writing, in a way very technically, about what techniques she thinks writers are using to have this evocative effect.  She begins with an interesting paradox. If you’re told, “Imagine the face of a friend,” it’s very hard to call up an image. Your mind doesn’t really do that very readily. But if you’re reading a description of someone’s face, you can get it in your mind quite clearly. The question is, what’s happening in the visual imagination that allows for that ease, that facility of calling up images? She thinks that it actually helps to be instructed, that if you’re told how to look, then your mind enters into a different space and you can call up these images. So she’s looking at the kinds of instruction the great writers use.

“The best measure of whether a book about visual experience is working is whether it returns you to the world with clearer eyes.”

I think she’s quite right, about these kinds of techniques: for example, the way that butterflies and birds and other things allow you to imagine flight or movement through the air. So I was very interested in that. For me, it was also useful because when you’re writing about a painting or photograph there’s always a question, are you trying to get the reader to see the thing? Or are you doing something different? I think both things are valuable. For a writer who is interested in evoking visual material, this is a wonderful book to look at, because it’s so technically clear.

I always read Amazon.com reader reviews because it gives me a good sense of what a range of people think about a book. One such reviewer said about this book, “This book has changed how I read books. Her revelations about technique cannot be undone once learned.” It’s a pretty important book, then?

Yes, it does seem to me it’s very persuasive and unusual. It’s not like anything I’ve ever read before. As a writer, I sometimes did have the feeling that I imagine a dancer might have reading an anatomy book, that you don’t necessarily want the bones laid bare in that way, to know what’s happening in this thing you’re using in this interpretive way. But, at the same time, I thought it was essential reading for someone trying to understand how writers create visual experience.

Yes and that’s useful for all writers  — in the end we all want to create vivid images in readers’ minds…

That’s right, and that’s also why it’s interesting to read books about visual work, even if that’s not your main interest, or even if you think “Well I don’t write about photographs or paintings.” It’s a very concentrated study of how you move around in the world with your eyes, which is surely what a lot of writers are trying to do. It sharpens and it sensitizes things. Going back to your first observation, we live in an ever more visual culture, we see so many more images every minute then people did 20 or 50 years ago. Somehow, interpretation of visual experience has become one of the primary jobs of the writer. Maybe it has always been, but it certainly is now.

April 9, 2014

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Rachel Cohen

Rachel Cohen has written essays for the New Yorker,  the Guardian , the London Review of Books  and the New York Times , amongst others. Her essays have been anthologized in Best American Essays and in the Pushcart Prize Anthology .  Her first book,  A Chance Meeting: Intertwined Lives of American Writers and Artists,  won the PEN/Jerard Fund Award and was named a notable book of the year by the Los Angeles Times and by Maureen Corrigan on National Public Radio.  She is a member of the regular faculty of the creative nonfiction program at Sarah Lawrence College. Her new book is  Bernard Berenson: A Life in the Picture Trade.  She keeps a notebook on looking at art online here .

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Israel’s representative at Venice Biennale shuts down art exhibit, demanding ceasefire and hostage deal

( JTA ) – The artist representing Israel at one of the world’s foremost contemporary art exhibitions is shutting down her exhibit until a deal for a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of hostages is reached.

Ruth Patir, whom Israel selected as its official representative at the Venice Biennale, closed her country’s pavilion on Tuesday with her artwork fully installed inside . To the door she affixed a note reading, “The artist and curators of the Israeli pavilion will open the exhibition when a ceasefire and hostage release agreement is reached.” 

Protests in the art world over Israel’s war with Hamas have become commonplace since Oct. 7 , and some artists unsuccessfully pushed for Israel’s exclusion from the Biennale because of the war. Patir’s action is unusual because she is an Israeli publicly rebuking her government on the world stage.

“I firmly object to [the] cultural boycott, but since I feel there are no right answer[s], and I can only do what I can with the space I have, I prefer to raise my voice with those I stand with in their scream,” Patir wrote on Instagram Tuesday, explaining her decision. “Ceasefire now, bring the people back from captivity. We can’t take it anymore.”

Israel’s government did not know about Patir’s actions before she took them, according to The New York Times. She had been selected as Israel’s official Venice Biennale artist in September, prior to the Oct. 7 Hamas attack and the outbreak of war, and the country has paid for half the costs of the pavilion. 

Since the war began, Patir said she has regularly joined protests in Tel Aviv calling for a ceasefire deal that would release the estimated 130 hostages still being held by Hamas. The protests also oppose Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom the protesters and even some negotiators say has acted with indifference to the plight of the hostages and their families. ( Polls have found that while Netanyahu is deeply unpopular in Israel, most Israelis support continuing the war. )

She came to the decision to shut the pavilion alongside her Israeli curators, Tamar Margalit and Mira Lapidot, who are also supporting the action. A small video installation, connected to Patir’s overall exhibit theme of maternal health, is visible from the pavilion door. The exhibit itself is called “(M)otherland” and was inspired by Patir’s own health struggles; after being diagnosed with a gene mutation that increases her risk of breast and ovarian cancer, doctors advised her to freeze her eggs. 

The artist and curators hope a ceasefire and hostage deal will be reached and they will be able to reopen their pavilion long before the scheduled end of the Biennale in November. 

Of the more than 130 Israelis held hostage in Gaza, as many as 100 are thought to remain alive. Hamas and Israel have been locked for weeks in negotiations over a potential deal that would include at least a temporary ceasefire and the release of some hostages in exchange for the release of a larger number of Palestinian security prisoners from Israeli prisons.

Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack killed approximately 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took some 250 hostage. Israeli forces have killed more than 30,000 Palestinians in Gaza in the six months of the war, many of them civilians, drawing intense international criticism. More than 250 Israeli soldiers have been killed in the invasion of Gaza.

Netanyahu has insisted that a planned operation in Rafah, where more than 1 million Gazans have sought refuge during the war, will still go through despite opposition from the United States.

Israel’s participation at the Biennale had come under fierce protest from a coalition of pro-Palestinian artists, who demanded that Venice shut it down in light of what they deemed a “genocide” in Gaza, a claim Israel rejects. The coalition, Art Not Genocide Alliance, has thousands of signatories including some artists with Jewish background , such as Nan Goldin, Adam Broomberg and Eyal Sivan, as well as the official Biennale representatives of Chile, Finland, Nigeria and around a dozen other countries. 

The Venice Biennale’s organizers have said that any country with diplomatic relations with Italy is entitled to a pavilion; the event is meant to bring together the leading artists from nearly every country on Earth in one space.

On Instagram the alliance took credit for Patir’s action , writing, “The artistic team of the Israeli pavilion has retreated as a direct consequence of widespread pressure and our collective campaign.”

Yet the coalition still had harsh words for Patir and her team, calling their shuttering of the pavilion “empty and opportunistic gestures timed for maximum press coverage.” The alliance criticized the fact that part of the exhibit was still visible from the pavilion door. 

“NO WINDOW DISPLAY,” the team wrote on Instagram in all-caps, reiterating its strict demands: “An end to the genocide being perpertrated [sic] by Israel against Palestinians in Gaza, ​​​​​an end to the apartheid and an end to the occupation of Palestine.”

For her part, Patir, who was born in the United States and has studied in both Israel and New York City, is regretful about the current state of the exhibition.

“I hate it,” Patir told the New York Times about her decision. “But I think it’s important.”

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