Preview

Art Essay - Visual Language

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
805 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Art Essay - Visual Language
“Visual language is used in art to give meaning to artworks. Discuss with reference to 3 artists”
Visual language is used in art to give meaning to artworks. Many artists use signs and symbols to convey many messages or communicate certain ideas or even to express their thoughts and feelings on certain topics, whether political or personal. Some artists who used symbolism in their artworks included: Pablo Picasso, Frida Kahlo, and Gordon Bennett.
Pablo Picasso was an artist who often used signs and symbols in his artworks. He was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and stage designer. He is one of the most influential artists from the 20th century and is widely known for co-founding the Cubist movement. One of his most known artworks “Guernica” was created in 1937, oil on canvas, in response to the Spanish Civil War from the bombings of Guernica, depicting suffering people, animals, and buildings wrenched by violence and chaos. “Guernica” is a mural painted in black and white. Two of the dominant elements in “Guernica” are the bull and the horse, which are important characters in Spanish culture. These characters were also used to play many different roles in his artworks overtime. The horse is the main focal point of the painting, due to its large gaping wound. The bull’s tail forms the image of a flame, symbolising the violence and danger of war.
In the bottom vector of the painting is a deceased soldier. On the open palm of the soldier is a stigma, which is a symbol of martyrdom derived from the stigmata of Christ. In the central top of the painting is a light bulb in the shape of an eye. This is to symbolise a bomb coming from the Spanish word for light bulb, “bombilla” In contrast to the light bulb, there is a female figure holding a flame-lit lamp which is to symbolise hope. The broken sword in the bottom of the painting is to symbolise the defeat of the people. Furthermore, the posture and shape of the bodies is to express

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Art 101 Essay

    • 378 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Leonardo da Vinci. The Last Supper (after restoration).Leonardo’s “Last Supper” is a priceless piece of art with much hidden meaning and obvious talents bestowed upon a wall. Leonardo was able to use his skills in creating a very detailed and a very naturalistic piece of work that would be remembered for hundreds of years. He was also able to create characters with amazing individuality. Not only was his portrayal of the characters magnificent, but the symbolism he used which emphasized the story being told in the “Last Supper”.…

    • 378 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Located on pages 1062-1063 of the 4th Edition (Volume II) of our textbook -Art History- are five paragraphs of commentary on Pablo Picasso’s “Guernica,” perhaps his most well known painting. In those five paragraphs, Stokstad and Cothern offer a fairly accurate and concise description of the historical events leading to the creation of the masterwork and a description of some of the imagery depicted in the painting itself. Unfortunately, Stokstad and Cothern do not offer any insight as to the legacy of the painting. Nor do they offer any examples of how the images contained in the painting have been utilized for contemporary purposes.…

    • 1731 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Some objects in the painting are a pregnant woman, a burning candle, a skull, and a cross lying on the table under some books. The way the woman’s head is rested on her hand and she is staring into the candle light, shows that she is in deep thought. I believe that the woman is reflecting upon her life. She looks to be pregnant, which represents life. The unity of…

    • 537 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Art 101 Week 1 Assignment

    • 582 Words
    • 3 Pages

    An artist can create art work through a creative process. An element of this process is critical thinking. Artists’ creativity process begins with seeing. It then goes from seeing to imagining and from imagining to making (Sayre, 2009). This essay will provide an explanation of artists’ roles. The essay will also include two chosen works of art, one of which embodies the role of the artist and the other holds symbolic significance requiring the application of iconography.…

    • 582 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Best Essays

    Watkins, J. (2010). Picasso’s Guernica: Propaganda, Art, or Revelation?, Available: http://www.transpositions.co.uk/2010/07/picassos-guernica-propaganda-art-or-revelation/, Last accessed 7th December 2012.…

    • 1893 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Best Essays
  • Good Essays

    Distinctively Visual Essay

    • 1056 Words
    • 5 Pages

    “Run Lola Run” directed by tom Twyker and “ The Third of May” by Francisco Goya both use visual techniques to convey their message to the audience and involve the audience in the experiences that the images create. The mediums in which both the composers choose to convey these messages are successful in communicating to the audience the types of experiences that are represented in the images…

    • 1056 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    He contends, “Painters whose work explores conceptual issues that seek to open a dialectical exchange tend to do their artistic thinking in a language as this best describes the interactions that occur as relationships are found and formed among artists, artworks, and viewers”…

    • 1141 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Picasso painted Guernica in 1937 as his homeland Spain was being torn apart by a bloody civil war. He was living in Paris at the time, and was commissioned by the Spanish Government to create an entry for the world Exposition. Picasso was having little success coming up with inspiration, but that all changed when he was made aware of the horrific bombing of a small village in Northern Spain – called Guernica. Late afternoon on Monday the 26th April 1937, Nazi and Italian warplanes used Guernica for bombing practice at the urging of the Spanish Fascist’s. As most of the town’s men were away fighting in the civil war, women and children were the main victims of this ruthless attack, which left more than 1,600 people…

    • 128 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Art Essay 101

    • 1252 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Citations: Sayre, Henry M. A World Of Art. 6th Edition. Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, 2010. 1, 3, 35, 42. Print.…

    • 1252 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The use of text within to the visual arts can be traced back as far as the inscribed carvings found on cave walls created by the Indigenous population of Australia approximately 46000 years ago. However, over the past few years, the use of text in art, also known as the art of typography, has become a frequent means of communication for artists in the creation of their works.…

    • 1913 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Visual Essay

    • 394 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Cyd Charisse and Fred Astaire are both dancing to jazz in this black and white photograph of the 1920’s. The couple is dancing as two men and two women are sitting in the background staring and concentrating all their attention on Ms. Charisse and Mr. Astaire. But the photograph explains more then just the swing dancing that is occurring. The outfits, music, and entertainment all tie in together to explain the 1920’s as “the roaring 20’s”.…

    • 394 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    People express themselves in many different ways, one way is taking pictures of nature to cope with grief and to express themselves. Like as with “photography is full of symbolism, it’s a symbolic language. You have to be able to materialize all your thoughts in one single image” (Sebastiao Salgado). People use symbolism everyday to help them describe situations. Especially those who are authors, like Fitzgerald in The Great Gatsby. An analysis of the novel shows great use of symbolism, in how he describes everything symbolically as he does with different colors and even the weather.…

    • 789 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Art Essay 2

    • 1433 Words
    • 6 Pages

    ‘What I like so much about contemporary art now is its ambiguity, its uncertainty. It is precisely this quality that engages and unsettles us’ – Benjamin Genocchio, art critic.…

    • 1433 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Artists paint and create images as a form of communication. A concept which most artists find hard to paint is their inner thought and feelings. As they must explore deep into their sub-conscious to find who they truly are as a person and how they can represent that on a canvas, print or paper through the use of symbols and other techniques. Two artists who have done this are Frida Kahlo and Vincent Van Gogh.…

    • 1160 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    art essay

    • 1433 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The context, of which art is created, clearly reflects its history and where it is from. Society’s values are further highlighted by the piece and give us insight into what life was like. This is interestingly interpreted by Juan Bautista de Espinosa’s exuberant baroque style painting, with a heavily catholic influence from Spain in the late 1500’s, as well as Margaret Olley’s contrasting and simplistic sensibility of the mid 20th century. Each artist’s aesthetic, although significantly different; equally allow us to understand a certain time and place…

    • 1433 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays