Portal:Visual arts

THE VISUAL ARTS PORTAL

Introduction

The visual arts are art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, image, filmmaking, design, crafts, and architecture. Many artistic disciplines such as performing arts, conceptual art, and textile arts, also involve aspects of the visual arts, as well as arts of other types. Within the visual arts, the applied arts, such as industrial design, graphic design, fashion design, interior design, and decorative art are also included.

Current usage of the term "visual arts" includes fine art as well as applied or decorative arts and crafts, but this was not always the case. Before the Arts and Crafts Movement in Britain and elsewhere at the turn of the 20th century, the term 'artist' had for some centuries often been restricted to a person working in the fine arts (such as painting, sculpture, or printmaking) and not the decorative arts, crafts, or applied visual arts media. The distinction was emphasized by artists of the Arts and Crafts Movement, who valued vernacular art forms as much as high forms. Art schools made a distinction between the fine arts and the crafts, maintaining that a craftsperson could not be considered a practitioner of the arts.

The increasing tendency to privilege painting, and to a lesser degree sculpture, above other arts has been a feature of Western art as well as East Asian art. In both regions, painting has been seen as relying on the imagination of the artist to the highest degree and being the furthest removed from manual labour – in Chinese painting, the most highly valued styles were those of "scholar-painting", at least in theory practiced by gentleman amateurs. The Western hierarchy of genres reflected similar attitudes. (Full article...)

Outline of the visual arts

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Architecture at Vkhutemas, book cover by El Lissitzky, 1927

Vkhutemas (Russian: Вхутемас, IPA: [fxʊtʲɪˈmas], acronym for Высшие художественно-технические мастерские Vysshiye Khudozhestvenno-Tekhnicheskiye Masterskiye "Higher Art and Technical Studios") was the Russian state art and technical school founded in 1920 in Moscow, replacing the Moscow Svomas.

The workshops were established by a decree from Vladimir Lenin with the intentions, in the words of the Soviet government, "to prepare master artists of the highest qualifications for industry, and builders and managers for professional-technical education". The school had 100 faculty members and an enrollment of 2,500 students. Vkhutemas was formed by a merger of two previous schools: the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture and the Stroganov School of Applied Arts. The workshops had artistic and industrial faculties; the art faculty taught courses in graphics, sculpture and architecture while the industrial faculty taught courses in printing, textiles, ceramics, woodworking, and metalworking. (Full article...)

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The Tetons and the Snake River by Ansel Adams

Credit: National Archives and Records Administration

Ansel Adams, whose The Tetons and the Snake River (1942, Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming) is pictured here, is best known for his black and white photographs of California's Yosemite Valley.

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“	Many are willing to suffer for their art. Few are willing to learn to draw.	”
	— Simon Munnery, Attention Scum!

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Portrait by William Aikman, 1727

William Adam (1689 – 24 June 1748) was a Scottish architect, mason, and entrepreneur. He was the foremost architect of his time in Scotland, designing and building numerous country houses and public buildings, and often acting as contractor as well as architect. Among his best known works are Hopetoun House near Edinburgh, and Duff House in Banff. His individual, exuberant style built on the Palladian style, but with Baroque details inspired by Vanbrugh and Continental architecture.

In the 18th century, Adam was considered Scotland's "Universal Architect". However, since the early 20th century, architectural critics have taken a more measured view, Colin McWilliam, for instance, finding the quality of his work "varied to an extreme degree". As well as being an architect, Adam was involved in several industrial ventures and improvement schemes, including coal mining, salt panning, stone quarries and mills. In 1731 he began to build up his own estate in Kinross-shire, which he named Blair Adam. He was the father of three architects; John, Robert and James, the last two were the developers of the "Adam style". (Full article...)

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Did you know (auto generated) - load new batch

... that Sculpture Space lets artists create large-scale works in a former metalworking shop?
... that two books of photos and drawings by Margot Dias were called "among the best-illustrated anthropological volumes ever produced"?
... that a Syrian filmmaker repurposed footage from his first film in his last film in order to criticize his younger self?
... that Dutch filmmaker Richard Raaphorst claimed that a boss character in Resident Evil Village copied the design of a monster he created for his 2013 film Frankenstein's Army?
... that the filmmakers of Cyborgs wrote dialogue in both Russian and Ukrainian to show the diversity of the eponymous soldiers who defended Donetsk Airport in late 2014?
... that the catalogue for Tanzania. Masterworks of African Sculpture highlighted traditional artworks such as a Sukuma mask?
... that in 1933 Nazi sympathisers attempted to kidnap two German-Jewish filmmakers in Liechtenstein?
... that Graham Crowley entered the John Moores Painting Prize ten times since 1976 before finally winning in 2023?

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General images

The following are images from various visual arts-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Two Scribes Seated with Books and a Writing Table Fragment of a decorative margin Northern India (Mughal school), ca. 1640–1650 (from History of painting)
Image 2Paul Klee, 1922, Bauhaus (from History of painting)
Image 3Grant Wood, 1930, social realism (from History of painting)
Image 4Irbid, Jordan, "We are Arabs. We are Humans". Inside Out is a global participatory art project, initiated by the French photographer JR, an example of Street art. (from Contemporary art)
Image 5Muromachi period, Shingei (1431–1485), Viewing a Waterfall, Nezu Museum, Tokyo. (from History of painting)
Image 6Edvard Munch, 1893, early example of Expressionism (from History of painting)
Image 7Mother Goddess A miniature painting of the Pahari style, dating to the eighteenth century. Pahari and Rajput miniatures share many common features. (from History of painting)
Image 8Baptism of Christ on a medieval Nubian painting from Old Dongola (from History of painting)
Image 9Lascaux, Bulls and Horses (from History of painting)
Image 10Hellenistic Greek terracotta funerary wall painting, 3rd century BC (from History of painting)
Image 11Rock Shelters of Bhimbetka, rock painting, Stone Age, India (from History of painting)
Image 12Joan Miró, Horse, Pipe and Red Flower, 1920, abstract Surrealism, Philadelphia Museum of Art (from History of painting)
Image 13Rock Shelters of Bhimbetka, rock painting, Stone Age, India (from History of painting)
Image 14Qianlong Emperor Practicing Calligraphy, mid-18th century. (from History of painting)
Image 15Pictographs from the Great Gallery, Canyonlands National Park, Horseshoe Canyon, Utah, c. 1500 BCE (from History of painting)
Image 16A fresco showing Hades and Persephone riding in a chariot, from the tomb of Queen Eurydice I of Macedon at Vergina, Greece, 4th century BC (from History of painting)
Image 17Loquats and Mountain Bird, anonymous artist of the Southern Song dynasty; paintings in leaf album style such as this were popular in the Southern Song (1127–1279). (from History of painting)
Image 18Rembrandt van Rijn, The Jewish Bride, ca. 1665–1669 (from History of painting)
Image 19Kiasma, a contemporary art museum in Helsinki, Finland (from Contemporary art)
Image 20Cueva de las Manos (Spanish for Cave of the Hands) in the Santa Cruz province in Argentina, c. 7300 BC (from History of painting)
Image 21Morgan Russell, Cosmic Synchromy (1913–14), Synchromism (from History of painting)
Image 22Cover of the Thanksgiving 1895 issue of The Chap-Book, designed by Will H. Bradley (from Graphic design)
Image 23Marcel Duchamp, Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2, 1912, Philadelphia Museum of Art (from History of painting)
Image 24Piet Mondrian, "Composition No. 10" 1939–1942, De Stijl (from History of painting)
Image 25Diego Rivera, Recreation of Man at the Crossroads (renamed Man, Controller of the Universe), originally created in 1934, Mexican muralism movement (from History of painting)
Image 26Giorgio de Chirico 1914, pre-Surrealism (from History of painting)
Image 27A Chinese painted jar from the Western Han Era (202 BCE – 9 CE) (from History of painting)
Image 28Golden section in book design (from Graphic design)
Image 29Max Ernst, 1920, early Surrealism (from History of painting)
Image 30Barnett Newman, Untitled Etching 1 (First Version), 1968, Minimalism (from History of painting)
Image 31Juan Luna, La Bulaqueña, 1895 (from History of painting)
Image 32The Sakyamuni Buddha, by Zhang Shengwen, 1173–1176 AD, Song dynasty period. (from History of painting)
Image 33Due to its interdisciplinary nature, graphic design can be performed in different areas of application: branding, technical and artistic drawing, signage, photography, image and video editing, 3D modeling, animation, programming, among other fields. (from Graphic design)
Image 34Patrick Henry Bruce, American modernism, 1924 (from History of painting)
Image 35Silk painting depicting a man riding a dragon, painting on silk, dated to 5th–3rd century BC, Warring States period, from Zidanku Tomb no. 1 in Changsha, Hunan Province (from History of painting)
Image 36Gwion Gwion rock paintings found in the north-west Kimberley region of Western Australia c. 15,000 BC (from History of painting)
Image 37The Museum of Contemporary Art in Miami, Florida (from Contemporary art)
Image 38A Boeing 747 aircraft with livery designating it as Air Force One. The cyan forms, the US flag, presidential seal and the Caslon lettering, were all designed at different times, by different designers, for different purposes, and combined by designer Raymond Loewy in this one single aircraft exterior design. (from Graphic design)
Image 39The Eternal Father Painting the Virgin of Guadalupe. Attributed to Joaquín Villegas (1713 – active in 1753) (Mexican) (painter, Museo Nacional de Arte. (from History of painting)
Image 40In 2021, researchers discovered ancient cave art in Leang Tedongnge, Sulawesi, Indonesia, estimated to be at least 45,500 years old. Depicting a warty pig, this artwork is recognized as the world's oldest known example of figurative or representational art. (from History of painting)
Image 41Max Beckmann, The Night (Die Nacht), 1918–1919, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf (from History of painting)
Image 42Francis Picabia, (Left) Le saint des saints c'est de moi qu'il s'agit dans ce portrait, 1 July 1915; (center) Portrait d'une jeune fille americaine dans l'état de nudité, 5 July 1915: (right) J'ai vu et c'est de toi qu'il s'agit, De Zayas! De Zayas! Je suis venu sur les rivages du Pont-Euxin, New York, 1915 (from History of painting)
Image 43Lascaux, Aurochs (Bos primigenius primigenius) (from History of painting)
Image 44Spanish cave painting of Bulls (from History of painting)
Image 45Petroglyphs, from Sweden, Nordic Bronze Age (painted) (from History of painting)
Image 46Pierre Bonnard, 1913, European modernist Narrative painting (from History of painting)
Image 47Hand stencils in the "Tree of Life" cave painting in Gua Tewet, Kalimantan, Indonesia (from History of painting)
Image 48Brice Marden, 1966/1986, Monochrome painting (from History of painting)
Image 49Colour (from Graphic design)
Image 50Bharat Mata by Abanindranath Tagore (1871–1951), a nephew of the poet Rabindranath Tagore, and a pioneer of the movement (from History of painting)
Image 51An Ethiopian illuminated Evangelist portrait of Mark the Evangelist, from the Ethiopian Garima Gospels, 6th century AD, Kingdom of Aksum (from History of painting)
Image 52Henri Matisse 1909, late Fauvism (from History of painting)
Image 53Lascaux, Horse (from History of painting)
Image 54Edward Hopper, Nighthawks, 1942, an American Scene painting (from History of painting)
Image 55Eland, rock painting, Drakensberg, South Africa (from History of painting)
Image 56A fresco from Cave 1 of Ajanta. (from History of painting)
Image 57Juan Luna, The Parisian Life, 1892 (from History of painting)
Image 58Spring Morning in the Han Palace, by Ming-era artist Qiu Ying (1494–1552 AD) (from History of painting)
Image 59Graphic symbols are often functionalist and anonymous, as these pictographs from the US National Park Service illustrate. (from Graphic design)
Image 60Poster to promote the Centennial of Argentina (1910) (from Graphic design)
Image 61Young Mother Sewing, Mary Cassatt (from History of painting)
Image 62Book of Hours (from History of painting)
Image 63Wayang beber, 17th century (from History of painting)