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Vocabulary
Art I Vocab Sheet # 1
NEOCLASSICISM - A style of art in nineteenth century France that was a reaction to Baroque. This style was derived from the art and culture of ancient Greece and Rome.
AESTHETICS –A branch of philosophy that studies how humans respond to and value social, psychological, and philosophical aspects of art and beauty.
AESTHETIC THEORY – A philosophical viewpoint concerning the nature of art.
REALISM – A mid nineteenth century style of art in which the artists mimicked the real world. Or a theory that the value of art depends on how closely the work mimics reality.
EMOTIONALISM – A belief that the purpose & value of art is based on its ability to convey emotion.
FORMALISM – Emphasis on the use of the elements and principles of design. (composition)
CONCEPTUALISM – Belief that the value of art is found when one considers the original purpose and process as opposed to the finished product
CONTEXTUALISM – Theory that the value of art depends on the external beliefs and perceptions that the viewer brings to the work
CRAFTSMANSHIP – The act of working carefully and skillfully with your hands.
CREATIVE - The ability to think divergently and with originality. All children are creative thinkers when encouraged to think in different ways.
Art I Vocab Sheet # 2
ANCIENT GREEK ART – There were a wide range of art forms and styles that came from ancient Greece. Ancient Greeks produced textiles, ceramic vessels, paintings, mosaics, and sculptures. The oldest art forms are very geometric in nature with later art forms dedicated to the realistic and naturalistic depiction of the human form. Greek art has influenced all western art forms that occurred after it.
BALANCE –An arrangement in which elements of art are organized so that the parts seem to be equally important on either side and have equal visual weight.
SYMMETRICAL BALANCE – Type of balance a composition has if it may be divided in half in only one way to get two mirror image parts.
ASYMMETRICAL BALANCE –Type of balance a composition has if it may not be divided to get two mirror image halves.
PATTERN –The principle of repetition of a type of line, shape, color, etc.
ART CRITICISM - The description, analysis, interpretation, and evaluation of the success of a work of art.
DESCRIPTION – Step in art criticism when you describe what you see. What medium was used, what size the piece is, what elements of design are present, etc. Only physical characteristics.
ANALYSIS – Step in art criticism that asks "How is the work organized? How has the artist used the principles of design?"
INTERPRETATION – Step in art criticism when you ask "What is the artist saying?" Interpret the meaning of the piece using visual clues.
EVALUATION – Final step in art criticism when one asks "Is it a successful work of art?"
Art I Vocab Sheet # 3
POST IMPRESSIONISM - Expressive movement in art history in the late 1800’s through 1900’s that used strong color and formal design.
LINE –The path created by a moving point (as a mark that is drawn by a pencil point).
CONTOUR - The outline and other visible edges of an object. There are many different kinds of contours. Usually a contour drawing is more than a sillouette of a form. It also includes lines inside the sillouette that define other edges and create volume
BLIND CONTOUR – Contour drawing done without looking at your paper while drawing
GESTURE – A drawing technique often used in drawing the figure (of people or animals) that uses a quickly drawn and expressive line to capture the emotion or movement of the pose.
COMPOSITION –How the elements of art and principles of design are arranged in a work of art.
EMPHASIS –The way artists use the organizational principles of art to direct greater attention on some areas rather than others.
MOVEMENT –The arrangement of elements or principles that guide the eye through a work of art and create the sensation of movement.
SYMBOL SYSTEM – In drawing, a set of symbols that are consistently used to form an image
REALISTIC DRAWING – The objective depiction of objects, forms, and figures attentively perceived
Art I Vocab Sheet # 4
ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM – Mid-20th century American movement in painting stressing formal purity
SHAPE – A defined area that has length and width, It is two-dimensional and can be geometric or organic.
GEOMETRIC SHAPE – A shape that is characterized by straight lines and angles instead of curves.
ORGANIC SHAPE –Two-dimensional shapes that are irregular and curvilinear. They are difficult to describe as they are not a prescribed shape. These shapes are similar to the shapes of living things.
POSITIVE SHAPE –The solid objects within a visual format. Positive shapes can be thought of as being more intentionally created as opposed to being more incidentally created.
NEGATIVE SHAPE –Shapes around positive shapes. Negative shapes can be thought of as being more incidentally created as opposed to being more intentionally created.
ABSTRACTION – A style of artwork that does not imitate perceptual reality; simplification. Abstraction can occur in varying degrees, perhaps to the extent where you may not recognize the subject matter.
ACHROMATIC –Term used to describe artwork employing no colors, only values – black and white.
SHADE –A darker value, the opposite of tint. Can be made by mixing black with a hue.
TINT –A color of paint with white added to it to make it lighter
Art I Vocab Sheet # 5
CUBISM – A style of painting invented by Picasso and Braque that simplified natural forms to their basic geometric parts and changed 3D forms to 2D shapes on the picture plane.
CONTRAST - Two things put together that are very different. Contrast tends to create variety and emphasis.
GRAPHITE – A soft black mineral substance, a form of carbon, available in powder, stick, and other forms. It has a metallic luster and a greasy feel. Compressed with fine clay, it is used in lead pencils
PENCIL SHADING – To shade with graphite. This media lends itself to smooth, solid shapes of tone, and smooth gradients of tone,
GRADIENT – A gradual, smoothly nuanced, step-by-step change from dark to light values, or one color to another
VALUE – An object's relative degree of lightness or darkness.
VALUE SCALE – A scale of values ranging from white (top) to black (bottom) and including several grays in between.(1-9)
LOW KEY VALUES – Values from middle to black on a value scale (1-5).
HIGH KEY VALUES – Values from middle to white on a value scale (5-9).
HALFTONES – The middle values in a composition below the low lights and above the high darks
Art I Vocab Sheet # 6
BYZANTINE ART - A style of art that uses bright colors, flattened, stiff figures, and often gold leaf, associated with the Eastern Roman Empire during the time period 330 AD - 1450 AD
COLOR – The characteristic of reflected light described as red, blue, yellow, etc
COLOR WHEEL – A theory that helps artists learn about the relationship between colors and how to mix them. Bending the color spectrum (rainbow) into a circle.
COLOR HARMONIES – Relationships between colors that go well together in a composition.
BRAIN MODE – A mental state implying emphasis on particular capabilities of the human brain.
L-MODE – A mental state of information processing characterized as linear, verbal, analytic, and logical associated with the left side of the cerebrum
R-MODE – A state of information processing characterized as simultaneous, global, spatial, and relational associated with the right side of the cerebrum
COGNITIVE SHIFT – A brain shift either from L-Mode to R-Mode or vice versa
HARMONY – As a principle of design, a way of combining elements of art to accent their similarities and bind the picture parts into a whole. It is often achieved through the use of repetition and simplicity.
SEVEN ELEMENTS OF DESIGN -. Line, color, shape, space, texture, value, and form.
ART I Vocab Sheet # 7
TEXTURE – The roughness or smoothness of a surface.
VARIETY –An assortment of different elements (e.g., colors, shapes, lines, values, textures, patterns).
ACTUAL TEXTURE – Texture that may be felt.
SIMULATED TEXTURE – Texture that can only be seen.
DISCIPLINE – A subject that is taught, an organized field of study, e.g. art, mathematics, reading
MEDIA – The plural of medium. Tools or materials used to create art.
HATCHING – Shading technique that uses a set of repeated lines
CROSS HATCHING – Method of shading using at least 2 sets of hatched lines that cross one another
SCUMBLING – A term with several different definitions. It can be a painting technique or a shading technique. It can mean to shade with a scribbling motion
THUMBNAIL SKETCH - A preliminary drawing done on a smaller scale than the final work.
Art I Vocab Sheet # 8
RENAISSANCE - A period in Europe 1400-1600 during which there was an emphasis on humanism, science, and learning and art.
SPACE - An open or enclosed area that has height, width, and depth.
FOREGROUND - In a still life this is the area that is lowest on the picture
MIDDLEGROUND - The part of a picture that is between the foreground and background.
BACKGROUND - In a still life this is the area that is highest on the picture.
OVERLAPPING - One way to create depth in a picture by making one form cover another form indicating that it is in front.
CRAYON ETCHING – Technique in which paint is applied on top of a layer of thick crayon then scratched away to reveal the crayon
CAST SHADOW – A dark shadow thrown by an object onto another surface
CREST SHADOW – The shadow on the dark side of an object
HIGHLIGHT – The lightest area of a picture or on an object
Art I Vocab Sheet # 9
BAROQUE – European art style in the1600s in which painters, sculptors, and architects sought emotion, movement, and variety in their works.
FORM – A three-dimensional object. It has width, depth and height. You can turn it, walk around it and see it from many sides.
GEOMETRIC FORMS – Mathematical concepts like the cube, cone, pyramid, etc.
ORGANIC FORMS – Dimensional forms that are not geometric but are irregular. (See organic shapes)
AMBIENT LIGHT – A general effect of all -over illumination of an area eliminating shadows
DIFFUSED LIGHT – Light that is scattered or reflected in many directions softening shadows
DIRECTIONAL LIGHT – Undiffused light coming from a clear source and moving through a scene in a linear direction causing cast shadows
LOCAL VALUES – The true value of an object or a surface as seen in typical daylight, rather than its value as seen in extreme lighting or through atmosphere or interpreted by the taste or imagination of the artist.
REFLECTED LIGHT – In a drawing of a form this is the light that bounces off another surface and into the crest shadow of a form.
SOFT EDGE –When there is a gradual change from light to dark or from one color to another between two shapes or on a form, often indicating a curved surface
Art I Vocab Sheet # 10
POST MODERNISM – A contemporary movement in aesthetics (mostly effecting architecture) concerned with signification or the means by which meaning is constructed
GRAPHING – A technique of transferring an image particularly good for making enlargements that uses a grid to get correct proportions
MAPPING – When shading a form from life, the breaking down of the form into well defined shapes of lights, darks, and middle tones by drawing boundary lines. When shadows seem indistinct you impose boundaries.
LIGHT LOGIC – In art, the effect caused by a light source. Light rays falling in straight lines can logically be expected to cause highlights, halftones and darks
SHADOW SHAPES – Shapes of different values made by light illuminating areas and creating shadows in other areas.
EXPRESSIVE QUALITY – The slight individual differences in the way each of us perceives and represents our perception in a work of art.
UTILITARIAN SEEING – The everyday, practical way we look at things
SEEING – Being aware of every detail of visual information you are receiving without filtering out what you deem unusual, complicated, or unnecessary.
CROPPING – To resize, and sometimes reshape the format of an image so that part of the image is cut away. Cropping is a good compositional technique.
DESIGN THEME – This is an easily recognized pattern of repeated shapes or lines used with some variation when composing a picture.
Art I Vocab Sheet # 11
DEPTH – One of the three dimensions of reality. It is usually thought of as the dimension running parallel to the viewers line of sight. In two dimensional art, depth is an illusion.
PERSPECTIVE – Artwork in which the shapes of objects and distances between them look familiar or “real”. The illusion of depth on a flat surface.
AERIAL PERSPECTIVE – The portrayal of atmospheric haze -- one means to adding to an illusion of depth achieved by using less focus, along with bluer, lighter, and duller hues for the distant spaces and objects depicted in a 2D picture.
RECEDING TONES – The use lighter tones to make objects appear to be receeding from the viewer.
PROJECTING TONES – The use of darker tones in the foreground to make objects appear closer to the viewer.
RECEDING COLOR – The use of cool colors to make objects appear to be receeding from the viewer.
PROJECTING COLOR – The use of warmer colors to make objects appear to be closer to the viewer.
WOBLE – The less-than-perfect quality of anything done by hand; imperfections that express the personality of the artist
ARCHITECTURAL OR DRAFTED FORMS – The forms of buildings and machines
NATURAL FORMS – The forms of things found in nature - ex. rocks, trees etc.
Art I Vocab Sheet # 12
LINEAR PERSPECTIVE – Creating a sense of space by using mathematical principles to create the illusion of distance of three-dimensions on a two-dimensional surface.
EYE LEVEL – The level of the viewers eye relative to the ground. In the real world the horizon line is always at eye level. In creating art based on the real world the artist determines an eye level. This is part of the point of view.
HORIZON LINE – The perceived line that indicates the break between the surface of the earth and the sky.
VANISHING POINT – Point on a picture plane where parallel receding lines converge
ORTHOGONAL LINE – A straight line imagined to be behind and perpendicular to the picture plane. The orthagonals in a painting appear to converge on each other as they recede toward one or more vanishing points on the horizon.
TRANSVERSAL – In one point perspective drawing, the width lines that cross orthogonals. These lines must always be kept completely horizontal
ONE-POINT PERSPECTIVE – Type of linear perspective in which only depth is receding, and there is only one vanishing point, which is on the horizon line.
PERFECTION OF MARK – Refinement in drawing, either in relation to representation or in relation to abstract structure; lack of extraneous marks
MAJOR THEME – The most important idea, image, message, or concept, that comes through the most clearly in an artists body of work.
MINOR THEMES – The many subordinate themes that come through in an artists body of work
Art I Vocab Sheet # 13
TWO-POINT PERSPECTIVE – An application of linear perspective in which all lines except height lines appear to meet at either of two points on the horizon - both depth and width appear to recede
RESTRAINT – Allowing parts of your painting to be less active or detailed or interesting than the area of emphasis
STASIS – Lack of movement, deadness, heaviness
TENSION – Dynamic opposition or balance between unlike or separate elements
DYNAMISM – Energy, a sense of directed movement; emotional or creative excitement
EXPLICIT LINES – The line of a draughtsman, with clear width, quality, and intensity
IMPLIED LINES – Line created by two or more line segments in the composition that do not connect. The mind creates a single line through closure
COLORED PENCIL – A pencil filled with clay, a colored pigment, and wax. Colored pencils are used for creating color drawings.
CHALK – White pigments mixed with gum and pressed into a stick form for use as crayons. Other colored pigments are sometimes mixed in to create chalk pastels.
CHARCOAL – Carbonized wood made by charring willow, vine, or other twigs in airtight containers
Art I Vocab Sheet # 14
INFORMAL PERSPECTIVE – Perspective drawing that relies more on sighting than on formal rules.
SIGHTING – In drawing, measuring relative sizes and angles by means of some constant measure.
SQUINTING – Partially closing ones eyes until the eyelashes form a screen that filters light and simplifies visual information into a series of light and dark shape patterns.
BINOCULAR VISION – Vision with two eyes, which is two different visual signals assimilated into one signal in the brain. Binocular vision perceived depth and form
MONOCULAR VISION – Vision with one eye, which does not perceive depth. All forms appear flattened into shapes
PICTURE PLANE – An imaginary window if front of the artist. The artist sees what is behind the window as if it were flattened out on the window.
FORESHORTENING – A means of creating the illusion of projecting or receeding forms on the picture plane.
VIEW FINDER – A device used by artists to frame a view and provide bounding edges to a composition.
BASIC UNIT – A starting shape or unit of measurement chosen from within the composition for the purpose of maintaining correct size relationships.
PROPORTION – The size relationships between a part and the other parts and between the parts and the whole.
Art I Vocab Sheet # 15
HUE – The name of a color. (Exp. red, blue, green, etc.)
COLOR VALUE – The lightness or darkness of a color.
INTENSITY – The concentration or saturation of a color. Also called chroma.
PRIMARY COLOR – The colors yellow, red (magenta), and blue (cyan) from which it is possible to mix all the other colors of the spectrum
SECONDARY COLOR – The colors that are made when two primary colors are mixed together. (eg.,orange, green, and violet).
INTERMEDIATE COLOR – Colors that are made from a primary and a secondary color (e.g., red-orange, yellow-orange, blue-green). Also called tertiary colors.
COMPLIMENTARY COLOR HARMONY – Colors that are directly across from one another. In one sense complimentary colors are opposites – they contrast one another strongly and when they are put together they make each other stand out. They also neutralize one another when they are mixed. They do, however go well together.
MASKING – In painting, the act of covering part of the support so that paint does not adhere to that part. There are many different methods for masking including the use of masking tape, wax, and masking fluids.
SENSORY FATIGUE – When we become physically tired or our senses become jaded from too much stimulation. This can be remedied by a qualitative change in stimulation. Ex. Taking a break from looking at art to have a cup of coffee.
ATTENTIVE FATIGUE – The mutation from interest to boredom. Ex. Listening to the art teacher talk for too long leads to boredom.
Art I Vocab Sheet # 16
CONCEPTUAL – Having to do with a governing idea or philosophy
FORMAL – Having to do with the character or relationships of form as a chief priority (composition)
CRITICAL PROCESS – The act of thinking critically or employing critical thinking skills to perceive, describe, analyze, interpret, and evaluate a work of art.
OBJECTIVE REACTION – Emotionally distanced reaction to a painting; A reasoned analysis
SUBJECTIVE REACTION – Intuitive or emotional response based on personal knowledge or associations
ABSTRACT THOUGHT– Thought concerned with theories principles or concepts
THROUGH-THE-WINDOW REALISM – Approach to painting in which the picture is like a window, and every object in the painting is an exact representation of the object you would see through a window. This approach yields a photorealist.
SELECTIVE REALISM – Approach to painting in which you only paint only the objects in your field of vision that you are aware of. In selective realism you paint what’s important to you and leave the rest out.
IMITATION OF NATURE – This is how most people see paintings. Recognition of subject matter is primary.
COMMUNICATION – The ability of an artwork to “speak” to the viewer.
