Artistic Styles

 

ARTISTIC STYLES

The search for truth is not exclusive to representational art. From viewing many of the examples so far you can see how individual artists use different styles to communicate their ideas. Style refers to a particular kind of appearance in works of art. It’s a characteristic of an individual artist or a collective relationship based on an idea, culture or artistic movement. Following is a list and description of the most common styles in art:

 

Naturalistic Style

Naturalistic style uses recognizable images with a high level of accuracy in their depiction. Naturalism also includes the idealized object: one that is modified to achieve a kind of perfection within the bounds of aesthetics and form.  William Sydney Mount’s painting The Bone Player Links to an external site. gives accuracy in its representation and a sense of character to the figure, from his ragged-edged hat to the button missing from his vest. Mount treats the musician’s portrait with a sensitive hand, more idealized by his handsome features and soft smile. 

 

Abstract Style

Abstract style is based on a recognizable object but which is then manipulated by distortion, scale issues or other artistic devices. Abstraction can be created by exaggerating form, simplifying shapes or the use of strong colors. Let’s look at three landscapes below with varying degrees of abstraction in them to see how this style can be so effective. In the first one, Marsden Hartley uses abstraction to give the spare “Landscape, New Mexico” a sense of energy. Through the rounded forms and gesture in treatment we can discern hills, clouds, a road and some trees or bushes.

 

Marsden Hartley, Landscape, New Mexico, 1918, pastel on paper

 

Georgia O’Keeffe’s, Birch and Pine Trees --Pink employs abstraction to turn the painting into a tree-filled landscape dominated by a spray of orange paint suggesting a branch of birch leaves at the top left.

 

Georgia O’Keeffe’s, Birch and Pine Trees --Pink, 1925, oil on canvas

 

Vasily Kandinsky’s, Landscape with Red Spots, No. 2, goes further into abstraction, releasing color from its descriptive function and vastly simplifying forms. The rendering of a town at the lower left is reduced to blocky areas of paint and a black triangular shape of hill in the background. In all three of these, the artists manipulate and distort the ‘real’ landscape as a vehicle for emotion.

Vasily Kandinsky’s, Landscape with Red Spots, No. 2, 1913, oil on canvas

 

It’s important to note the definition of ‘abstract’ is relative to cultural perspective. That is, different cultures develop traditional forms and styles of art they understand within the context of their own culture (see ‘Cultural Styles’ below), and which are difficult for other cultures to understand.

So what may be ‘abstract’ to one could be more ‘realistic’ in style to another. For example, the Roman bust of Sappho below looks very real from a western European aesthetic perspective. Under the same perspective, the African mask would be called ‘abstract’.

 

Roman bust of Sappho.  Capitoline Museum, Rome.
Image in the public domain.

 

African mask photo by Cezary.
Image in the public domain.

 

Yet to the African culture that produced the mask it would appear more realistic. In addition, the African mask shares some formal attributes with the Tlingit ‘Groundhog Mask’ (below under ‘Cultural styles’) from Canada’s west coast. It’s very possible these two cultures would see the Roman bust as the ‘abstract’ one. So it’s important that we understand artworks from cultures other than our own in the context in which they were originally created.

Questions of abstraction can also emerge from something as simple as our distance from an artwork. View and read about Fanny/Fingerpainting Links to an external site.by the artist Chuck Close. At first glance it is a highly realistic portrait of the artist’s grandmother-in law. You can zoom it in to see how the painting dissolves into a grid of individual fingerprints, a process that renders the surface very abstract. With this in mind, we can see how any work of art is essentially made of smaller abstract parts that, when seen together, make up a coherent whole.

 

Abstract Style - Non-objective

Another style of abstract art is Non-objective imagery -- it has no relation to the ‘real’ world – that is – the work of art is based solely upon itself. In this way the non-objective style is completely different than abstract, and it’s important to make the distinction between the two. This style rose from the modern art movement in Europe, Russia and the United States during the first half of the 20^th century. Pergusa Three Links to an external site. by American artist Frank Stella uses organic and geometric shapes and strong color set against a heavy black background to create a vivid image.  More than with other styles, issues of content are associated with a non-objective work’s formal structure. 

 

Cultural Styles

Cultural styles refer to distinctive characteristics in artworks throughout a particular society or culture. Some main elements of cultural styles are recurring motifs Links to an external site., created in the same way by many artists.  Cultural styles are formed over hundreds or even thousands of years and help define cultural identity. We can find evidence of this by comparing two masks; one from Alaska and the other from Canada. The  Yup'ik Links to an external site. masks from Alaska are quite stylized and elaborate, multiple pieces combined to tell the story. Carved objects are attached to the mask and give an upward movement to the whole artwork while the face evokes an animated expression.

By comparison, a ‘Groundhog Mask’ from the Tlingit culture in coastal northwestern Canada exhibits similar forms and many of the same motifs, although composed differently. This cultural style ranges from western Alaska to northern Canada.

 

 Ground Hog Mask,Tlingit, c. 19^th century. Carved and painted wood, animal hair.
Collection the Burke Museum, University of Washington, Seattle. Used by permission.

 

Celtic art from Great Britain and Ireland shows a cultural style that’s been identified for thousands of years. Its highly refined organic motifs include spirals, plant forms and zoomorphism Links to an external site.. Intricate and decorative, the Celtic style adapted to include early book illustration. The Book of Kells is considered the pinnacle of this cultural style. 

 

 Page from the Book of Kells, around 800 CE. Trinity College, Dublin.
Image in the public domain.