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Period: Apr 19, 1100 to Apr 20, 1400
Medieval Art
Medieval Art focused on early Christian, Romanesque, and Gothic concepts. The church funded the projects to be displayed or painted directly in the churches. Most medieval art contained muted colors and no portraits were created because the church did not believe in portraying the face of Christ. This reflects the time period because many people's lives revolved around the church. Everything was done in preparation of the afterlife. -
Apr 19, 1163
Notre Dame
Notre Dame was commissioned by Louis VII to replace St. Stephen Cathedral. It reflects the emphasis put on religion which can be seen in the intricate details of the façade as well as in the beautiful windows and statues inside. -
Period: Apr 20, 1400 to Apr 21, 1500
Renaissance Art
The Renaissance was a period of change without a distinct start or end. It showed a revival of interest in classical learning based on inspiration from ancient Greece and Rome. The Renaissance began in Italy after the church began to lose international power in the late Middle Ages and focused on embracing the natural world and emotion. Some key figures were Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael, as well as Ghiberti, Brunelleschi, Donatello, and Masaccio. -
Apr 20, 1475
La Scapigliata
In La Scapigliata, da Vinci focused on her facial expression, connecting to a theme of the Renaissance of displaying human emotion as well as the natural world. He drew her hair as unkempt to show how women do not need to be what society considers perfect to be strong and influential. -
Period: to
Baroque Art
Baroque Art returned to the ideals of the church to depict scenes from the Bible. It reflected the splitting of the church after the Protestant Reformation. It was thoroughly naturalistic rather than idealized and showed an interest in natural knowledge. Two of the most influential artists from the time period were Michelangelo and Caravaggio. -
The Taking of Christ
The Taking of Christ by Caravaggio displays the ideals of Baroque art as it displays a scene from the Bible to show the return to traditional religious teachings after Martin Luther's 95 Theses. It was commissioned by a Roman nobleman named Ciriaco Mattei. -
Period: to
Rococo Art
Rococo art emerged in 18th century France under the rule of Louis XV. It emphasized lavish, often lighthearted decorations with pastel colors and plays of light. It was associated with the aristocracies of the Old Regime as it often displayed French aristocracy at play or doing leisure activities. It can be seen in the hotels of France. Francois Boucher was one of the most influential Rococo artists. -
Period: to
Neoclassical Art
Neoclassical art emerged as a rebuttal to Rococo art. It was drawn from the ideas of the Enlightenment and relied on ancient republican values that criticized the Old Regime. It meant to return to figurative and architectural models drawn from the Renaissance. Many artists traveled to Rome to be inspired from work displayed there. These works rarely suggest movement and focused on public life, morals, and heroism. It was embraced by the French Revolution and by Napoleon. -
The Swing
This painting by Jean-Honoré Fragonard is one of the most well-known from the Rococo period. It depicts a member of the aristocracy being pushed on a swing to show the leisure activities of the upper class. It shows the strategic use of light as well as the lighter pastel colors associated with Rococo art. -
Period: to
Romantic Art
Romantic art emerged as a reaction to society in the 18th century. It portrayed scenes from medieval life since the Middle Ages represented social stability and religion that was lacking in their own time. It idealized rural life and did not observe the classical forms and rules. Some of the most influential people from this time were Dante, Petrarch, Shakespeare, and Boccaccio. They tried to associate Romantic literature with medieval romances to further connect to their idealized period. -
Napoleon I on His Throne
This portrait done by Ingres portrays Napoleon I in a heroic manner common to Neoclassical art that reflect the relationship between this style of art and the French. Napoleon overthrew the old government to take over and was seen by many people as a hero for freeing them. The portrait appears stiff because the artists were less inclined to display movement in their works during this period. -
Period: to
Realism
Realism focused on accurately portraying the modern world and the hypocrisy and brutality common to bourgeois life. They utilized scientific objectivity and observation learned from the Enlightenment to further their work and rejected the ideas of nature, the poor, love, and polite society associated with romanticism. Some of the famous writers include Charles Dickens and George Eliot. -
Bonjour Monsieur Courbet
This painting by Gustave Courbet in the Realism period displays a common meeting that has been approached by someone with a scientific eye, as seen in the details of the painting. It focused more on the people in the picture than on the setting to differ from the Romantic period. -
Neuschwanstein Caste
Although this castle was built after the peak of Romanticism, it displays the return to medieval style found in Romanticism. It was commissioned by Ludwig II of Bavaria as a retreat, but he died shortly after completion and the castle was opened to the public. It displays the picturesque ideals of romanticism as well as the traditional Gothic architecture style of the Medieval period. -
Period: to
Modernism
Modernism was a multifaceted movement that focused more on the beauty of life than on the social issues of the time. They sought to break the mold of preexisting forms and experiment with new forms and silhouettes. One of the most well-known modernist groups was the Bloomsburg groups who included Virginia Woolf. Vanessa Bell, and Duncan Grant. -
Period: to
Impressionism
The Impressionist movement occurred mainly in France. These artists were concerned with modern life focusing especially on social life and the leisure activities of the middle and lower classes. They were fascinated with light, color, and the visual experiences they could create. The most famous artists of the period were Monet, Manet, Camille Pissaro, and Edgar Degas. -
Impression, soleil levant
This painting by Monet portrays the ideals of Impressionism as it shows a sunrise through the use of colors and brush strokes that creates more of the experience of a sunrise than simply a picture of the sunrise itself. By including the people on the boat, Monet is focusing on a leisure activity that the lower and middle classes like to do. -
Period: to
Postimpressionism
Postimpressionism can be viewed as an extension of the Impressionist movement, however these new artists sought to return to traditional methods to create form and structure while also including the experience. The new painters included Georges Seurat, Paul Cezanne, and Vincent Van Gogh who hoped to become back in touch with the earlier artistic trends. -
Starry Night Over the Rhône
This painting by Van Gogh describes the Postimpressionist style by using the vibrant colors and various lines to show the form and structure of what Van Gogh was experiencing. He hoped to reflect what previous artists had accomplished by focusing on a landscape and accurately describing it to create a window into that moment. -
Period: to
Cubism
Cubism differed greatly from the other art forms in that it played with the various perpectives and angles of pieces of the object to create a feeling from the object rather than simply depicting it true to life. Artists like Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque created autonomous realms of art that served no purpose beyond itself. Their paintings often reflected the sorrow or misery from the world wars. -
Girl with a Mandolin
The various pieces in this painting by Pablo Picasso reflect Cubism as do the downturned head that was common to the sorrow from the world wars. By segmenting the painting into different angles and perspectives of different pieces, Picasso is able to show more of the subject and can give a more abstract but clear message through the painting. -
The Persistence of Memory
This work by Salvador Dalí reflects the modern period because it shows the new way of approaching art by thinking outside the box and twisting the shapes. It focuses on the beauty of the elongated, fluid clocks rather than on people or society to reflect modernism's disenchantment with social issues.
