Realism
Skeleton Notes using 2-Column Format (“T” notes)
Time Period | 1800-1877 |
Characteristics | Reaction against the vagueness of Romantic Art |
Artists believed that art should represent ordinary people and activities, such as peasants, working class (genre paintings) | |
Art should be only what can be seen or touched | |
Gustave Courbet (Core-BAY) | “Father of the Realist Movement” |
Built his own exhibition hall (a shed) called the “Pavilion of Realism”—the first one man show | |
“The Stone Breakers,” 1849 | Formerly in Dresden, present whereabouts unknown; possibly destroyed in WW II |
Impasto (Im-PAHST-oh) | Thickly applied paint, applied with a palette knife |
Jean Francois MILLET (Mil-LAY) | a member of “The Barbizon School” |
| The Barbizon School | Painted outdoors (en plein air) near the town of Barbizon |
| “The Gleaners,” 1857 | From a Bible story: you leave some of the harvest for the poor to gather NO “technology” |
| Watercolor | Invented by the Egyptians Used for sketches until mid-19th century |
| American Realism: Winslow HOMER | FIRST to display watercolor as a finished artwork MAJOR AMERICAN MARINE PAINTER/WATERCOLORIST OF ALL TIME |
| Illustrator during Civil War | |
| “Man against the elements” | |
| Thomas EAKINS (A-kins) | First concern was to “get the anatomy right” |
| Learned to use chiaroscuro to make figures solid, lifelike | |
| a pioneer in photography | |
| “The Gross Clinic,” 1875 | A relative was required to be at surgical procedures by law as a witness |
Became Director of Pennsylvania Academy; required his students to draw nudes from life (co-ed classes) & do dissections Had a male model in a woman’s art class; was fired for breach of propriety Ahead of his time; encouraged blacks/women to study art; Henry O. TANNER was his student | |
| Henry O. TANNER | Went to the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in 1879 |
| “The Banjo Lesson,” 1883 | Banjo had become a symbol of derision (making fun of something) and stereotype; this painting fought against this cliché |
| Showed love between grandfather and grandson |