Portal:Visual arts

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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 to the highest degree on the imagination of the artist 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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Campbell's Soup Cans is a series of 32 paintings produced between November 1961 and June 1962 by the American pop art artist Andy Warhol. Each canvas measures 20 inches (51 cm) in height and 16 inches (41 cm) in width and contains a painting of a Campbell's Soup can. The works were Warhol's hand-painted depictions of printed imagery deriving from commercial products and popular culture and belong to the pop art movement.

Warhol began as a commercial illustrator in 1949. The series was first shown on July 9, 1962, at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles, California. The exhibition marked the West Coast debut of pop art. After the exhibition Irving Blum took ownership of the set of paintings until he loaned it to the National Gallery of Art for several years in 1987 and then sold it to the Museum of Modern Art in 1996. Warhol's motives as an artist were questioned, but the work has become embraced as the most transformative work of art in terms of reconsidering the meaning of art since Marcel Duchamp's 1917 piece Fountain. Warhol's association with the subject led to his name becoming synonymous with the Campbell's Soup Can paintings. (Full article...)

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Plate VI: The Smoking Fire from Carceri d'Invenzione by Giovanni Battista Piranesi

Credit: Fb78

Giovanni Battista Piranesi was famous for his etchings of imaginary "prisons" as illustrated here by Plate VI: The Smoking Fire from Carceri d'Invenzione.

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“	Most painting in the European tradition was painting the mask. Modern art rejected all that. Our subject matter was the person behind the mask.	”
	— Robert Motherwell, The Times (November 17, 1985)

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John Michael Wright (May 1617 – July 1694) was an English painter, mainly of portraits in the Baroque style. Born and raised in London, Wright trained in Edinburgh under the Scots painter George Jamesone, and sometimes described himself as Scottish in documents. He acquired a considerable reputation as an artist and scholar during a long sojourn in Rome. There he was admitted to the Accademia di San Luca and was associated with some of the leading artists of his generation. He was engaged by Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria, the governor of the Spanish Netherlands, to acquire artworks in Oliver Cromwell's England in 1655.

He took up permanent residence in England from 1656 and served as court painter before and after the English Restoration. A convert to Roman Catholicism, he was a favourite of the restored Stuart court, a client of both Charles II and James II, and was a witness to many of the political manoeuvrings of the era. In the final years of the Stuart monarchy he returned to Rome as part of an embassy to Pope Innocent XI. (Full article...)

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Did you know (auto generated) - load new batch

... that the catalogue for Tanzania. Masterworks of African Sculpture highlighted traditional artworks such as a Sukuma mask?
... that Mexican filmmaker David Zonana wrote his first feature film after producing for two other directors?
... that Mayu Sakai found drawing Peter Pan Syndrome difficult because of its fantasy elements?
... that the author of Sugar Dog Life ended up buying and raising a cactus after drawing one in the manga?
... that Sculpture Space lets artists create large-scale works in a former metalworking shop?
... that Graham Crowley entered the John Moores Painting Prize ten times since 1976 before finally winning in 2023?
... that Superstring at Marymount station features child-like drawings of the sun, a singing bird, and cryptic messages on babies and saving water?
... that in May 1983 British public health physician Spence Galbraith suggested withdrawing blood products made from blood donated in the U.S. after 1978?

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General images

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

Image 1The Museum of Contemporary Art in Miami, Florida (from Contemporary art)
Image 2Juan Luna, The Parisian Life, 1892 (from History of painting)
Image 3Due 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 4Silk 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 5Book of Hours (from History of painting)
Image 6Brice Marden, 1966/1986, Monochrome painting (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 8Max Ernst, 1920, early Surrealism (from History of painting)
Image 9Rock Shelters of Bhimbetka, rock painting, Stone Age, India (from History of painting)
Image 10Qianlong Emperor Practicing Calligraphy, mid-18th century. (from History of painting)
Image 11Golden section in book design (from Graphic design)
Image 12Giorgio de Chirico 1914, pre-Surrealism (from History of painting)
Image 13Grant Wood, 1930, social realism (from History of painting)
Image 14Piet Mondrian, "Composition No. 10" 1939–1942, De Stijl (from History of painting)
Image 15Henri Matisse 1909, late Fauvism (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 17Colour (from Graphic design)
Image 18Irbid, 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 19A 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 20Edward Hopper, Nighthawks, 1942, an American Scene painting (from History of painting)
Image 21Spring Morning in the Han Palace, by Ming-era artist Qiu Ying (1494–1552 AD) (from History of painting)
Image 22Pierre Bonnard, 1913, European modernist Narrative painting (from History of painting)
Image 23Lascaux, Horse (from History of painting)
Image 24Graphic symbols are often functionalist and anonymous, as these pictographs from the US National Park Service illustrate. (from Graphic design)
Image 25Lascaux, Bulls and Horses (from History of painting)
Image 26Rock Shelters of Bhimbetka, rock painting, Stone Age, India (from History of painting)
Image 27Cueva de las Manos (Spanish for Cave of the Hands) in the Santa Cruz province in Argentina, c. 7300 BC (from History of painting)
Image 28The 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 29Poster to promote the Centennial of Argentina (1910) (from Graphic design)
Image 30Max Beckmann, The Night (Die Nacht), 1918–1919, Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf (from History of painting)
Image 31Rembrandt van Rijn, The Jewish Bride, ca. 1665–1669 (from History of painting)
Image 32Paul Klee, 1922, Bauhaus (from History of painting)
Image 33A fresco from Cave 1 of Ajanta. (from History of painting)
Image 34Bharat Mata by Abanindranath Tagore (1871–1951), a nephew of the poet Rabindranath Tagore, and a pioneer of the movement (from History of painting)
Image 35Loquats 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 36Muromachi period, Shingei (1431–1485), Viewing a Waterfall, Nezu Museum, Tokyo. (from History of painting)
Image 37Patrick Henry Bruce, American modernism, 1924 (from History of painting)
Image 38Two 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 39Diego 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 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 41Pictographs from the Great Gallery, Canyonlands National Park, Horseshoe Canyon, Utah, c. 1500 BCE (from History of painting)
Image 42Edvard Munch, 1893, early example of Expressionism (from History of painting)
Image 43Baptism of Christ on a medieval Nubian painting from Old Dongola (from History of painting)
Image 44Wayang beber, 17th century (from History of painting)
Image 45Petroglyphs, from Sweden, Nordic Bronze Age (painted) (from History of painting)
Image 46Joan Miró, Horse, Pipe and Red Flower, 1920, abstract Surrealism, Philadelphia Museum of Art (from History of painting)
Image 47Marcel Duchamp, Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2, 1912, Philadelphia Museum of Art (from History of painting)
Image 48Hellenistic Greek terracotta funerary wall painting, 3rd century BC (from History of painting)
Image 49Juan Luna, La Bulaqueña, 1895 (from History of painting)
Image 50Cover of the Thanksgiving 1895 issue of The Chap-Book, designed by Will H. Bradley (from Graphic design)
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 52Francis 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 53Hand stencils in the "Tree of Life" cave painting in Gua Tewet, Kalimantan, Indonesia (from History of painting)
Image 54The Sakyamuni Buddha, by Zhang Shengwen, 1173–1176 AD, Song dynasty period. (from History of painting)
Image 55Spanish cave painting of Bulls (from History of painting)
Image 56Gwion Gwion rock paintings found in the north-west Kimberley region of Western Australia c. 15,000 BC (from History of painting)
Image 57Lascaux, Aurochs (Bos primigenius primigenius) (from History of painting)
Image 58Young Mother Sewing, Mary Cassatt (from History of painting)
Image 59Morgan Russell, Cosmic Synchromy (1913–14), Synchromism (from History of painting)
Image 60Barnett Newman, Untitled Etching 1 (First Version), 1968, Minimalism (from History of painting)
Image 61Eland, rock painting, Drakensberg, South Africa (from History of painting)
Image 62A Chinese painted jar from the Western Han Era (202 BCE – 9 CE) (from History of painting)
Image 63Kiasma, a contemporary art museum in Helsinki, Finland (from Contemporary art)

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Major topics

Types of visual art – Architecture • Art intervention • Ceramic art • Computer art • Drawing • Fashion • Film • Installation art • Land art • Mixed media • Painting • Performance art • Photography • Printmaking • Sculpture • Stained glass; • Artists' Books

Art history – Pre-historic art • Ancient art • Art of Ancient Egypt • Art in Ancient Greece • Minoan pottery • Scythian art • Roman art • Women artists

Western art periods and movements – Medieval art • Gothic art • Renaissance • Mannerism • Baroque • Rococo • Neoclassicism • Romanticism • Realism • Modern Art • Impressionism • Symbolism • Fauvism • Proto-Cubism • Cubism • Futurism • Dada • Art Deco • Surrealism • Abstract Expressionism • Lyrical abstraction • Conceptual Art • Contemporary Art • Postmodern art visual arts.

Eastern and Middle Eastern art – Buddhist art • Chinese art • Islamic art • Japanese art • Laotian art • Thai art • Tibetan art

Lists – Architects • Art movements • Art periods • Painters • Printmakers • Sculptors • Statues

Lists of basic topics – Visual arts • Architecture • Film • Painting • Photography • Sculpture

v t e Visual arts and the art world
Artwork	Appropriation Collage Conceptual art Cultural artifact Drawing Fine art Fine-art photograph Found object Installation art Kinetic art Mixed media bricolage Mural fresco graffiti New media art history digital virtual Painting Performance art Plastic arts Portrait Printmaking Public art street art Sculpture carving relief statue tallest Site-specific art Social sculpture Soft sculpture Stained glass Artwork title
Roles	Artist Collector Conservator-restorer paintings frescos Critic Curator Dealer Model Patron Visual arts education Europe
Places and events	Art auction Art colony Art commune Art exhibition alternative exhibition space Art gallery Contemporary art gallery Art museum Single-artist museum Art school Europe Arts centre Arts festival Artist collective Artist cooperative Artist-in-residence program Artist-run initiative Artist-run space Biennale Commission Sculpture garden Sculpture trail Virtual museum
History of art	Timeline of art Art history (academic study) Art manifesto Art movements Criticism feminist History of painting outline Periods in Western art history Timeline of 20th century printmaking in America
Related	Art market The arts Catalogue raisonné Classificatory disputes Museum collection management deaccessioning Conservation-restoration paintings Cultural policy Depiction Destination painting Eclecticism in art Economics of art art finance art valuation Elements of art Forgery Index of painting-related articles Outline of the visual arts painting sculpture Provenance Sociology of art Style Unfinished work
Lists	Art magazines Art media Art techniques Art movements Art museums largest most visited sculpture parks single artist Art reference books Colossal sculptures in situ Contemporary artists Contemporary art galleries Modern artists National galleries Painters by name by nationality Photographers Sculptors female Stolen paintings Most expensive paintings, sculptures, works by living artists
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