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Art In Love

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This gallery is run by Wendy, a beginning art history student.

This gallery contains different types of work including oil and acrylic paintings, marble and bronze sculptures, and mixed media.

 

Exhibition Introduction

Love In Art

Artists presented:

Pablo Picasso

Louise Bourgeois

Roy Lichtestein

Gustav Klimt

Max Backmann

Mr. Brainwash

Jasper Johns

Vaeta Zitman

Auguste Rodin

Kim Anderson

The connection between the works displayed at this gallery have been chosen because they portray the theme of love. I chose these works because they evoked a feeling of love. I did try to show different forms of what I consider to be love and chose art from different times and through different mediums. I wanted to show how different artists express the theme of love in drastically different ways, but they all give the viewer the same or similar sense of love.

Pablo Picasso

Artist: Pablo Picasso

Title: The Dream

Media: Oil on canvas

Dimensions: 130 x 97 cm

Date: 1932

Biography info:

 Pablo Picasso was a Spanish painter, draughtsman, and sculptor. He was born on October 25, 1881 and passed in April 08, 1973. He is one of the most famous artists of the 20th century. At a very early age he demonstrated uncanny ability to paint in a realistic manner. He is known worldwide and his periods are well-known: Blue period, Rose period, African-inspired period, Cubism period, Classicism and Surrealism period.

Statement on the work:

 This painting belongs to Picasso's distorted depictions with oversimplified outlined and contrasting colors.

Background info on the work:

This work portrays Marie-Therese, his twenty-four year old mistress (at the time he was fifty years old).

Connects to theme and why I chose it:

 I chose this painting because it shows Picasso's love for his mistress. Not only is the sexual aspect of their relationship obvious, but her face is in the shape of a heart.

Louise Bourgeois

Artist: Louise Bourgeois

Title:  Giant Spider

Media: Bronze, Stainless Steel and Marble

Dimensions: 365 x 351 x 403 in

Date: 1999

Biography info:

Louise Bourgeois was born in Paris in 1911 and passed on May 2010. She studied art at many schools in Paris. At the age of 27, she moved to the New York, where she studied at the Art Students League. Her early works were paintings and engravings, but byt the 1940s she focused on sculptures. She used varying types of materials such as wood, rubber, bronze, and stone.

Statement on the work: “My childhood has never lost its magic, it has never lost its mystery, and it has never lost its drama.”

Background info on the work:

Bourgeois’ works became larger and more referential to what became the dominant theme of her work: her childhood. The spider is representing motherhood. Spiders are very maternal, they protect their young, and Bourgeois sees them as affectionate to their offspring.

Connects to theme and why I chose it:

I chose this sculpture because it is very different from the others I have chosen to display. Not everyone will look at a spider and automatically think of “love” but the artist does, an upon knowing that spiders are representing motherhood in her work, the viewer can understand why work is included. The love between a mother and a child is immeasurable and that is why I wanted to include this sculpture.

Roy Lichtenstein

Artist: Roy Lichtenstein

Title: We Rose Up Slowly

Media: Oil and Magna on canvas, 2 panels

Dimensions: 68 x 92 in

Date: 1964

                   

Biography info:

Roy Lichtenstein born in New York on October 27, 1923 and passed on September 29, 1997. He was a prominent American pop artist whose work was influenced by advertisements and the comic book motif. He studied at the Art Students League in 1939, and later attended Ohio State University. His studies were interrupted by three years of army service in which he drew maps for the troops. After serving in World War II, Lichtenstein returned to his studies and attained his master of fine arts degree from Ohio State where he taught for two years. He then taught at Oswego State College in New York for six years and then another three years at Rutgers University in New Jersey. He then gave up teaching and began to paint full-time.

Statement on the work:

Starting with a scene from a science fiction comic book, Lichtenstein made a small sketch of the composition. Then he used a machine to project the sketch to the size he wanted and traced it onto his canvas. To simulate photoengraver's dots, Lichtenstein laid a metal screen on the canvas, spread oil paint over the screen with a roller and rubbed the paint through the holes with a toothbrush. Undotted parts of the picture were masked with paper. Lichtenstein then painted in the letters and black outlines. The finished picture shows how Lichtenstein altered the cartoon by centering the face and balloon, adding a red helmet and turning the comic strip's question into a joke about his own art.

Background info on the work:

His works have been controversial in the art community. Earlier in the same year that this work was made, Life magazine published an article on Lichtenstein by he title “Is he the worst artist in America?”. In this same year dialogue balloons begin to disappear from his works.

Connects to theme and why I chose it:

I chose this art work because I like the comic book look the artist chose. It portrays a couple intimately close and about to kiss. The couple seems to have a lot of passion and love for each other. The words “as if we didn’t belong to the outside world any longer” shows that the couple is so wrapped up in their love that everything else does not matter.

Gustav Klimt

Artist: Gustav Klimt

Title: The Kiss

Media: Oil on canvas

Dimensions: 180 x 180 cm

Date: 1908

Biography info:

 Gustav Klimt was an Austrian painter that lived from July 14, 1862 to February 6, 1918. His primary subject of his paintings, murals, sketches and other works was the female body.

Statement on the work: 

A perfect square, the canvas depicts a couple embracing their bodies entwined in elaborate robes decorated in a style influenced by both linear constructs of the contemporary Art Nouveau style and the organic forms of the earlier Arts and Crafts movement.

Background info on the work:

“The Kiss” was created during Klimt’s “Golden Phase”. During this period he used gold leaf. In this work the female is the protagonist, rather than merely the object of desire.

Connects to theme and why I chose it: 

I chose this work because there is an overall sense of tenderness and love between the couple embracing. The man carefully angles her face so he can kiss her. This shows that the couple love each other

Max Beckmann

Artist: Max Beckmann

Title: Odysseus and Calypso

Media: Oil on canvas

Dimensions: 150 x 115.5 cm

Date: 1943

Biography info:

Max Beckmann is a German painter that lived from 1884 to 1950. He decided he would be a painter at the early age of fifteen. By 1906 Beckmann was an accomplished painter. In 19010 he became the youngest member ever to elected to the executive board of the Secession by his colleagues. He created more than eight hundred paintings and produced hundreds of prints and drawings during 1905 and 1950. During this time he was also persecuted by the Nazis so he had to leave his homeland and work in isolation to avoid the war. He served as a medical volunteer for a year and was discharged in 1915 after a breakdown. When he started painting again in 1917 his style had changed radically. Nazis began ridding Germany of Modern art, which they believed to be socially and morally corrupt. By 1937, almost six hundred of Beckmann’s works had been confiscated. After the war, he moved to the U.S. where he taught and painted the last three years of his life.

Statement on the work:

 I am painting portraits, still lifes, landscapes, visions of towns rising up out of the sea, beautiful women, and grotesque monsters. People bathing and female nudes; in short a life — a life that simply exists. Without thoughts or ideas. Filled with colors and forms from nature and from out of myself. — As beautiful as possible.

Background info on the work: 

The painting depicts Odysseus and Calypso laying down intimately in bed with the company of a parrot and a cat. The portrait of the cat is actually of Beckmann’s own cat “Pip”, who is also the subject of some of his other works.

Connects to theme and why I chose it:

 I chose this painting because it portrays a couple that is in love. The woman seems to be very passionate and lovingly caressing the male. And even if someone does not know the story of Odysseus and Calypso the painting still speaks of love. The fact that they let the parrot and the cat stay nearby also speaks about their love for their pets.