Example Of Essay About Art

Compare and Contrast the self-portraits of Rembrandt van Rijn and Cindy Sherman. What do each of these artists understand the self-portrait to reveal about themselves?Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669) was the most prominent Dutch painter of all times and one of the greatest painters in the history of art. He made over a hundred self-portraits in different techniques. His life was very exciting which can be seen from his artwork. Some of his self-portraits are clear, sometimes less clear, dreamy and ethereal and his final self-portraits are realistic with gray hair and sorrow on his face. However, what all of these self-portraits have in common is style. His face is wrinkled, his lips are tight but we can see the depth of his soul and his dignity.
Rembrandt was a realistic and a philosophical painter. His colors have life. He painted with the chiaroscuro technique (light-dark) and his deepest shadow as well as the lightest shade are painted vividly. He was a painter and a model at the same time. It was his challenge. His self-portraits were painted between 1629. and 1669. He was studying carefully human soul and trying to understand the psychophysical condition by looking through the physiognomy.
In Rembrandt's self-portraits we can see his love and ambition, sorrow because of the death of his family members, bitterness, resignation and fear of death, which he felt early. He seeks comfort in his childhood. His loneliness is the main reason for painting self-portraits. While Rembrandt was young, he practiced by painting himself in the lack of other models, whereas later in life, after accomplishing success, self-portraits were his pleasure. His self-portraits reveal us his youth, hide his true nature and represent his most intimate being. Rembrandt's self-portrait from 1634. which is exhibited in the Louvre, show him as a happy and proud man. Self-portrait with Saskia from 1635., exhibited in the Art Gallery in Dresden, represents him as a bohemian, which he never was. Saskia is sitting in his lap and the meaning of this painting is to show the careless and joyful life of a young married couple.
Rembrandt's self-portraits show us his genius and his interest for spirituality. They reveal us his personal life, his deepest secrets. When he was 52 years old, he painted himself as a magnificent patriarch in a chair. His suffering is in his heart and he looks at the world from the above holding his cane like a scepter. The tragedies in his life only encouraged him to create more.
Cindy Sherman was born in 1954. in New Jersey. She works as a photographer and a film director in New York. Her work is controversial. She is famous mostly for her conceptual portraits. Her works are exhibited in galleries in Berlin, London and New York. She deals with the questions of the role and significance of women in society, media and the ways of making art. Cindy works in series, having a typical way of photographing herself in different costumes. In her series of 69 photographs, Untitled Film Stills (1977-1980), she appears like a star in B-films, foreign films and as an actress of film noir. In her series after 2003., she appears as a clown. She doesn't consider her work as feminist, but she did self-portraits as a female stereotype from television, films and magazines. She also did a "sexy" series in 1989. The critics said that her work is both fun and disturbing. In her work, she is, like Rembrandt, both hidden and revealed.
The difference between Sherman and Rembrandt is in success as well. While Rembrandt suffered a lot during his career and had many misfortunes in his life, Sherman is recognized as a great contemporary artist who has influenced American pop art. The similarity between self-portraits of Rembrandt and Sherman is in their wish to show the perception of the world around them, the society and its relation with their inner state. The difference between their self-portraits is in the techniques that were used for their creation and the fact that Rembrandt was depicting himself as a morally supreme being, whereas Sherman engages in the roles of other women as well and tries to represent their position.
Compare and Contrast the Greek Anavysos Kouros with the Roman Funerary Relief of a Circus Official. How do each of these monuments deal with the issue of human individuality? Be sure to discuss each of these works within the philosophical ideals of the historic cultures in which they were embedded.
Kouros is a term for a male statue in ancient Greece. The Anavysos Kouros was created around the year 525. BC. The term kouros is a neutral term. Most of these statues were dedicated to a god, such as Apollo. Kouros was always nude. This statue represents neither a god, nor human, but something in between. They represent physical perfection . The Anavysos Kouros is also called the Kroisos Kouros. Its height is 1,95 meters and it is exhibited in the National Museum in Athens. It is a tomb statue of Kroisos, a hero who died in a battle. He was colored. There are paint residues on his hair and on the irises of eyes. This statue has massive volume and it has blunt curves instead of sharp and abstract areas of the older statues. It also has much more anatomical details in comparison with older statues. Kroisos is standing proudly and his face has an expression of satisfaction, which was usual for the statues of that period. This work deals with human individuality because it represents a certain hero. That person is glorified by being rewarded with a tomb statue. The prominent philosophers of this culture were: Thales, Anaximenes, Anaximander, Heraclitus and Pythagoras. The first three of these dealt with the problem of being. Problems of knowledge and movement are still not in their focus. Heraclitus identified God with nature. The main law is logos which rules the world. People can understand logos through reason, not through senses. Only reason can grasp the wholeness of everything. Pythagoras concluded that harmony stems from relations between numbers. Number is perfection. He believes that a certain relation of numbers means righteousness, another soul, mind etc.
The Roman Funerary Relief of a Circus Official originates from Italy from the year 120 AD. The Circus stands for the Circus Maximus, which was ancient Roman stadium for entertainment in Rime. Chariot races took place there. The Funerary Relief of a Circus Official is a tomb sculpture as well as Anavysos Kouros. It was made for ordinary people, not aristocracy or noble individuals. This relief tells a story. The official is sown doing three things in different periods of time. He is racing with his chariot, he is being given a branch of a palm and we can also see him wearing a toga in the afterlife. His wife, who had already passed away is also present. He is holding her hand and we know that she is dead as well because she is standing on a lifted place. The similarity between this relief and kouros is that both represent people whose deaths were honorable. The difference is that we don't know who was kouros, although we know that he represents physical perfection, whereas this relief of the circus official represents an ordinary male who raced for the elite to have fun. This relief deals with human individuality by paying respect to a deceased official. He is depicted in all the main situations in his life.
Roman philosophy of this time was developed with the ancient Greece philosophy as a role model. The Romans were looking for a moral in a story. Guides for achieving happiness were also important for them as well as the preparations for public life. The Roman philosophy was practical.