Art

Art history

This discipline is dedicated to reconstructing the various contexts in which a work of art was produced.

Aesthetics

This term refers to the philosophical inquiry into the nature and expression of beauty.

Art criticism

This term refers to the explanation of current art events to the masses.

Formal analysis

This type of analysis focuses on only the visual qualities of an artwork.

Contextual analysis

In this type of analysis, critics look at the environment surrounding a work of art's creation and consumption.

Chronological

Art historians follow this development pattern.

Close examination of artwork

Art historians begin an analysis with this act.

Photographs

These artworks appear flatter and lacking in subtlety when reproduced in books.

Participant observation

This method of art historical study is influenced by anthropology.

Pliny the Elder

This ancient Roman historian wrote Natural History.

The Lives of the Artists

Giorgio Vasari wrote this important art historical work.

Artistic genius

This concept developed during the Renaissance and is discussed in The Lives of the Artists.

Johann Joachim Winckelmann

This German scholar emphasized the study of stylistic development in relation to historical context.

Feminist historians

This group of historiansrevised art history to include more women.

Visual culture

This broad area of artistic concern includes advertisements, television, etc.

Stone, metal, and fired clay

These three enduring materials reveal much about early civilizations.

Papyrus

This delicate material survived in Egypt due to its hot, dry climate.

Caves and tombs

These two types of sealed areas helped preserve ancient artworks around the world.

Western art was often better preserved.

Art criticism has focused on Western cultures for this reason.

d on Western cultures for this reason.

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Central and South America

This geographical region features known but unexplored historical sites.

Chauvet Cave

This cave is the site of Old Stone Age cave paintings in southeastern France.

Red ochre, black charcoal, and a bit of yellow

These three colors appear in the Chauvet Cave paintings.

Animals such as horses, rhinoceros, lions, buffalos, and mammoths

These beings are the subjects of the Chauvet Cave paintings.

Lascaux and Altamira

These caves are the two most famous cave painting sites.

Human hands

This part of the human body is depicted in Lascaux and Altamira.

Venus of Willendorf

This Old Stone Age statuette exhibits exaggerated female features.

Fertility statue

Historians suspect that this use may be the purpose of Venus of Willendorf.

Rock shelters

These dwellings developed during the Middle Stone Age.

Depiction of the human figure

This detail distinguished rock shelter paintings from older cave paintings.

Megaliths

These large rock constructions were built during the New Stone Age.

Salisbury Plain, Wiltshire, England

This location is the home of Stonehenge.

Sarsen

Stonehenge uses this form of sandstone.

Tigris and Euphrates

These two rivers border Mesopotamia.

Ziggurats

Sumerians built these stepped pyramids for religious purposes.

King of Ur

This neo-Sumerian ruler reasserted control of Sumer after the Guti conquest.

Shamash

This sun-god appears upon the stone stele of the Code of Hammurabi.

Relief carvings depicting battles, sieges, hunts, and other important events

These carvings are the most notable Assyrian artworks from 900 to 600 B.C.E.

Bel

The Ishtar Gate is dedicated to this Babylonian deity.

Persepolis

Location of Persian palace constructed of stone, brick, and wood in an Egyptian architectural style

Alexander the Great

This man conquered Egypt in 332 B.C.E.

Queen Nefertiti

This Egyptian queen's portrait bust is among Ancient Egypt's most recognizable works.

Hierarchical scale

This manner of depicting figures in an artworkportrays those with greater social status in a larger scale.

Palette of King Narmer

This Egyptian artifact used for mixing cosmetics displays hierarchical scale.

Fractional representation

This Egyptian painting method depicts each part of the body as clearly as possible.

Elaborate burials

This Egyptian custompreserved rich stores of objects.

Tutankhamen

This Egyptian boy king's tomb contained a wealth of artifacts.

Gold, blue glass, and semi-precious stones

These three materials appear on Tutankhamen's burial mask.

Nubia

This kingdom south of Egypt once ruled its northern neighbor.

Simplified, geometric nude females

The Cycladic culture is famous for these sculptures.

Knossos on Crete

The Minoan culture was centered on this city.

Minotaur

This half-man, half-bull creature was rumored to live in a Minoan maze.

Mycenaean culture

This culture arose and replaced the Minoans.

Gold

The best-known Mycenaean artifacts are made from this metal.

Limestone and marble

The Greeks used these two types of stone to create freestanding sculptures.

Doric and Ionic

These two architectural styles were used in building Greek temples between 660 and 474 B.C.E.

Corinthian style vases

Figures are portrayed against a floral background in this style of vase.

Large, linear black figures

These types of figures appeared on Athenian style vases.

Roman replicas of Greek art

Information about Doric columns has survived in this manner.

Contrapposto

This manner of posing standing figures by shifting their weight onto one leg was developed by the Greeks.

Persians

This culture was responsible for destroying the Parthenon.

Peloponnesian War

This war signaled the beginning of the Late Classical Period and the decline of architecture.

Venus de Milo and the Laoco�n Group

These two statues are notable artworks of the Hellenistic Period.

Brick and wood

Etruscan structures were built from these two materials.

Ceramic models

Information about Etruscan buildings has survived in this manner.

Clay and bronze

Most surviving Etruscan art is constructed from these two media.

Concrete

This Roman discovery allowed the construction of huge domed buildings.

Curved arch

This development allowed the Romans to construct bridges and aqueducts.

The Pantheon and the Colosseum

These two buildings, still standing in Rome, represent the genius of Roman engineering.

Relief sculptures portraying Roman emperors or military victories

These artworks often sit atop Roman triumphal arches.

Carrying small carved images of the deceased

This funereal ritual became common in the Roman Republic.

Mosaics made from small ceramic tiles.

Byzantine artists are best known for these artworks

Ravenna

This Italian city is famous for its Byzantine mosaics.

Latin

This language was the international language in the medieval period.

Book of Kells and the Coronation Gospels

These two books are notable examples of medieval illuminated manuscripts.

Germanic peoples

These early medieval people were famous for their metalwork

Vikings

This medieval culture was famous for itsimmense wooden ships.

Saint-Sernin

This famous Romanesque church is in Toulouse, France.

Vault

This arch-shaped structure can be used as a ceiling or to support a roof.

Ribbed vaults

This term refers to a framework of thin stone arches or ribs beneath intersections of vaulted portions of Gothic ceilings.

Flying buttresses

This term refers to arches or bracing materials placed on the outsides of buildings.

Chartres Cathedral

This French Gothic cathedral is famous for its large stained-glass windows and flying buttresses.

Giotto di Bondone

This Florentine fresco painter is famous as a transitional artist between the Gothic and Renaissance.

Paper money

This innovation allowed the Medici family to acquire a vast fortune.

Intellectual figures of high status

Artists played this role during the Renaissance.

Baptistery

A competition was held in Florence to design the doors for this building.

Twenty-five years

The "Gates of Paradise" required this number of years for for Lorenzo Ghiberti to complete them.

Double-shelled dome

This type of structure was Filippo Brunelleschi's winning design for the dome of the cathedral in Florence.

Linear and aerial

These two types of perspective were used by Masaccio in frescoes.

A bronze statue of David

This statue is Donatello's most well-known work.

The Birth of Venus

This work by Botticelliestablished a long-lasting image of female beauty.

Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo

These two men inspired the term "Renaissance Man.

Locks which control water flow through canals

These prototypes designed by da Vinci are still used today.

The Last Supper and the Mona Lisa

These two paintings of da Vinci's have become well known in popular culture.

Sfumato

This term refers to the use of mellowed colors and blurred outlines allowing colors to blend subtly in paintings.

David

Michelangelo created this sculpture from an immense piece of cracked marble.

Pope Julius II

This religious leader commissioned Michelangelo to design first his tomb and then the ceiling of the Sistine chapel.

Raphael Sanzio

This High Renaissance artist painted frescoes, including the School of Athens, and influential images of the Madonna.

Giorgione

This Venetian painter is credited with making landscapes viable subject matter for paintings.

Titian Vecelli

This Venetian portraitist, known as an influential colorist, used columns or drapes as backgrounds for portraits.

Mannerism

This painting style featured warped perspective and acidic colors.

Chiaroscuro

This term refers to dramatic contrasts of dark and light in a painting.

Counter Reformation

The Catholic church launched this movement, emphasizing lavish church decoration and extreme emotion.

El Greco

This well-known Mannerist painter's work emphasized the emotion of the counter-reformation.

The Alps

This geographical feature divided the Southern Renaissance from the still-Gothic North.

Engravings

Copies of Italian Renaissance artworks became available in the North through this medium.

Germany

This country's upper-class merchants traded considerably with Venice, inspiring the Northern Renaissance.

Matthias Gr�newald and Albrecht D�rer

These two men are considered the greatest artists of the Renaissance in northern Europe.

Ten works

This number of Matthias Gr�newald's works are known to have survived.

Isenheim Altarpiece

This work, consisting of nine panels on two sets of folding wings, is considered Matthias Gr�newald's masterpiece.

Albrecht D�rer

This man is considered the most famous artist of Reformation Germany.

The naturalistic detail popular in the north with the theoretical ideas of Italian artists

Albrecht D�rer's artistic style aimed to combine these two traits.

Theories of art

Albrecht D�rer wrote about this topic.

Hans Holbein the Younger

This great Renaissance portraitist was born in Germany but best known for his work in England.

Henry VIII of England

Hans Holbein's portrait of this monarch captures the subject's psychological character.

Jesuits

This religious order founded in the Baroque era focused on gathering converts worldwide.

Maria Theresa of Austria, Peter the Great and Catherine the Great of Russia, and King Louis XIV of France

These four powerful Baroque sovereigns ruled by divine right.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

This Enlightenment author's work was a protest against the concentration of wealth.

Caravaggio

This Baroque artist used chiaroscuro so extensively that his name is used to describe extremes of dark and light.

Depiction of biblical figures as poor people in ragged clothing

This naturalistic aspect of Caravaggio's work caused some patrons to reject his work.

Artemisia Gentileschi

This female baroque artist was the daughter of a painter, and her works include paintings of Old-Testament women.

Ecstasy of St. Theresa

This sculpture, done by Bernini for the Cornaro Chapel, attempts to recreate clouds and fabric in stone.

Rembrandt van Rijn

This Dutch Baroque artist was famous for his painting, printmaking, and especially draftsmanship.

Versailles

This lavish palace created for Louis XIV allowed French culture and Baroque art blossom.

Salon

This annual art exhibition, held in Louis XIV's court, established rules for judging art.

Diego Vel�zquez

This artist, the court painter of King Philip I, painted figures out of patches of color.

Versailles

Rococo art was centered at this royal court.

Jean-Antoine Watteau

This French Rococo artist was responsible for the creation of the f�te galante genre.

Madame Pompadour

This mistress to Louis XV was a patron of Rococo art.

The French Revolution of 1789

This cataclysmic eventushered in Neoclassicism to replace Rococo.

Napoleon Bonaparte

Despite his prior revolutionary leanings, Jacques Louis David had no issues with working for this man.

Romanticism

This artistic style emphasized emotions, dreams, exotic and melodramatic events.

Eug�ne Delacroix, Th�odore Gericault, and William Blake

These three men are some of the most important Romantic artists.

The Stonebreakers

This Realist painting by Gustave Courbet depicts ordinary workmen repairing a road.

Classical figures or women in exotic settings

These contexts are the only two appropriate settings for depicting female nudes in Romantic-era paintings.

Impression: Sunrise

This painting by Claude Monet gave Impressionism its name.

Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro, and Alfred Sisley

These three artists are noteworthy Impressionists.

Paul Cezanne

This artist redefined works in terms of form, inspiring Cubism.

Searching for more and more brilliant color

This trait unified Post-Impressionists.

Optical mixing

In this process, the viewer's eye blends the dots of color in a painting.

Vincent van Gogh

This artist used vivid color to emphasize vice in Night Caf�.

Stockbroker

Paul Gauguin held this career prior to discovering painting.

Chemically-based paints and the paint tube

These two inventions allowed Impressionists to take art outdoors

Japanese-style perspective and photography's snapshot style

These two characteristics influenced Edgar Degas' impressionist style.

Pre-Raphaelites

These English artists dissatisfied with the Industrial Revolution shaped a new style reminiscent of pre-Renaissance art.

Fauves, or "Wild beasts

Modernist artists who used arbitrary color extensively

Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque

These two artists collaborated to analyze form, eventually developing Cubism.

Emil Nolde and Ernst Ludwig Kirchner

These two artists utilized arbitrary colors and intense feelings along with their group, Die Br�cke.

Der Blaue Reiter

Vasily Kandinsky led this German Expressionist group.

Piet Mondrian

This Dutch Expressionist artist's De Stijl canvasses consist of flat fields of primary color.

World War I and the rise of Modern Art in the United States

These two events caused the center of the art world to move from Paris to New York.

The Armory Show

This exhibition was the first major showing of modern art in the United States.

Harlem

This area of New York was the center of the African-American creative renaissance in the United States.

LHOOQ, Fountain, and Bull's Head

Marcel Duchamp created these three Dadaist artworks.

Sigmund Freud

This psychologist's theories influenced surrealist artists such as Salvador Dal�.

Bauhaus Architecture

This architectural style aimed to combine aesthetics with industry.

Painter, graphic artist, and designer

Bauhaus School instructor Joseph Albers held these three artistic professions.

Propaganda

This type of art was produced the most during World War II.

Artists who were developing abstraction

Art critic Harold Greenberg was an advocate for this type of artist.

Jackson Pollock

This artist's work represented the pinnacle of Abstract Expressionism.

Action-paintings

This type of Abstract Expressionist painting involved dramatic brushstrokes or dripping paint.

Robert Rauschenberg

This artist created "combines" from cast-off objects he found around him.

Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, and Robert Indiana

These three famous Pop-Artists' paintings included soup cans, comics, and commercial stencils.

Acrylic paint and the airbrush

These two inventions led to "hard-edge painting.

Jeanne-Claude and Christo

These two Earthwork artists are responsible for wrapping monuments in plastic.

Guerilla Girls

This group of female artists wears gorilla masks in protest of male-dominated art world.

AT&T (Sony) Building

Philip Johnson added a finial atop this building.

The Great Wall

This structure is considered the most famous work of Ancient Chinese art.

Bronze

The dynasties succeeding the Qin in China cast this type of metal with mysterious methods.

Tang dynasty

During this Chinese dynasty, often referred to as the "Golden Age," Buddhism had a profound effect.

People's Republic of China

This Chinese government regime forced most artists to create propaganda.

Hinduism and Buddhism

These two religions have had the greatest effect on Indian art.

Shiva

This Hindu god is often depicted in sculpture dancing with raised arms.

Impressionism

This European artistic style influenced Japanese art in the 19th

Impressionism (UARG:30,1,3) century.

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Flat colors and overhead viewpoint

These two aspects of Japanese prints influenced French artists in the late nineteenth century.

Nok civilization

This ancient African society located in present-day Nigeria was renowned for its life-like terracotta sculptures.

Benin Kingdom

This ancient African society was famous for its bronze statues of the oba, or king.

Perception of traditional artworks as pagan symbols

Europeans destroyed much African art for this reason.

Art for art's sake

Traditional African art does not adhere to this Western artistic concept.

Dan and Bwa

These two African cultures were renowned for their mask making.

Polynesia, Melanesia, and Micronesia

These three archipelagos together constitute Oceania.

The Asmat

This Melanesian cultural group practicedhead-hunting.

The Maori

This New Zealand culture is currently seeking cultural renewal by placing old traditions in modern contexts.

The Quran

This Islamic holy book contains the teachings of Muhammed and is often richly decorated.

Qibla

This wall in a mosque always faces Mecca.

Anthropological and archeological museums

These two types of museums initially displayed Native American art

Pyramids and Pueblo complexes

These two types of structures are examples of extraordinary early American architecture.

Line

This term refers to a path of a point moving through space.

Vertical line

This type of line was included in medieval churches to promote spiritual awe.

Shape

This term refers to the two-dimensional area of an object.

Form

This term refers to the three-dimensional area of an object.

Organic shapes

This term refers to freeform or irregularly shaped objects.

Shading and highlighting

These two techniques are used on the contours of a two-dimensional shape to create the illusion of form.

Aerial perspective and atmospheric perspective

These two terms refer to a type of perspective which accounts for particles in the air changing the appearance of distant objects.

Vanishing point

This term refers to a point in a painting where lines converge and disappear.

Hue

This term refers to the name of a color.

Secondary colors

This term refers to colors formed by mixing two of the three primary colors.

Color wheel

Sir Isaac Newton invented this tool in the seventeenth century to organize colors.

Value

This term refers to the lightness or darkness of a color or neutral.

Neutrals

This term encompasses black, white, and the grey continuum.

Intensity

This term refers to the brightness or purity of a color.

Relativity

This property of color makes it look different next to another color.

Optical color

This term refers to the effects of special light upon colors.

Actual and visual

These terms refer to the two types of texture in the context of art.

Rhythm

This term refers to the sense of movement created in an artwork through repetition of elements.

Motif

This term refers to a single element of a pattern repeated to create rhythm.

Focal point

This term refers to a place in a composition where the eye tends to rest.

Proportion

This term refers to the size relationships among the parts of a composition.

The human figure

The Classical Greeks used this standard as the measure of all things.

Paper

Modern artists most often draw upon this common, wood-based surface.

Charcoal

This drawing medium is so soft the color of the paper shows through in areas where it is lightly applied.

Hatching and crosshatching

These two types of shading use lines.

Stippling

This shading technique involves a pattern of dots.

Pastels

This soft drawing tool is popular for portraiture and came into heavy use around the 1700s.

Relief prints, intaglio prints, lithographs, and screen prints

These four printmaking processes involve a "matrix" upon which the printed image is initially generated.

Intaglio printmaking

Lines are incised into a matrix in this printmaking process.

Lithography

This printmaking process utilizes the oil-resistant nature of water.

Screen printing

Ink is forced through stenciled silk with a squeegee in this printmaking process.

Mexican Revolution

During this event, printmaking became a way to disseminate mass-produced images of social protest.

Pigments, binders, and solvents

These three types of materials combine to make paint.

Buon fresco

In this fresco technique, paint is applied to wet plaster.

Diego Rivera

This Mexican muralist was famous for his strongly political, early 20th century frescos.

Quick-drying and narrow tonal range

These two limitations are characteristics of tempera paint

Impasto

This term refers to thickly applied, lumpy oil paint.

Encaustic

This wax-based paint was fused with irons to Egyptian grave markers.

Tempera, watercolor, and gouache

These three paints are commonly-used types of water-based paint.

Oil paint and turpentine

Some artists are allergic to these two substances, making acrylic paint important.

Photography

This development at first caused painters to strive for hyper-realism.

Carving, modeling, casting, and construction

These four processes are the basic ways of creating sculpture.

Carving

Bits of the original material are removed in this subtractive sculpture process.

Alexander Calder

This artist created mobiles from wire forms that move with the wind.

Communities and government agencies

Two groups of people from whom Environmental artists must gain approval before they can begin their work.

Collage

In this type of mixed media art, the artist combines any material that can be stuck to a surface.

Joseph Cornell

This twentieth-century artist filled open boxes with objects to make artistic statements.

Masks and ceremonial costumes

These two examples of traditional artwork can be considered mixed media.

Performance art

This type of art emphasizes a unique, unrepeatable experience.

Pinching, coiling, slab, and throwing

These four processes are types of pottery processes.

Slip

This term refers to liquid clay applied to solid clay pieces to make them stick together.

Kiln

This term refers to a special oven used for firing clay pieces.

Knitting, crocheting, and braiding

These three weaving techniques do not require a loom.

Silica

Glass is most often made from this material.

Glassblowing

Artists can form vases and bottles from glass through this method.

Boxes and house boards

Northwest Coast Indians commonly carve these two items with traditional designs.

Architects

This term refers tospecialists who design structures and buildings.

Climate

This feature dictated house-building materials in ancient times.

Post-and-lintel construction

In this important architectural development, a long piece of stone or wood is placed horizontally upon two upright pieces.

The Parthenon

This building is a famous Greek example of post-and-lintel construction.

Thin walls and stained-glass windows

The invention of flying buttresses made these two stylistic features of cathedrals possible.

The Crystal Palace

This structure was constructed from glass walls and slim iron rods for the World's Fair in London.

Antonio Gaudi

This artist created organically-shaped cut stone buildings in Spain.

Steel and concrete

These two types of materials are favored for multi-family urban developments.