SELECTING ARTWORK FOR INTERIORS

Mel Fee Adv. Dip.IDD

ART IN SOCIETY

Public Art is a mirror that reflects the local environment, cultural values and artistic vitality of the community.

When selecting art for a Public space it is hoped that the work will have, and give ,meaning to the space and inspire those who have the opportunity to see it.

Public Art is usually durable, easy cared for material, especially that exhibited in non-controlled environments and outdoors.

ART IN INTERIOR SPACES

For much of the last part of the 20th

century, the acquisition of artworks for display in homes and workspaces was primarily intended for aesthetic enjoyment.

Today, a blurring of the edges has changed our understanding of where art starts and stops giving the Interior Designer the opportunity to either:

a. Create an environment around an artwork or

b. B. Enhance an environment through the inclusion of an artwork.

ART & CONTEXTA major factor in the

understanding and appreciation of art is knowledge of its timeframe – when a work of art was made, and under what circumstances – how cultural factors of the time may have influenced the artists.

For instance, Picasso’s Guernica was created in response to the Nazi bombing of the city of Guernica in Spain, massacring its population and creating devastation in the lead up to World War II.

The artwork remains today as a chillingly dramatic protest against the brutality of war.

CRITERIA FOR SELECTING APPROPRIATE ARTWORK

1. Research the artist, the type of art they create, and the era in which they work(ed).

2. Determine the purpose of the artwork :

• Will it serve as decoration?• Is it an allusion to wealth/ stature?• Is it intended to disturb the viewer?• Will it enhance a theme or idea?• Will it make a political or social

comment?• Is it part of a collection?• Will it assist to alter to a rooms

proportions?• How will it be acquired? Auction?

Purchase? Hire? Commission?

COMMISSIONING ARTWORK

• The commissioning of an artist can occur two ways:

1. By approaching an artist directly.

This requires the purchaser to be familiar with the work of the selected artist and be prepared to negotiate clearly a specific brief;

1. Through an art dealer/commercial gallery or agency. Many artists are represented exclusively by an art gallery or agency so that their work must be mediated through the gallery or agent.

ARTWORK CONSIDERATIONS

When selecting or commissioning art a number of factors must be considered:

• Size and scale of the room;

• Framework (if any);

• Arrangement (grouping);

• Lighting (to effectively showcase the piece without inflicting UV damage)

HISTORY OF ART

PREHISTORIC PERIOD30,000BC-2500BC

Long before they could write, artists painted pictures of animals on cave walls as an early form of visualisation.

MESOPOTAMIAN PERIOD3500BC-500BC

• This period covers several civilisations. This type of art was usually war inspired propaganda and also focussed on religious and tomb art.

• It is often masculine, but also refined and

sometimes comic and highly imaginative.

EGYPTIAN ART3100BC-332BC

• Most Egyptian art was made to adorn the tomb.

• It is highly colourful and symbolic, usually demonstrating a narrative, however less dramatic and realistic the mesopotamianart.

ANCIENT GREEK ART850BC-323BC

• The Greeks artists invented the perspective drawing to allow artists to represent the world realistically., although in an idealised fashion (no pot bellies, zits or receding harlines!).

• Aclassical art period known for its otherworldly calm and beauty.

HELLENISTIC ART323BC-30BC

An era where art is stripped of its idealism,

although statues are still physically perfect.

Expressions of anger, sorrow, and fear were evidenced for the first time in the dramatic portrayal of this artwork.

ETRUSCAN & ROMAN ART8TH CENTURY BC – 4TH CENTURY BC

• Borrowed extensively from the Greeks, with a Roman contribution.

• Features a continuation of a focus on tomb art, although the early Etruscans seemed to demonstrate a happy existence in their art and viewed death as a pleasant continuation of life.

BYZANTINE ARTAD 500- AD1453

• Symbolic art, less naturalistic than the Greek and Roman predecessors.

• Byzantine art points to the hereafter rather than the here and now. Icons (mages of Jesus, Mary and the saints) is the most popular form.

• Mosaics were also a favourite medium of

the artists.

MEDIEVAL ART 500AD-1400AD

An era which followed the fall of Rome and before the Renaissance period.

Featured art forms in stained glass windows, silver and golden reliquaries (containers for holy relics – bones and other body parts of saints).

Medieval arts is steeped in mysticism and symbolism with a focus on the after life.

RENAISSANCE PERIOD

• Renaissance means “rebirth” and although the images are still dominated by religion, the images in the art tend to celebrate man and things of this world.

• The rising value of the individual led to many portrait commissions.

• To make paints and sculptures look 3 dimensional, artists worked on the mathematical law of perspective.

HIGH RENAISSANCE1495-1520

• Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael defined this era. All three strove for perfection and often found it in stable, geometrically shaped compositions.

• This period features idealised subjects with an aura of beauty and calm.

MANNERISM1530-1580

• After mastering nature, artists began to intentionally distort it. Elongated human figures, contorted postures and distorted landscapes are features.

• Art was no longer a window into the idealised version of the world, but a window into the fanciful imaginations of the artists.

BAROQUE ART 1600-1750

• Baroque became a propaganda weapon in the religious wars between Catholicism and protestantism . The Catholic Church wanted art to have a direct and powerful emotion appeal that would grab the attention of ordinary people and bind them to the faith. Cathedrals were stuffed with dramatic sculptures and paintings. Protestant artists went out of their way to downplay the importance of saints, preferring images of everyday events that read like fables.

• Baroque artists traded the geometrical composure of the Renaissance for the drama that involved the view.

• Baroque artists were also retained by the wealthy and royalty to commission work which celebrated their wealth and power.

ROCOCO ART1715-1760

• Defined as “Art on a Binge”, baroque is the art favoured by royalty who had too much money to spend.

• The ornamental quality of Rococo is often more important than the subject matter.

NEOCLASSICAL ART1765-1830

• This style of art which eminatedduring the Industrial revolutions, was used to convey a political and or spiritual message.

• The men and women of the period are depicted as Gods and heroes, their pose often grandiose gestures that are larger than life.

ROMANTICISMLate 1700’s-early 1800’s

• Artists of this era shunned the industrial revolution and attacked the excesses of the royalty.

• Some took refuge in nature, others sought a mixture of fear and awe in the sublime landscapes and seascapes.

• Imagination with a capital I and Nature with a capital N were the outcome of this creativity.

REALISM1840’s-1880’s

This period reasserted the integrity of the physical world stripping it of romantic dreaminess.

It was the artists intention that life be painted with a rugged honesty.

ARTS & CRAFTS1850’s-1930’s

• Artists created art to counter the negative effects of the Industrial Revolution – gritty cities, poverty.

They rejected the materialistic society and returned to the mysticism of the Middle Ages, focussing on hands on work with a focus on decorative art.

IMPRESSIONISM1869-late 1880’s

• Impressionists painted a slice of everyday life in natural light –people on a picnic, a walk in the park, an outdoor summer dance. It is renowned for capturing the subtle changes of atmosphere and shifting light.

• Impressionist paintings convey the fleeting quality of life.

POST IMPRESSIONISM1886-1892

Not necessarily an art movement, but a classification of a group of diverse artists like Vincent Van Gogh and Henri Toulouse Lautrec who painted in the wake of Impressionism.

FAUVISM1905-1908

• A Short lived movement headed by Henri Matisse and AndreDerain, wherein a simplified form or art was stylised.

• Perspectives where flattened, which made their art look more like wallpaper. It is generally considered inspiring, decorative and fun to view.

EXPRESSIONISM1905-1933

• A German movements where in artists distort the exterior of people and places to express the interior.

• On an expressionist canvas, a scream distorts not just the face but the whole body. Similarly the madness inside an aslyum twists the architectures itself so that it too looks mad.

CUBISM1908-1920

• This artwork era fractured physical reality into bit-sized units.

• The artists impression of Einsteins theory of relativity – all is relative – what you see depends upon your relativity.

• Pablo Picasso invented Cubism so people could observe all views of a person or an objet at once.

FUTURISM1909-1940

• This artwork era also fractured physical reality into bit-sized units.

• Futurists embraced technology and speed and unfortunately violence and fascism, and this was reflected in the volatile aspect of their work.

• Their movement was based mostly in Italy and Pre revolution Russia.

DADA 1916-1920

• In response to WWI, DADA art was aimed to mock the prevailing culture, including mainstream art.

• Its reasoning was that the rational thinking created the war and the antidote to war must be irrational thinking.

SURREALISM1924-1940

• Surrealists hoped to fix humanity by snubbing the rational world. They sought to get in touch with the deeper, instinctual reality of ones unconscious.

• They painted their dreams, and mixed up the order of life in the art by juxtaposing objects that don't’ normally fit together – e.g. a vacuum cleaner plugged into a tree.

CONSTRUCTIVISM1914-1934

• Russian artists of this pre war period refused to make art for galleries or museums. They wanted to create a practical art that ordinary workers could use and that represented the modern utopia that Socialism was supposedly

creating.

DE STIJL 1917-1931

An Artform based on artistic geometry achieved with a few shapes and primary colours – red, blue and yellow along with black and white.

It was believed that there are 2 types of beauty – subjective which is linked to the world and its senses, and objective which is considered universal and abstract.

This artform wanted to depict the objective beauty, so they avoided realism because it awakened subjective feelings.

ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM1946-1950

• After WWII German Expressionism emerged and sought to distort the fact of reality (the way human faces are distorted by exttreme feelings, but are still recognisable), beyond all recognition.

• One of the most famous abstract expressionists, Jackson Pollock achieved this effect by throwing paint on his canvases.

POP ART1960’s

• Inspired by advertising and the fantasies of stardom in America after WWII.

• This art is sometimes hard to distinguish from the movies and the ads they borrowed from .

CONCEPTUAL ART1960’s-1970’s

• Inspired by generating concepts or ideas.

• In reality this art is often a type of performance or happening that can be very spontaneous and audience driven.

POSTMODERNISM1970’s-

• Postmodernist thinkers view contemporary society as a fragmented world that has no coherent centre.

• Consequently, postmodernist artists and architects sometimes borrow from the past and mix old styles until they wind up with a new style that reflects contemporary society.