'Petroglyph Park' by Jaune Quick-to-See Smith and 'The large Blue Horses' byFranz Marc - Term Paper Example

‘Petroglyph Park’ and ‘The Large Blue Horses’ Order No. 548872 ‘The Petroglyph Park’ is an outstanding art work by Jaune Quick-to-see Smith who is recognized as one of the twentieth century’s best known Native American artists whose unique style of painting involves modern abstractions while including a traditional touch. The artist’s personal attachment to the city of New Mexico has served to transform our vision of American landscape. The second painting that I am going to use to compare and contrast is ‘The Large Blue Horses’ (1911) by artist Franz Marc, who was well known as the pioneer of Abstract Art and the son of a landscape painter.

Franz, was a very sensitive painter who was well known for expressing his feelings and emotions through his pieces of art. He loved painting animals, especially horses because he felt that animals are innocent creatures and are much closer to God than human beings. Both artists, Juane and Franz had their own unique and peculiar style of painting but yet shared some commonality between them – such as abstract figures and the use of rich colors. Juane’s paintings are well known as “inhabited landscapes” while she makes use of modernist color and unique techniques created from her vocabulary of art work which includes oil painting as well as works on paper.

The Petroglyph Park was started by Juane about five years later when she completed her MA in art in 1980, from the University of New Mexico and it is this series of paintings that established her artistic voice in the lineage of landscape painting in America. In her modern abstraction of the Petroglyph Park, she makes use of a unique compositional style with brilliant colors and gestural layers of paint. ‘The Large Blue Horses’ by Franz Marc is an expression of his feelings towards animals in general.

His type of painting belongs to the category of ‘Expressionists’ as it depicts the sensitive feelings and emotions of the artist. According to Franz, yellow and red are more feminine colors while blue depicts masculinity. The artist uses a lot of deep blue and smooth curves to portray the muscular strength of the horses, but that the same time it shows them as tender, vulnerable, emotional creatures, emphasizing Franz’ sensitivity towards the world of nature. The oil on canvas painting of ‘The Large Blue Horses,’ occupies a special niche because it is one of the first major modernist works in the history of art.

It measured 41 -5/8 by 71- 5/16 in. Franz experimented a lot with his radical compositions as he strived to strike a human chord with nature. Jaune’s influence of depicting Petroglyphs stems from her living in the Southwest where she was often in contact with examples of Petroglyphs which are images that are incised on rock. In addition to this, she draws her influence from the pictographs which are drawings or images painted on rocks. It was these that were the driving force behind her works of abstract art.

Like the artist Franz, she too used rich, brilliant colors and has a symbolic representation for her work. In her Petroglyph Park she co-ordinates a direct allusion to the Blue Rider of Kandinsky and Marc by drawing an analogy between the sad fate of the Native American and the fate of the blue horse. Her art work depicts lost peoples - like the early demise of Marc in World War I and also the Petroglyph makers who are no longer alive. This depiction helps to keep these lost people in our memories long after they have gone from this world.

The Petroglyph Park by Jaune Quick- To- See Smith Franz Marc – Artist of ‘The Large Blue Horses. Painting of ‘The Large Blue Horses’ by Franz Marc. References Artopia: Painting www.knowitall.org/artopia/painting/artcritic/text/text A World of Art studentoffortune.com/.5./1605006-A_World_of_Art_6e_Ch21 Jaune Quick-To- See Smith – Landscapes www.contemporaryart.com/./jaune-quick-to-see-smith-landscapes-of-an-american-modernist/