Van Gogh's The Starry Night and Salvador Dali's Persistence of Time - Essay Example

When and where was each work of art made? Van Gog’s The Starry Night was painted in 1889 while he was confined in an Asylum at Saint-Remy while Salvador Dali’s Persistence of Time was painted in 1931 at Figueras, Catalonia. Both paintings are now in the Museum of Modern Art or Moma in New York City. 2. What was happening in this place at the time? What are the identifying features of the culture or time period in which each work was made? The two paintings were painted under very different circumstances. Van Gogh’s The Starry Night was painted while he was locked up in a mental health institution when his neighbor’s petitioned him to be taken away. During the time that The Starry Night was created, Van Gogh’s fits were recurring unpredictably (Trachtman). Because Van Gogh was locked up in an Asylum, he was only painting from what he could see through the bars of his windows. Also, Van Gogh as an artist was unrecognized during the time he painted The Starry Night. Van Gogh considered his now-iconic The Starry Night, which he painted from his barred window at Saint-Rémy, a failed attempt at abstraction. Before leaving Saint-Rémy, he wrote to Émile Bernard: "I have been slaving away on nature the whole year, hardly thinking of impressionism or of this, that and the other. And yet, once again I let myself go reaching for stars that are too big--a new failure--and I have had enough of it. (Trachtman)" In contrast, Salvador Dali’s painting of Persistence of Time was a product of Dali’s evolution as a multi-faceted artist. When the Persistence of Time was painted, Salvador Dali was dabbling in surrealism. But it is important to mention that while Salvador Dali was a leading figure in surrealism and metaphysical painting, he was also interested in science and religion especially after the Hiroshima bombing in the The Second World War where his interest in atom was heightened. 3. What is the background, training, individual interests, and personality of each artist. What motivated them to make this piece of art? Vincent Van Gogh only began painting during the last 10 years of his career. Unlike Salvador Dali who started his career early and already recognized at age 27, Van Gogh was virtually unknown in the artistic world during this lifetime. Van Gogh can also be said to be inclined with religion being a son of a Minister. Dali on the other hand is more predisposed to science as can be seen in his artwork that deals with surrealism. Van Gogh He also killed himself at the age of 37 in 1890 and while he produced a total of 900 paintings and 1,100 drawings, in his lifetime, he managed to sell just one painting (Barrett, 2011). Van Gogh as was characterized by MoMAs curator, Joachim Pissarro, great-grandson of the French Impressionist Camille Pissarro as an artist to be “most audacious, crazy passionate, frenzied, unleashed bursts of brushwork. But despite of his mental anguish, Van Gogh never ceased to enjoy an astonishingly clear self-awareness and consciousness of what he was doing."( Trachtman). As an artist, Salvador Dali shared some characteristic with Van Gogh because he was also considered as eccentric and his behaviors often considered absurd and unrestraint. But unlike Van Gogh’s eccentricity, he was never locked up in an Asylum due to the bizarreness of his behavior. 4. Do we know name of the patron for the art piece? What led to the commission? Despite of Van Gogh’s artistic genius, he was generally unknown during his time. While he produced 900 paintings and 1,100 drawings in his lifetime, only one was sold. Clearly, no one patronized Van Gogh during his lifetime. In contrast, Salvador Dali had Giuseppe Albaretto as a patron and a friend who commissioned him to create one hundred and five lithographs to illustrate the Bible. Their friendship continued even after Dali’s death because Albaretto published the largest private collection of Dali’s original works (Bourne). 5. What material and technique were used to make each work of art? What part does it play in the over-all appearance of the work? Do they contribute to expressive qualities of the work? Were they used in earlier time periods or are they new?  The paintings of Van Gogh (The Starry Night) and Salvador Dali (Persistence of Time) were both rendered in oil painting. Van Gogh’s The Starry Night is characterized by using heavy stroke of brush and a masterful use of colors and an abundant trowelling of paint with a pastel knife and its genius lies in the technical rendering of the artwork. With regard to Dali’s The Persistence of Time the genius of the work lies with the theme of the work. The usage of time melting and being swarmed by ants on a realistic background evokes a certain unsettling feeling among its audience (Museum of Modern Art). 6. What is the style of each work of art? What are the stylistic conventions? Which formal elements (line shape color space texture) are most prominent? How are they used? Is the composition unified and balanced? Vincent Van Gogh painting style is considered to be post expressionism and a pioneer in 20th century expressionism. Impressionism is an artistic style and movement that depicts the experience of the artist’s experience. Among the impressionist artists, Van Gogh is considered to be the forerunner as he exaggerates the experience of the anguish of man. Perhaps his artwork is the rendering of the anguish he felt within. The Starry Night illustrates the environment of Saint-Remy Asylum where Van Gogh was confined and it portrays the usual evening of Van Gogh’s night as the heaven is lit by a moon. It shows a typical moonlit scene in Saint-Remy asylums neighborhood where he stayed for more than a year during his last period of life. Salvador Dali on the other hand was a leader of the Surrealist art movement. This is evident with his rendering of the masterpiece The Persistence of Time which is considered as the beset surrealistic artwork ever painted that even present generation continues to study it. The disturbing aspect of Dali’s work was highlighted when the melting watch was emphasized on the linear branch that made it more pronounced to its audience. The theme was not unified because it portrays the opposite world of dream and reality. Yet, Dali’s genius was able to balance the two to form an artwork albeit unsettling. 7. What is the subject matter and theme of each work? Does it have particular meaning or function? Are the meaning and iconography complex or is the meaning simple and clearly conveyed?  Of the two paintings, Salvador Dali’s The persistence of time is more difficult to decipher because it is allegorical not to mention that it combines reality with fantasy or dream. Van Gogh’s The Starry Night may mean a lot of things to its audience but the theme primarily depicts his typical evening where a moon can be seen through his window. The genius of Van Gogh’s work was more on rendering the painting than the thematic aspect of the work. Salvador Dali’s work can be interpreted in a lot of ways but it cannot be denied that the nature of the painting was to disturb and to unsettle. The background of the paint may be unrealistic but the melting watches are not the way watches are should be and as such it subconsciously disturbs us. Especially the orange watch which were attacked or eaten by ants as if to depict that our time is always under attack by its passing. 8. How does each work fit into the history of art? Is the work similar in any way to the works of art you are already familiar with?  Personally, I likened Van Gogh’s The Starry Night with Monet’s Water Lilies because of the same usage of heavy stroke of brush and the trowelling of paint on the canvass. With regard to Salvador Dali, I immediately remember Jackson Pollock because both of their works has unsettling feeling in addition to their both eccentric personalities. Works Cited Barrett, Frank. “Starry, starry sights”. Mail on Sunday, July 03, 2011. Bourne, Rose. Who was Salvador Dalis Friend and Patron?” web. February 18, 2007. http://rose.wrytestuff.com/swa132897.htm Museum of Modern Art. “The Persistence of Memory”. Web. 2010. http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=79018 Trachtman, Paul. “Night Visions”. Smithsonians , 00377333, 2009, 39(10) Read More