Your Opinion on Chapter 2 on Pictures - Essay Example

Visual Arts and Film Studies 30 Oct My Opinion on Chapter 2 The chapter offers an overview of the basics of painting and photography techniques and perceptive effects. It is a good resource for beginners to learn more about art in terms of how the artworks are produced. Some of the author’s remarks are really important for interpretation, like the description of ink technique with all its difficulties and opportunities (Sporre 30). These descriptions could be even more appealing if they were enriched with some anecdotes about the artists.

For instance, a remark about the fresco technique (no changes are possible) (Sporre 32) could be illustrated with the description of devastating toil and health losses which Sistine Chapel actually came to be for Michelangelo ("Michelangelo Paints the Sistine Chapel"). Plausibly, such explications are often given in the passages about photography: for instance, Stieglitz took his city photos with a new technology that allowed depicting the streets in motion but was virtually impossible for the previous generation of photographers (Sporre 41).

Another interesting case of technique description occurs in the paragraph distinguishing between baroque and post-impressionism: the latter, Sporre insists, was more formalistic in a sense that it exhibited rather the very tools of picture making (brush strokes etc.) than mere content (31). The list of exemplifying works is remarkable for its multiculturality: Sporre includes not only acknowledged Western painters but also the work by Native American watercolor painter Harrison Begay and Thomas Joshua Cooper’s photography with intriguing description (42); the author also mentions social and gender problems in the discussion of Dorothea Lange’s (45) and Betye Saar’s (33) works.

Some of the described techniques and painting characteristics are distinctly Asian: for instance, wash and brush technique (Sporre 30) and shifting perspective (Sporre 58-59). What the chapter lacks is a section about painting and photography genres: there is a whole body of landscape, portrait, and still life theory that is useful in artwork interpretation.A separate section is dedicated to the theory of colors (grayscale and the variety of colors) (Sporre 51-52). This section could be useful not only for art connoisseurs but also for those who would like to master graphic redactors.

Again, several passages about optics could be added to this section, but it already contains enough of useful information.In sum, the chapter was interesting to read, though I have already been familiar with many things. The book could be a good source for every beginner in art education. Works Cited"Michelangelo Paints the Sistine Chapel" EyeWitness to History. 2005. 30 Oct 2012 .Begay, Harrison. Women Picking Corn. N. d. National Museum of American Indian, Smithsonian Institution. Sporre, Dennis J.

Perceiving the Arts: An Introduction to the Humanities. Tenth Ed. Harcourt: Pearson, 2011. 32. Print. Cooper, Thomas Joshua. The Mid North Atlantic Ocean, Punta de la Calera. 2002. Sean Kelly Gallery, New York. Sporre, Dennis J. Perceiving the Arts: An Introduction to the Humanities. Tenth Ed. Harcourt: Pearson, 2011. 42. Print.Lange, Dorothea. Migrant Mother, Nipomo, California. 1936. The Library of Congress. Sporre, Dennis J. Perceiving the Arts: An Introduction to the Humanities. Tenth Ed.

Harcourt: Pearson, 2011. 45. Print.Saar, Betye. The Liberation of Aunt Jemima. N. d. Brooklyn Museum of Art, New York. 30 Oct 2012 < https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/eascfa/feminist_art_base/gallery/BetyeSaar.php >.Sporre, Dennis J. Perceiving the Arts: An Introduction to the Humanities. Tenth Ed. Harcourt: Pearson, 2011. Print.