Awareness Post #7 - Alphonse Mucha5/16/2018 Alphonse Mucha was a Czech Art Nouveau painter and decorative artist who often painted women for advertisements, illustrations, and designs. He lived from 1860 - 1939 and his work continues to be iconic to the Art Nouveau movement (which is actually often referred to as The Mucha Style). His work is characterized by images of beautiful young women in flowing robes surrounded by lush flowers and beautiful embellishments which more often than not form halos behind their heads. He often used pale pastel colors unlike most of the posters of that time period.
"Reverie" is considered one of Mucha's most famous works. It is a lithograph designed to serve as the 1898 Champenois company calendar. Upon its publication, however, its popularity led it to become apart of the magazine La Plume as a decorative panel with the title Reverie. It depicts a hazy-eyed woman looking through a book of decorative designs. She sports flowers in her hair and a halo of decorative flowers and stems behind her. The halo forms a lace-like pattern. In terms of meaning, Mucha's work generally depicts a "new woman" which was his way of celebrating femininity in an over-industrialized, "masculine" world. He wanted to communicate a spiritual message and uplift viewers, so he often mass-produced his art. The halo in this work and many of his others represent the religious icons that Mucha would often witness in his Catholic upbringing. Mucha's work is PHENOMENAL to me. I've always loved the illustrative and decorative style and never knew that Art Nouveau was exactly the art movement I was looking for until now. I adore the pastel colors he uses, the flowers in the hair, the halo of decoration around her, and the delicate folds of the woman's dress. The swoops in the background with the date are absolutely gorgeous to me, and I love the intricacy of the design. Line hold so much importance in this piece as nearly everything is accompanied with a contour to emphasize each aspect of the painting. Mucha employs a simple composition with the woman in the center but he gives the work movement with the position of her arm and the folds of her robe. I have little negative to say about this work besides I wish it had more contrast between the colors in order to emphasize the woman. Although there are many variations, I find that the one with the brown background is most common and I think the brown detracts from the piece. It makes the work look muddy and the ones with a vibrant evergreen color easily surpass the other variations. In addition, for such detail at the top, I think that the bottom left and right corners lack something. Although, this is not a large detail as the piece is still balanced. In addition, her hand holding the book lacks shading that he employed on the face. The non-cohesiveness makes her hand look like it is not part of her body and the lack of strong contour lines between fingers makes it appear as if she has no fingers whatsoever. I definitely want to look into illustration and more of Mucha's work. I love his embellishments and I hope to incorporate his attention to detail into my own work as well. I will utilize the motif of flowers more especially since I love the concept of them and the way Mucha executes them is simply phenomenal. Mucha has also inspired me to experiment with lithographic printing as his ability to mass produce his work without losing detail is incredibly intersting to me.
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Progress Post #30 - May 4, 20185/10/2018 This week we discussed our planning for our big end of the year sculpture project! I decided on making a live sculpture out of chicken wire, moss, and plants! I am very excited because I have always wanted to test out something that grows and lives as art. I think it is very interesting for art pieces to change over time. I also decided on my 2D project being a photograph but painting over those photographs! I am excited to see the ways I can overlay my drawings. I am kind of terrified of working with chicken wire as it seems semi-painful, but I am super excited to put in the plants. I hope this all works out as I'm not the greatest at plants!
author.jacqueline. she/her. senior. virginia, usa. art v. archives.
March 2020
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