A Designer of Art Noveau

The movement of Art Noveau started a new style for new artists. This movement begins in 1890 and ended in 1910, but there were some artists who kept the style of the Art Noveau still going. One artist who used the Art Noveau style was Alphonse Maria. He started out having a rough time with his art and trying to sell it too. Eventually, he became an illustrator and designed posters for cigarette papers, theatrical performances, and champagne bottles. Alphonse was influenced by Paul Gauguin’s art and style. Gauguin had a certain style that dealt with curvy lines and decorative clothes. Alphonse picked up the curvy lines from Gauguin and incorporated it into his designs. Alphonse was famous for his designs when he was pushed into doing posters for Sarah Bernhardt. Sarah Bernhardt needed some posters done for the  theatre, and the company she usually get her posters printed from had no designers to create her posters. So Alphonse was chosen to create the posters for her and he has done them for her from then on. Alphonse did paintings, sculptures, posters, and decorative panels. The two designs I have picked from Alphonse Maria was decorative panels I have found on his official website. The two panels are called Zodiac and Reverie. These panels are very decorative with flowers weaving throughout the design and the use of curvy lines with the hair that makes the hair looks like it is flowing in the wind. Alphonse incorporates the style of Art Noveau into these panels. He is well known for the curvy lines in the hair and how he uses different shapes into the background to make the figure in the foreground seem three-dimensional. He uses a lot of natural colors like browns, greens, and reds for the background, and he uses vibrant colors for the hair of the figure and any jewels on the figure too. I think these panels and some of his other designs are beautiful and goes with the style of Art Noveau.

Objects in the New Century

Throughout the centuries designers have created wonderful objects that are functional to their consumers. The designers in this century make a lot of objects from chairs, bowls, earrings, purses, and many more. Fumbling through the website to get something related to the movie that we watched in class called Objectified. I found an artist name Jeff Davis who uses old vinyl records that have been discarded and no longer used to listen to at home. He uses 12” vinyl records to shape them like bowls which are functional for dry foods or for decoration. The label is still intact with a mylar seal that protects the label. His bowls have been in exhibitions and a person can actually buy these bowls with there favorite genre of music. Jeff Davis also makes bowls that have vinyl feet which gives the bowls some personality. His art relates to the movie because he uses something that has not been used in a long time and makes them a piece of art that a person can actually use again but in a different function. There were some other artists who used vinyl records to make necklaces, earrings, purses, journals, and even silhouette figures.  I have picked this artist, Jeff Davis, because it incorporates with the movie and how each designer designs objects to make them functional for their consumers, and how they want their product to make the consumers happy and comfortable with their product.

Wood-cut Block Prints

In the 1450’s, printmaking became a big hit because people were able to print pages for books and pieces of art. Printmakers most likely started with writing and painting illuminated manuscripts, but found it easier to use a printer and getting multiples of the same pages. Later on printers have improved to be more sufficient. For an example, the University of West Florida has a printmaking class where the student has to wind the lever around to push the paper and the fabric that keeps the paper safe from ink. My personal opinion, I love this class because I learned different techniques with using the ink and how to use different materials to etch a picture on. Besides a little history of printmaking and the enjoyment of printing, I found a website that talked about little children from Chongquing, China who did prints and painted the backgrounds and the foregrounds of the prints to make beautiful pieces of art. The children made handmade wood-carved print blocks that they printed and painted together. This article was done in 2009 for a 2^nd Annual Festival in China. From little information and pictures, I thought that it was awesome that even little children is involved with an old fashion wood-cut print technique. The China Art Online website, show some printmaking artists that still does some this century. One artist is named Song-YanWen who does nature type prints. They are all done with a handmade wood-cut block. Song-YanWen does only black ink and very subtle etching into the woodblock. The recent one was The Wave of Birds which was done 2007. The print shows subtle waves of shadows and light that gives the impression of birds flying in sky. But my favorite one is Abstract Fish which was done in 2005. This one is unique because the fish is so close together that the viewer has to focus on the illusion to recognize what is in the picture. The print also shows depth in the middle that gives the print more kudos.

Rococo Art meets Contemporary Art

In the eighteenth century, a new art was introduced called the Rococo. The clothing in this era was frilly, lacy, and poufy. In the Kamikaze Girls movie, Momoko loved the style from a clothing line she shopped in Tokyo. This clothing line was based off of the Rococo period but they called the style Lolita. This clothing line deals with the frills and laces like the Rococo period too. For the contemporary artists, I have found an artist that designs clothes from fabrics that are found and then designed into a contemporary piece of art. The artist’s name is Yinka Shonibare. He is a unique artist that designs his graphics that gets incorporated into his fabrics which make the design of the clothing. He does get some help because he is disabled which makes him lean to one side. Yinka finds these fabrics that are in bright colors and uses headless bodies to show the piece in a humorous way. I love the way he uses these headless bodies with his Rococo clothing and designs a piece that is very interesting. He also puts the bodies in a freeze frame. It means that the headless bodies are in some motion and is frozen in that motion with the clothing moving a certain way. Yinka’s pieces also show motion with the arms and legs of the headless bodies and there is a piece that I love that is based off of a Rococo painting called The Swing by Fragonard. Yinka incorporates that painting into his own piece called The Swing too. I think he did a great job with this piece because it looks like a three dimensional painting of the The Swing, but the female has no head which makes the piece interesting and unique. When I see Yinka’s pieces and the clothing on the bodies, it does make me feel that the clothing was actually made in the Rococo period which I think is awesome.

Yinka Shonibare

Some of his

pieces.