Portal:Arts/Featured article
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[edit] 2005
- December
El Lissitzky was a Russian artist, designer, photographer, teacher, typographer, and architect. He was one of the most important figures of the Russian avant-garde, helping develop suprematism with his friend and mentor, Kazimir Malevich, and designed numerous exhibition displays and propaganda works for the former Soviet Union. His work greatly influenced the Bauhaus, Constructivist, and De Stijl movements and experimented with production techniques and stylistic devices that would go on to dominate 20th century graphic design. Lissitzky's entire career was laced with the belief that the artist could be an agent for change, later summarised with his edict, "das zielbewußte Schaffen" (The task-oriented creation). In 1941 he produced one of his last known works — a Soviet propaganda poster rallying the people to construct more tanks for the fight against Nazi Germany.
[edit] 2006
- January
Buddhist art, defined as the figurative arts and decorative arts linked to the Buddhist religion, originated in the Indian subcontinent in the centuries following the life of the historical Gautama Buddha in the 6th to 5th century BCE, before evolving through its contact with other cultures and its diffusion through the rest of Asia and the world. A first, essentially Indian, aniconic phase (avoiding direct representations of the Buddha), was followed from around the 1st century CE by an iconic phase (with direct representations of the Buddha). From that time, Buddhist art diversified and evolved as it adapted to the new countries where the faith was expanding. It developed to the north through Central Asia and into Eastern Asia to form the Northern branch of Buddhist art, and to the east as far as South-East Asia to form the Southern Branch of Buddhist art. In India, the land of its birth, Buddhist art flourished and even influenced the development of Hindu art, until Buddhism almost disappeared around the 10th century with the expansion of Hinduism and Islam.
- February
Graffiti is a type of deliberate human markings on property. Graffiti can take the form of art, drawings, or words, and is illegal vandalism when done without the property owner's consent. Its origin can be traced back to ancient civilizations such as the Roman Empire and Ancient Greece. Graffiti originally was the term used for inscriptions, figure drawings, etc., found on the walls of ancient sepulchers or ruins, as in the Catacombs, or at Pompeii. It has evolved to include any decorations inscribed on any surface that are considered to be vandalism or pictures or writing placed on surfaces, usually outside walls and sidewalks, without the permission of the owner. Thus, inscriptions made by the authors of a monument are not considered graffiti. The word "graffiti" expresses the plural of "graffito", although the singular form has become relatively obscure and is largely used in art history to refer to works of art made by scratching the design on a surface.
- March
The Parthenon (Greek: Παρθενώνας) is the best-known surviving building of Ancient Greece and is regarded as one of the world's great cultural monuments. The building has stood atop the Acropolis of Athens for nearly 2,500 years and was built to give thanks to Athena, the city's patron goddess, for the salvation of Athens and Greece in the Persian Wars. The building was officially called the Temple of Athena the Virgin, and its popular name derives from the ancient Greek word παρθένος (parthenos), a virgin. The Parthenon replaced an older building that had been destroyed by the Persians. As well as being a temple, the Parthenon was used as a treasury, and was the location of the treasury of the Delian League, which later became the Athenian Empire. Although the nearby Temple of Hephaestus is the most complete surviving example of a Doric order temple, the Parthenon, in its day, was regarded as the finest. It was elaborately decorated with marble sculptures both internally and externally. These survive only in part, but there are good descriptions of most of those parts that have been lost. Beginning in 1975, the Greek Government, with funding and technical assistance provided by the European Union, began a concerted effort to restore the Parthenon and other Acropolis structures.
- April
Sicilian Baroque is the distinctive form of Baroque architecture that took hold on the large island of Sicily off the southern Italian coast in the 17th and 18th centuries. The style is recognisable not just by its typical Baroque curves and flourishes, but by its grinning masks and putti and a particular flamboyance that has given Sicily a unique architectural identity. The Sicilian Baroque style came to fruition during a major surge of rebuilding following a massive earthquake in 1693. Previously, the Baroque style had been used on the island in a naive and parochial manner, having evolved from hybrid native architecture rather than being derived from the great Baroque architects of Rome. After the earthquake, local architects, many of them trained in Rome, were given plentiful opportunities to recreate the more sophisticated Baroque architecture that had become popular in mainland Italy. Around 1730, Sicilian architects had developed a confidence in their use of the Baroque style. Their particular interpretation of this style led to its evolving further into a personalised and highly localised art form on the island. From the 1780s onwards, the style was gradually replaced by the newly-fashionable neoclassicism.
- May
The Abbey Theatre, also known as the National Theatre of Ireland, is located in Dublin, Ireland. The Abbey first opened its doors to the public on December 27, 1904 and, despite losing its original building to a fire in 1951, it has continued to stage performances more or less continuously to the present day. The Abbey was the first state-subsidised theatre in the English-speaking world; from 1925 onwards it has received an annual subsidy from the Irish Free State. In its early years, the theatre was closely associated with the writers of the Celtic revival, many of whom were involved in its foundation and most of whom had plays staged there. The Abbey served as a nursery for many of the leading Irish playwrights and actors of the 20th century. In addition, through its extensive programme of touring abroad and its high visibility to foreign, particularly North American, audiences, it has become an important part of the Irish tourist industry.
- June
Igor Stravinsky was a Russian-born composer of modern classical music. He composed in the primitivist, neo-classical and serialist styles, but he is best known for three works from his earlier, Russian period: Le sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), Petrushka and L'Oiseau de feu (The Firebird). For some, these daring and innovative ballets practically reinvented the genre. Stravinsky also wrote in a broad spectrum of ensemble combinations and classical forms. His oeuvre included everything from symphonies to piano miniatures.
Stravinsky also achieved fame as a pianist and conductor, often at the premières of his own works. He was also a writer. With the help of Alexis Roland-Manuel, Stravinsky composed a theoretical work entitled Poetics of Music. In it, he famously claimed that music was incapable of "expressing anything but itself". Robert Craft transcribed several interviews with the composer, which were published as Conversations with Stravinsky.
A quintessentially cosmopolitan Russian, Stravinsky was one of the most influential composers and artists of 20th century music, both in the West and in his native land. He was named by Time magazine as one of the most influential people of the century.
- July
Restoration literature is the literature written in English during the period commonly referred to as the English Restoration (1660 - 1689), corresponding with the last years of the direct Stuart reign in England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. In general, the term is used to denote roughly homogeneous styles of literature that center on a celebration of or reaction to the restored court of Charles II. It is a literature that includes extremes, for it encloses both Paradise Lost and the Earl of Rochester's Sodom, the high-spirited sexual comedy of The Country Wife and the moral wisdom of Pilgrim's Progress. It saw Locke's Treatises on Government, the founding of the Royal Society, the experiments and holy meditations of Robert Boyle, the hysterical attacks on theaters from Jeremy Collier, and the pioneering of literary criticism from John Dryden and John Dennis. It saw news become a commodity, the essay develop into a periodical artform, the beginnings of textual criticism, and the emergence of the stock market.
The dates for "Restoration literature" are a matter of convention, and they differ markedly from genre to genre. Thus, the "Restoration" in drama may last until 1700, while in poetry it may last only until 1666 and the annus mirabilis, and in prose it might end in 1688, with the increasing tensions over succession and the corresponding rise in journalism and periodicals or not until 1700, when those periodicals grew more stabilized. In general, the term "Restoration" is used to denote the literature that began and flourished due to Charles II, whether that literature was the laudatory ode that gained a new life with restored aristocracy or the eschatological literature that showed an increasing despair among Puritans, or the literature of rapid communication and trade that followed in the wake of England's mercantile empire.
- August
Diego Rodríguez de Silva y Velázquez (June, 1599 – August 6, 1660), commonly referred to as Diego Velázquez, was a Spanish painter, the leading artist in the court of King Philip IV. He was an individualistic artist of the contemporary baroque period, important as a portrait artist. His two visits to Italy while part of the Spanish court are well documented. In addition to numerous renditions of scenes of historical and cultural significance, he created scores of portraits of the Spanish royal family, other notable European figures, and commoners, culminating in the production of his masterpiece, Las Meninas (1656).
Starting in the first quarter of the nineteenth century, Velázquez's artwork proved a model for the realist and impressionist painters, in particular Édouard Manet. Since that time, more modern artists, including Spain's Pablo Picasso, Francisco Goya and Salvador Dalí, have paid tribute to Velázquez by recreating several of his most famous works.
- September
Porgy and Bess is an opera with music by George Gershwin, libretto by DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin and Heyward. It was based on Heyward's novel Porgy and the play of the same name that he co-wrote with his wife Dorothy. All three works deal with African American life in the fictitious Catfish Row in Charleston, South Carolina in the early 1930s.
Originally conceived by Gershwin as an "American folk opera," the work was first performed in various forms in the fall of 1935, but was not widely accepted in the United States as a legitimate opera until the late 1970s and '80s: it is now considered part of the standard operatic repertoire. Porgy and Bess is also regularly performed internationally, and several recordings of the complete work, including Gershwin's cuts, have been made. Despite this acclaim, the opera has been controversial; some from the outset have considered it racist.
"Summertime" is by far the best-known piece from the work, and countless interpretations of this and other individual numbers have also been recorded and performed. The opera is admired for Gershwin's innovative synthesis of European orchestral techniques with American jazz and folk music idioms. Porgy and Bess tells the story of Porgy, a crippled black man living in the slums of Charleston, South Carolina, and his attempts to rescue Bess from the clutches of Crown, her pimp, and Sportin' Life, the drug dealer.
- October
Ran is a 1985 film written and directed by Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa. It is a Jidaigeki (Japanese period drama) depicting the fall of Hidetora Ichimonji (Tatsuya Nakadai), an aging Sengoku-era warlord who decides to abdicate as ruler in favor of his three sons. His kingdom slowly disintegrates as each son struggles for power, murdering rivals and laying waste to the land. Hidetora goes insane after watching his retainers slaughtered in an epic massacre, the centerpiece of the film. As the kingdom crumbles and rival warlords move in for the kill, the Ichimonji clan collapses in a culmination of revenge and betrayal as old scores are finally settled. The story is based on legends of the daimyo Mori Motonari as well as on the Shakespearean tragedy King Lear.
Ran was Kurosawa's last great epic. With a budget of $12 million it was the most expensive Japanese film ever produced. Kurosawa would direct three other films before he died, but none would be so large scale. The film was hailed for its powerful images and use of color – costume designer Emi Wada won an Academy Award for Costume Design for her work on Ran. The distinctive film score, written by Toru Takemitsu, plays in isolation with the normal sound muted–particularly as Hidetora's castle is destroyed.
- November
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| Ezra Pound in 1913. |
The poetry of the United States began as a literary art during the colonial era. Unsurprisingly, most of the early poetry written in the colonies and fledgling republic used contemporary British models of poetic form, diction, and theme. However, in the 19th century a distinctive American idiom began to emerge. By the later part of that century, when Walt Whitman was winning an enthusiastic audience abroad, poets from the United States had begun to take their place at the forefront of the English-language avant-garde. This position was sustained into the 20th century to the extent that Ezra Pound (pictured) and T.S. Eliot were perhaps the most influential English-language poets in the period around World War I. By the 1960s, the young poets of the British Poetry Revival looked to their American contemporaries and predecessors as models for the kind of poetry they wanted to write.
Toward the end of the millennium, consideration of American poetry had diversified, as scholars placed an increased emphasis on poetry by women, African Americans, Hispanics, Chicanos and other subcultural groupings. Poetry, and creative writing in general, also tended to become more professionalized with the growth of Creative Writing programs on campuses across the country.
- December
Hong Kong action cinema is the principal source of the Hong Kong film industry's global fame. It combines elements from the action movie, as codified by Hollywood, with Chinese storytelling and aesthetic traditions, to create a culturally distinctive form that nevertheless has a wide transcultural appeal. In recent years, the flow has reversed somewhat, with American and European action films being heavily influenced by Hong Kong genre conventions.
The first Hong Kong action films favoured the wuxia style, emphasizing mysticism and swordplay, but this trend was politically suppressed in the 1930s and replaced by styles in which films depicted more down-to-earth unarmed kung fu, often featuring folk hero Wong Fei Hung. Post-war cultural upheavals led to a second wave of wuxia films with highly acrobatic violence, followed by the emergence of the grittier kung fu films for which the Shaw Brothers studio became best known. The 1970s saw the rise and sudden death of international superstar Bruce Lee. He was succeeded in the 1980s by Jackie Chan—who popularised the use of comedy, dangerous stunts, and modern urban settings in action films—and Jet Li, whose authentic wushu skills appealed to both eastern and western audiences. The innovative work of directors and producers like Tsui Hark and John Woo introduced further variety (for example, gunplay, triads and the supernatural). An exodus by many leading figures to Hollywood in the 1990s coincided with a downturn in the industry.
[edit] 2007
- January
Sicilian Baroque is the distinctive form of Baroque architecture that took hold on the island of Sicily, off the southern coast of Italy, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The style is recognizable not only by its typical Baroque curves and flourishes, but also by its grinning masks and putti and a particular flamboyance that has given Sicily a unique architectural identity.
The Sicilian Baroque style came to fruition during a major surge of rebuilding following a massive earthquake in 1693. Previously, the Baroque style had been used on the island in a naïve and parochial manner, having evolved from hybrid native architecture rather than being derived from the great Baroque architects of Rome. After the earthquake, local architects, many of them trained in Rome, were given plentiful opportunities to recreate the more sophisticated Baroque architecture that had become popular in mainland Italy; the work of these local architects — and the new genre of architectural engravings that they pioneered — inspired more local architects to follow their lead. Around 1730, Sicilian architects had developed a confidence in their use of the Baroque style. Their particular interpretation led to its evolving further into a personalised and highly localised art form on the island. From the 1780s onwards, the style was gradually replaced by the newly-fashionable neoclassicism.
The highly decorative Sicilian Baroque period lasted barely fifty years, and perfectly reflected the social order of the island at a time when, nominally ruled by Spain, it was in fact governed by an extravagant and egocentric aristocracy. Its Baroque architecture gives the island an architectural character that has lasted into the 21st century.
- February
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| Self-Portrait, c. 1866. |
Felice Beato (born 1833 or 1834, died c.1907), sometimes known as Felix Beato, was a Corfiote photographer. He was one of the first photographers to take pictures in East Asia and one of the first war photographers. He is also noted for his genre works, portraits, and views and panoramas of the architecture and landscapes of Asia and the Mediterranean region. Beato's travels to many lands gave him the opportunity to create powerful and lasting images of countries, people and events that were unfamiliar and remote to most people in Europe and North America. To this day his work provides the key images of such events as the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and the Second Opium War. His photographs represent the first substantial oeuvre of what came to be called photojournalism. He had a significant impact on other photographers, and Beato's influence in Japan, where he worked with and taught numerous other photographers and artists, was particularly deep and lasting.
- March
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| Oscar Wilde is one of Ireland's best-known playwrights. |
The history of Irish theatre begins with the rise of the English administration in Dublin at the start of the 17th century. Over the next 400 years this small country was to make a disproportionate contribution to drama in English.
In the early days of its history, theatrical productions in England tended to serve the political purposes of the administration, but as more theatres opened and the popular audience grew, a more diverse range of entertainments was staged. Many Dublin-based theatres developed links with their London equivalents and performers and productions from the British capital frequently found their way to the Irish stage. However, most Irish playwrights from William Congreve to George Bernard Shaw found it necessary to go abroad to establish themselves.
At the beginning of the 20th century, theatres and theatre companies dedicated to the staging of Irish plays and the development of indigenous writers, directors and performers began to emerge. This allowed many of the most significant Irish dramatists to learn their trade and establish their reputations at home rather than in Britain or the United States.
- April
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| Holkham Hall. |
Holkham Hall, Norfolk, England, is an eighteenth century country house constructed in the Palladian style for Thomas Coke 1st Earl of Leicester by the architect William Kent with advice from the architect and aristocrat Lord Burlington. Burlington's Chiswick House is the prototype for many of England's Palladian revival houses.
Holkham Hall is one of England's finest examples of the Palladian revival style of architecture, the severity of the design being closer to Palladio's ideals than many of the other numerous Palladian style houses of the period. The Holkham estate, formerly known as Neals, had been purchased in 1609 by Sir Edward Coke, the founder of the family fortune. It remains today the ancestral home of the Coke family, Earls of Leicester of Holkham.
- May
Portal:Arts/Featured article/May, 2007
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- June
Portal:Arts/Featured article/June, 2007
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