Portal:Visual arts

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THE VISUAL ARTS PORTAL

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Introduction

Visual arts are a class of art forms focusing on the creation of works which are primarily visual in nature, such as painting, drawing, photography, printmaking, and filmmaking. Those that involve three-dimensional objects, such as sculpture and architecture, are more narrowly referred to as plastic arts.

The visual arts are distinguished from the performing arts, language arts, culinary arts and other such classes of artwork, but those boundaries are not rigid. Many artistic endeavors combine aspects of visual arts with one or more non-visual art forms, such as music or spoken word.

The current use of the term "visual arts" includes fine arts as well as crafts, but this was not always the case. Prior to the Arts and Crafts movement in Britain and elsewhere at the turn of the 20th century, "visual artist" referred to a person working in the fine arts (such as painting, sculpture, or printmaking) and not the handicraft, craft, or applied art disciplines.

The scope of study and appreciation of visual arts spans the globe, and reaches through time back to people drawing on stone walls. All societies have embellished their tools and toys with more visual interest than is functionally necessary.

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Sand mandala
Image credit: Henryart
Sandpainting in the form of a temporary sand mandala, constructed by Tibetan Buddhist monks in the City-Hall of Kitzbuehel in Austria.
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A side view of the House With Chimaeras, a major art nouveau building, in the historic Pechersk neighbourhood.
The House with Chimaeras or Gorodetsky House is a major Art Nouveau building in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. It was built in the period of 1901-1902 by Vladislav Gorodetsky, who was regarded as the Gaudí of Kiev.

The building is commonly dubbed as "The House With Chimaeras" because it contains various scenes depicting exotic animals and hunting scenes, as Gorodetsky was an avid hunter. It is situated on № 10, Bankova Street, across from the president of Ukraine's office in the historic Pechersk neighbourhood of Kiev. It is currently used as a presidential residence for official and diplomatic ceremonies.

The Italian sculptor Emilio Sala made both the internal and external sculptural decorations, such as mermaids, dolphins, and frogs on the roof of the building, sinking ships and hunting trophies on the exterior walls, and exuberant interior decorations, such as grand stairways and chandeliers depicting huge catfish strangled in the stems of lotus flowers.

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“ Most painting in the European tradition was painting the mask. Modern art rejected all that. Our subject matter was the person behind the mask. ”
— Robert Motherwell, The Times (November 17, 1985)
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El Greco: Self portrait (1604)
El Greco was a prominent painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance. El Greco was born in Crete, which was at that time part of the Republic of Venice, and at 26 travelled to Venice to study. In 1570 he moved to Rome, where he opened a workshop and executed a series of works. During his stay in Italy, El Greco enriched his style with elements of Mannerism and of the Venetian Renaissance. In 1577 he emigrated to Toledo, Spain, where he lived and worked until his death. In Toledo El Greco received several major commissions and produced his best known paintings. El Greco's dramatic and expressionistic style was met with puzzlement by his contemporaries but found appreciation in the 20th century. El Greco is regarded as a precursor of both Expressionism and Cubism, while his personality and works were a source of inspiration for poets and writers such as Rainer Maria Rilke and Nikos Kazantzakis. El Greco has been characterized by modern scholars as an artist so individual that he belongs to no conventional school. He is best known for tortuously elongated figures and often fantastic or phantasmagorical pigmentation, marrying Byzantine traditions with those of Western civilization.
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