Paper 1: Visual Analysis
ASSIGNMENT
Compose a 500-1000 word visual analysis of the formal elements of a work selected from the list below.
A visual analysis will address the significant pictorial elements and their arrangement within the picture plane. Review the course material on the visual elements and the principles of design.
This is not a research exercise. It is an exercise in looking closely at the work. Use the vocabulary of the visual arts to describe what you see—line, shape, color, value, texture, form, space, etc. Consider how these things are used and why they are arranged as they are. Consider the focal points or points of the work. How does the arrangement of the elements structure and direct your vision?
Your final submission should consist solely of your own observations and insights about the work. It should not incorporate any outside research about the artwork, with the following exception: Since we are dealing with the work in an electronic reproduction it is important to take note of the information in the caption. This will give you the size of the work, the title, the artist, and the medium. The small image on your computer screen might give no indication that the piece is 8’ x 10’—or conversely that something which looks huge is actually very small. These details can help you make connections and more intelligent observations about the work.
A visual analysis has two principal components:
A detailed description of an artwork’s formal components, such as scale, material, line, color, tone, and composition. Look carefully and closely at the work.
A thoughtful and well-reasoned claim about how the formal elements come together to communicate something. This will be your thesis. It is the point of your discussion. Such a claim might, among other things, relate to the particular mood the art object evokes, the significance of the chosen subject matter, or even the artist’s attitude toward the act of art-making itself. Is the work intended to provide a record, create meaning, or provoke sensations? How does it do this? State your claim about the work clearly and succinctly. Use visual evidence to explain out and support your claims.
A successful visual analysis will be:
Specific and precise. Generalities lead to bland and boring work. Use a rich vocabulary and thoughtful descriptions. I should be able to see what you describe without having the work in front of us.
Creative and surprising. I want to know what you think about this work of art, not what generations of scholars before you have said. Use your own words and your own ideas. Take the time you spend on this project to show us something I wouldn’t be able to see right away.
Well-reasoned and well-written. Make sure the claim you make about the work is supported by the visual evidence. Your argument should originate in the work itself and your prose should be clear and compelling. I want to understand your insights.
IMAGE OPTIONS
For this formal analysis assignment, choose one of the following works.
Mickalene Thomas, Portrait of Mnonja (Fig. 1-11)
Leonardo da Vinci, Salvator Mundi, (Fig. 1-20)
Marcel Duchamp, Nude Descending a Staircase (Fig. 1-22)
Andy Warhol, Race Riot, (Fig. 1-26)
Willem DeKooning, North Atlantic Light, (Fig. 2-1)
Beatriz Milhazes, Carambola, (Fig. 2-13)
Howling Wolf, Treaty Signing at Medicine Creek Lodge, (Fig. 2-20)
Yoshitomo Nara, Dead Flower (Fig. 3-2)
Rembrandt van Rijn, The Three Crosses (Fig. 3-7)
Vincent van Gogh, The Sower (Fig. 3-9)
Hung Liu, Relic (Fig. 3-14)
Jacques-Louis David, The Death of Socrates, (Fig. 3-18)
Robert Mapplethorpe, Lisa Lyons, (Fig. 3-23)
Gustave Caillebotte, Place de l’Europe on a Rainy Day (Fig. 4-18)
Guo Xi, Early Spring, (Fig. 4-25)
Paul Cézanne, Mme. Cézanne in a Red Dress (Fig. 4-27)
Sonia Delaunay, Prismes Electriques (Electric Prisms) (Fig. 5-31)
Jordan Casteel, Galen, (Fig. 5-35)
Enguerrand Quarton, Coronation of the Virgin (Fig. 7-4)
Elizabeth Murray, Just in Time (Fig. 7-34)
Further Suggestions on How to Proceed…
Look
Resist the temptation to do anything else—such as looking things up on the web about the work or the artist. Spend at least 15 minutes looking at the work before writing down any observations. If you can’t sustain 15 minutes of looking all in one sitting, break up the time into smaller increments. Try 5 minutes. Then have a coffee or a walk and come back for the other 10 minutes. What do you see in the picture?
Describe the work-Make Some Notes and/or Sketches
The description will provide the substance of your discussion and the evidence for any claims you make.
Describe what you see. Resist “naming” things or jumping to interpretations before you’ve described what’s in the picture. Use your own words. Sometimes it’s helpful to make a sketch of the work, to get a handle on the composition.
Once you begin to take notes about what you see, the more precise you can be the better. Instead of noting “there’s a lot of orange in the picture…” you might write that “the sky, which takes up two thirds of the image, is mostly orange with subtle shifts in intensity and some suggestion of texture…”
Think
How might your descriptions and observations combine to produce an argument or claim about the work as a whole? What are the most important elements in structuring your visual experience? Why do you think the artist arranged things in this way? Sometimes it’s helpful to consider alternate ways the elements may have been used or the composition arranged. “What if?” questions can be useful in stimulating thinking. What do you have to say about the work? Think of this as if you were talking to someone about the work. What do you want them to know about what you see in the work? This will be your thesis. This takes a little work but it is important to get it right. This claim will help you organize your discussion.
Write
State your claim, your thesis, about the work clearly and succinctly. Use the collected visual evidence to back up this claim. Explain out how what you see supports the claim you make. You want to be clear, logical and persuasive. Your final submission need not describe every single aspect of the work. Describe only those elements that are significant for your claim.
