Author: lindamayoux

  • Abstraction

    What is Abstraction?

    (from the Latin abs, meaning away from and trahere, meaning to draw)
    is the process of taking away or removing characteristics from something in order to reduce it to a set of essential characteristics. (http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/abstraction)

    Abstract Art

    wikipedia

    Abstract art uses a visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world.

    Abstraction exists along a continuum.

    • All art is in some degree abstraction in the sense that even figurative art  is selective in what it represents.
    • Partial abstraction through obvious alterations of eg colour or form.
    • Total abstraction bears no trace of any reference to anything recognizable.

    History

    Much of the art of earlier cultures – signs and marks on pottery, textiles, and inscriptions and paintings on rock – were simple, geometric and linear forms which might have had a symbolic or decorative purpose.

    In Western Art abstraction started to develop in 19th Century. Three art movements which contributed to the development of abstract art were Romanticism, Impressionism and Expressionism.

    Romanticism

    James McNeill Whistler  in his painting Nocturne in Black and Gold: The falling Rocket, (1872), placed greater emphasis on visual sensation than the depiction of objects.

    John Constable, J M W Turner, Camille Corot and from them to the

    Impressionists

    Paul Cézanne had begun as an Impressionist but his aim – to make a logical construction of reality based on a view from a single point, with modulated colour in flat areas – became the basis of a new visual art, later to be developed into Cubism by Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso.

    Expressionist painters

    Expressionists explored the bold use of paint surface, drawing distortions and exaggerations, and intense color and produced emotionally charged paintings that were reactions to and perceptions of contemporary experience; and reactions to Impressionism and other more conservative directions of late 19th-century painting. The Expressionists drastically changed the emphasis on subject matter in favor of the portrayal of psychological states of being.

    Edvard Munch

    James Ensor

    Additionally in the late 19th century in Eastern Europe mysticism and early modernist religious philosophy as expressed by theosophist Mme. Blavatsky had a profound impact on pioneer geometric artists like Wassily Kandinsky, and Hilma af Klint. The mystical teaching of Georges Gurdjieff and P.D. Ouspensky also had an important influence on the early formations of the geometric abstract styles of Piet Mondrian and his colleagues in the early 20th century.

    20th century

    Post Impressionism as practiced by Paul Gauguin, Georges Seurat, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Cézanne had an enormous impact on 20th-century art and led to the advent of 20th-century abstraction. The heritage of painters like Van Gogh, Cézanne, Gauguin, and Seurat was essential for the development of modern art.

    Fauvism: At the beginning of the 20th century Henri Matisse and several other young artists including the pre-cubist Georges Braque, André Derain, Raoul Dufy and Maurice de Vlaminck revolutionized the Paris art world with “wild”, multi-colored, expressive, landscapes and figure paintings that the critics called Fauvism. With his expressive use of color and his free and imaginative drawing Henri Matisse comes very close to pure abstraction in French Window at Collioure, (1914), View of Notre-Dame, (1914), and The Yellow Curtain from 1915. The raw language of color as developed by the Fauves directly influenced another pioneer of abstraction Wassily Kandinsky (see illustration).

    Cubism ultimately depends upon subject matter, it became, along with Fauvism, the art movement that directly opened the door to abstraction in the 20th century. Pablo Picasso made his first cubist paintings based on Cézanne’s idea that all depiction of nature can be reduced to three solids: cube, sphere and cone. With the painting Les Demoiselles d’Avignon 1907, Picasso dramatically created a new and radical picture depicting a raw and primitive brothel scene with five prostitutes, violently painted women, reminiscent of African tribal masks and his own new Cubist inventions. Analytic cubism was jointly developed by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque, from about 1908 through 1912. Analytic cubism, the first clear manifestation of cubism, was followed by Synthetic cubism, practised by Braque, Picasso, Fernand Léger, Juan Gris, Albert Gleizes, Marcel Duchamp and countless other artists into the 1920s. Synthetic cubism is characterized by the introduction of different textures, surfaces, collage elements, papier collé and a large variety of merged subject matter. The collage artists like Kurt Schwitters and Man Ray and others taking the clue from Cubism were instrumental to the development of the movement called Dada.

    The Italian poet Marinetti published ‘The Founding and Manifesto of Futurism’ in 1909, which inspired artists such as Carlo Carra in, Painting of Sounds, Noises and Smells and Umberto Boccioni Train in Motion, 1911, to a further stage of abstraction and profoundly influenced art movements throughout Europe.[10]

    Orphism During the 1912 Salon de la Section d’Or the poet Guillaume Apollinaire named the work of several artists including Robert and Sonia Delaunay, Orphism.[11] He defined it as, the art of painting new structures out of elements that have not been borrowed from the visual sphere, but had been created entirely by the artist…it is a pure art.[12]

    Since the turn of the century cultural connections between artists of the major European and American cities had become extremely active as they strove to create an art form equal to the high aspirations of modernism. Ideas were able to cross-fertilize by means of artists books, exhibitions and manifestos so that many sources were open to experimentation and discussion, and formed a basis for a diversity of modes of abstraction. The following extract from,’The World Backwards’, gives some impression of the inter-connectedness of culture at the time: ‘David Burliuk’s knowledge of modern art movements must have been extremely up-to-date, for the second Knave of Diamonds exhibition, held in January 1912 (in Moscow) included not only paintings sent from Munich, but some members of the German Die Brücke group, while from Paris came work by Robert Delaunay, Henri Matisse and Fernand Léger, as well as Picasso. During the Spring David Burliuk gave two lectures on cubism and planned a polemical publication, which the Knave of Diamonds was to finance. He went abroad in May and came back determined to rival the almanac Der Blaue Reiter which had emerged from the printers while he was in Germany’.

    From 1909 to 1913 many experimental works in the search for this ‘pure art’ had been created: Francis Picabia painted Caoutchouc, 1909,[13] The Spring, 1912,[14] Dances at the Spring[15] and The Procession, Seville, 1912;[16] Wassily Kandinsky painted Untitled (First Abstract Watercolor), 1910,[17] Improvisation 21A, the Impression series, and Picture with a Circle (1911);[18] František Kupka had painted the Orphist works, Discs of Newton (Study for Fugue in Two Colors), 1912[19] and Amorpha, Fugue en deux couleurs (Fugue in Two Colors), 1912; Robert Delaunay painted a series entitled Simultaneous Windows and Formes Circulaires, Soleil n°2 (1912–13);[20] Léopold Survage created Colored Rhythm (Study for the film), 1913;[21] Piet Mondrian, painted Tableau No. 1 and Composition No. 11, 1913.[22]
    Wassily Kandinsky, On White 2, 1923
    And the search continued: The Rayist (Luchizm) drawings of Natalia Goncharova and Mikhail Larionov, used lines like rays of light to make a construction. Kasimir Malevich completed his first entirely abstract work, the Suprematist, ‘Black Square’, in 1915. Another of the Suprematist group’ Liubov Popova, created the Architectonic Constructions and Spatial Force Constructions between 1916 and 1921. Piet Mondrian was evolving his abstract language, of horizontal and vertical lines with rectangles of colour, between 1915 and 1919, Neo-Plasticism was the aesthetic which Mondrian, Theo van Doesburg and other in the group De Stijl intended to reshape the environment of the future.

    Music
    As visual art becomes more abstract, it develops some characteristics of music: an art form which uses the abstract elements of sound and divisions of time. Wassily Kandinsky, himself a musician, was inspired by the possibility of marks and associative color resounding in the soul. The idea had been put forward by Charles Baudelaire, that all our senses respond to various stimuli but the senses are connected at a deeper aesthetic level.

    Closely related to this, is the idea that art has The spiritual dimension and can transcend ‘every-day’ experience, reaching a spiritual plane. The Theosophical Society popularised the ancient wisdom of the sacred books of India and China in the early years of the century. It was in this context that Piet Mondrian, Wassily Kandinsky, Hilma af Klint and other artists working towards an ‘objectless state’ became interested in the occult as a way of creating an ‘inner’ object. The universal and timeless shapes found in geometry: the circle, square and triangle become the spatial elements in abstract art; they are, like color, fundamental systems underlying visible reality.

    Russian avant-garde

    Many of the abstract artists in Russia became Constructivists believing that art was no longer something remote, but life itself. The artist must become a technician, learning to use the tools and materials of modern production. Art into life! was Vladimir Tatlin’s slogan, and that of all the future Constructivists. Varvara Stepanova and Alexandre Exter and others abandoned easel painting and diverted their energies to theatre design and graphic works. On the other side stood Kazimir Malevich, Anton Pevsner and Naum Gabo. They argued that art was essentially a spiritual activity; to create the individual’s place in the world, not to organise life in a practical, materialistic sense. Many of those who were hostile to the materialist production idea of art left Russia. Anton Pevsner went to France, Gabo went first to Berlin, then to England and finally to America. Kandinsky studied in Moscow then left for the Bauhaus. By the mid-1920s the revolutionary period (1917 to 1921) when artists had been free to experiment was over; and by the 1930s only socialist realism was allowed.[23]

    The Bauhaus
    The Bauhaus at Weimar, Germany was founded in 1919 by Walter Gropius. The philosophy underlying the teaching program was unity of all the visual and plastic arts from architecture and painting to weaving and stained glass. This philosophy had grown from the ideas of the Arts and Crafts movement in England and the Deutscher Werkbund. Among the teachers were Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, Johannes Itten, Josef Albers, Anni Albers, Theo van Doesburg and László Moholy-Nagy.

    In 1925 the school was moved to Dessau and, as the Nazi party gained control in 1932, The Bauhaus was closed. In 1937 an exhibition of degenerate art, ‘Entartete Kunst’ contained all types of avant-garde art disapproved of by the Nazi party. Then the exodus began: not just from the Bauhaus but from Europe in general; to Paris, London and America. Paul Klee went to Switzerland but many of the artists at the Bauhaus went to America.

    Abstraction in Paris and London

    During the 1930s Paris became the host to artists from Russia, Germany, Holland and other European countries affected by the rise of totalitarianism.

    Sophie Tauber and Jean Arp collaborated on paintings and sculpture using organic/geometric forms.

    The Polish Katarzyna Kobro applied mathematically based ideas to sculpture. The many types of abstraction now in close proximity led to attempts by artists to analyse the various conceptual and aesthetic groupings.

    An exhibition by forty-six members of the Cercle et Carré group organised by Michel Seuphor contained work by the Neo-Plasticists as well as abstractionists as varied as Kandinsky, Anton Pevsner and Kurt Schwitters. Criticised by Theo van Doesburg to be too indefinite a collection he published the journal Art Concret setting out a manifesto defining an abstract art in which the line, color and surface only, are the concrete reality.

    Abstraction-Création founded in 1931 as a more open group, provided a point of reference for abstract artists, as the political situation worsened in 1935, and artists again regrouped, many in London.

    1935 The first exhibition of British abstract art was held in England in 1935. The following year the more international Abstract and Concrete exhibition was organised by Nicolete Gray including work by Piet Mondrian, Joan Miró, Barbara Hepworth and Ben Nicholson. Hepworth, Nicholson and Gabo moved to the St. Ives group in Cornwall to continue their ‘constructivist’ work.

    America: mid-century
    Main articles: Modernism, Late modernism, American Modernism and Surrealism

    During the Nazi rise to power in the 1930s many artists fled Europe to the United States. By the early 1940s the main movements in modern art, expressionism, cubism, abstraction, surrealism, and dada were represented in New York: Marcel Duchamp, Fernand Léger, Piet Mondrian, Jacques Lipchitz, André Masson, Max Ernst, André Breton, were just a few of the exiled Europeans who arrived in New York.

    The rich cultural influences brought by the European artists were distilled and built upon by local New York painters. The climate of freedom in New York allowed all of these influences to flourish. The art galleries that primarily had focused on European art began to notice the local art community and the work of younger American artists who had begun to mature. Certain of these artists became distinctly abstract in their mature work.

    During this period Piet Mondrian’s painting Composition No. 10, 1939-1942, characterized by primary colors, white ground and black grid lines clearly defined his radical but classical approach to the rectangle and abstract art in general.

    Some artists of the period defied categorization, such as Georgia O’Keeffe who, while a modernist abstractionist, was a pure maverick in that she painted highly abstract forms while not joining any specific group of the period.

    Eventually American artists who were working in a great diversity of styles began to coalesce into cohesive stylistic groups. The best known group of American artists became known as the Abstract expressionists and the New York School.

    Mark Rothko, born in Russia, began with strongly surrealist imagery which later dissolved into his powerful color compositions of the early 1950s. The expressionistic gesture and the act of painting itself, became of primary importance to Jackson Pollock and Franz Kline. While during the 1940s Arshile Gorky’s and Willem de Kooning’s figurative work evolved into abstraction by the end of the decade.

    Both geometric abstraction and lyrical abstraction are often totally abstract. Among the very numerous art movements that embody partial abstraction would be for instance fauvism in which color is conspicuously and deliberately altered vis-a-vis reality, and cubism, which blatantly alters the forms of the real life entities depicted.[3][4]

    st-Impressionists they were instrumental to the advent of abstraction in the 20th century.

    Abstraction in the 21st century

    Main articles: Abstract expressionism, Color field, Lyrical abstraction, Post-painterly abstraction, Sculpture and Minimal art

    A commonly held idea is that pluralism characterizes art at the beginning of the 21st century. There is no consensus, nor need there be, as to a representative style of the age. There is an anything goes attitude that prevails; an “everything going on”, and consequently “nothing going on” syndrome; this creates an aesthetic traffic jam with no firm and clear direction and with every lane on the artistic superhighway filled to capacity. Consequently magnificent and important works of art continue to be made albeit in a wide variety of styles and aesthetic temperaments, the marketplace being left to judge merit.

    Digital art, computer art, internet art, hard-edge painting, geometric abstraction, appropriation, hyperrealism, photorealism, expressionism, minimalism, lyrical abstraction, pop art, op art, abstract expressionism, color field painting, monochrome painting, neo-expressionism, collage, decollage, intermedia, assemblage, digital painting, postmodern art, neo-Dada painting, shaped canvas painting, environmental mural painting, graffiti, figure painting, landscape painting, portrait painting, are a few continuing and current directions at the beginning of the 21st century.

    Into the 21st century abstraction remains very much in view, its main themes: the transcendental, the contemplative and the timeless are exempified by Barnett Newman, John McLaughlin, and Agnes Martin as well as younger living artists. Art as Object as seen in the Minimalist sculpture of Donald Judd and the paintings of Frank Stella are still seen today in newer permutations. The poetic, Lyrical Abstraction and the sensuous use of color seen in the work of painters as diverse as Robert Motherwell, Patrick Heron, Kenneth Noland, Sam Francis, Cy Twombly, Richard Diebenkorn, Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, among others.

    There was a resurgence after the war and into the 1950s of the figurative, as neo-Dada, fluxus, happening, conceptual art, neo-expressionism, installation art, performance art, video art and pop art have come to signify the age of consumerism. The distinction between abstract and figurative art has, over the last twenty years, become less defined leaving a wider range of ideas for all artists.

    Causation

    One socio-historical explanation that has been offered for the growing prevalence of the abstract in modern art – an explanation linked to the name of Theodor W. Adorno – is that such abstraction is a response to, and a reflection of, the growing abstraction of social relations in industrial society.[31]

    Frederic Jameson similarly sees modernist abstraction as a function of the abstract power of money, equating all things equally as exchange-values.[32] The social content of abstract art is then precisely the abstract nature of social existence – legal formalities, bureaucratic impersonalisation, information/power – in the world of late modernity.[33]

    Post-Jungians by contrast would see the quantum theories with their disintegration of conventional ideas of form and matter as underlying the divorce of the concrete and the abstract in modern art.[34]

  • Western Graphic Design Movements

    Western Graphic Design Movements

    Design Movements

    • Art Deco

      Art Deco

      Art Deco, or Deco, first appeared in France after World War I and flourished internationally in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s. The style is often characterized by rich colours, bold geometric shapes and lavish ornamentation. Its popularity waned after World War II. 

    • Art Nouveau

      Art Nouveau

      Art Nouveau is an international philosophy and style of art, architecture and applied art – especially the decorative arts – that was most popular during 1890–1910.  Art Nouveau is known as Jugendstil  in Germany, Modern in Russia,  Modernisme in Catalonia,  Secession in Austria-Hungary and Stile Liberty in Italy.

    • Bauhaus

      The Bauhaus was founded in 1919 in the city of Weimar by German architect Walter Gropius (1883–1969). Its core objective was a radical concept: to reimagine the material world to reflect the unity of all the arts. Other visual artists included  Paul Klee, Vasily Kandinsky and Josef Albers.

    • Constructivism

      Constructivism

      Constructivism was primarily an art and architectural movement originating in Russia after World War 1. It rejected the idea of art for arts’ sake and the traditional bourgeois class of society to which previous art had been catered. Instead it favoured art as a practise directed towards social change or that would serve a social…

    • Dada

      Dada or Dadaism was an art movement of the European avant-garde in the early 20th century. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature, poetry, art manifestos, art theory, theatre, and graphic design, and concentrated its anti-war politics through a rejection of the prevailing standards in art through anti-art cultural works.

    • Futurism

      Futurism

      Futurism (Italian: Futurismo) was an artistic and social movement that originated in Italy in the early 20th century. It emphasized speed, technology, youth, and violence, and objects such as the car, the aeroplane, and the industrial city. It glorified modernity and aimed to liberate Italy from the weight of its past.

    • International Swiss Style

      International Swiss Style

      The International Typographic Style, also known as the Swiss Style, is a graphic design style that emerged in Russia, the Netherlands and Germany in the 1920s and developed by designers in Switzerland during the 1950s. The International Typographic Style has had profound influence on graphic design as a part of the modernist movement, impacting many…

    • Modernism

      Modernism in design and architecture emerged in the aftermath of the First World War and the Russian Revolution – a period when the artistic avant-garde dreamed of a new world free of conflict, greed and social inequality. It was not a style but a loose collection of ideas.

    Other design movements forthcoming posts

    Expressionism

    Expressionist woodcuts

    Post-modernism

    Surrealism

    Impressionism

    Designhistory.org (Western design only)

  • Feminist Design

    Feminist Design

    NOTE: Post for significant development 2025

    Feminist art and design

    • What were the social and political conditions that made these artists communicate in the ways they did?
    • How is this demonstrated in their work?
    • How did these artists establish their own artistic
      identity?

    “I have had to go to men as sources in my painting because the past has left us so small an inheritance of woman’s painting that had widened life….Before I put a brush to canvas I question, “Is this mine? Is it all intrinsically of myself? Is it influenced by some idea or some photograph of an idea which I have acquired from some man?”

    Georgia O’Keefe
    http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/modern/Georgia-OKeeffe.html

    For an interview with Georgia O’Keefe visit http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYwKRVJaNEA

    What is feminism?

    Some people have found it helpful to think about the history of the feminist movement in terms of first, second and third waves. Broadly speaking, these are:

    • First wave – from the formation of the National Women’s Society for Women’s Suffrage in 1867 to full female enfranchisement in the UK in 1928.
    • Second wave – from the feminist movements associated with the American civil rights movement of the early 1960s to equality legislation in the UK in the 1970s.
    • Third wave – from the 1980s to the present day, more about social and political change than legislative change.

    http://www.ehow.com/facts_4910333_history-feminist-art-movement.html

    For further research

    https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/f/feminist-art

    https://www.vermeulen-design.com/blog/feminism-graphic-design

    https://www.antalis.co.uk/home/what-we-do/print/news-events/latest-news/2022/03/design-for-good-force-feminism.html

    https://eyeondesign.aiga.org/how-feminist-movements-co-opt-graphic-design-to-express-themselves

    https://futuress.org/stories/canon-misbound

    https://saraoliveirablender.wordpress.com/2016/11/25/primary-research-feminism-in-graphic-design/

    Hannah Höch (1889–1978)

    Tamara de Lempicka (1898–1980)

    Frida Kahlo (1907–54).

    Sketchdesk 2024: The undeniable impact of women in design

    These 15 female graphic designers didn’t just break barriers. They reshaped the landscape of graphic design with their lifelong commitments to creativity, innovation, and vision. Ivy Croteau March 7, 2024

    Paula Scher

    Paula Scher is a trailblazer in the world of graphic design, known for her bold and eclectic style. As a partner at Pentagram, she worked on iconic projects like the rebranding of Citibank and Microsoft Windows. As a designer, Scher’s innovative approach to typography and branding earned her numerous accolades, solidifying her place as one of the most influential female graphic designers of our time.

    Carolyn Davidson

    Carolyn Davidson is best known for her creation of the iconic Nike “Swoosh” logo. Her minimalist yet impactful design became synonymous with the global sportswear brand, showcasing her innate ability to capture the essence of a company through visual identity.

    Jane Davis Doggett

    Jane Davis Doggett made history as the first woman to design signage for a major airport – the iconic Miami International Airport. Her innovative use of color and typography transformed airport way-finding systems, setting a new standard for environmental graphic design.

    Jessica Walsh

    Jessica Walsh is a design powerhouse, known for her vibrant and experimental approach to graphic design. Co-founder of the creative agency Sagmeister & Walsh, she worked with major brands such as Levi’s and The New York Times. As a designer, Walsh’s bold and imaginative designs continue to push the boundaries of visual communication.

    Susan Kare

    Susan Kare is a pioneer in the field of digital iconography. In the height of her career, she designed many of the original icons for the Apple Macintosh computer. Her pixel art designs, including the iconic “Happy Mac” and “Command Key,” are ingrained in pop culture, cementing her influence on user interface design.

    Jessica Hische

    Jessica Hische is a lettering artist and typographer renowned for her intricate and elegant designs. Her work spans branding, book covers, and editorial design, with clients including Wes Anderson and Penguin Books. As a designer, Hische’s dedication to craftsmanship and attention to detail earned her widespread acclaim in the design community.

    Leta Sobierajski

    Leta Sobierajski is a multidisciplinary designer known for her bold and unconventional approach to visual communication. Her playful use of color and texture challenges traditional design conventions, resulting in dynamic and engaging work across print and digital platforms.

    Louise Fili

    Louise Fili is a master of typographic design, celebrated for her exquisite craftsmanship and vintage-inspired aesthetics. With a career spanning over four decades, she created iconic branding and packaging designs for clients like Tiffany & Co. and the New York Public Library.

    Marian Bantjes

    Marian Bantjes is celebrated for her intricate and ornamental typographic designs that blur the line between illustration and lettering. Characterized by its meticulous attention to detail and whimsical aesthetic, her work garners admiration from designers worldwide.

    Bea Feitler

    Bea Feitler was a pioneering art director and graphic designer whose work revolutionized the world of editorial design. As art director for publications such as Harper’s Bazaar and Rolling Stone, she brought a bold and innovative approach to magazine layout and design, shaping the visual landscape of the 1960s and 70s.

    April Greiman

    April Greiman is a visionary designer known for her groundbreaking work in digital design and new media. A pioneer of the “New Wave” design movement, she embraced technology to create dynamic and interactive design experiences. Greiman’s innovative approach continues to inspire designers to push the boundaries of traditional graphic design.

    Deborah Sussman

    Deborah Sussman was a prolific designer whose colorful and exuberant designs helped define the visual identity of the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. Her bold use of color and geometric forms brought a sense of joy and vibrancy to the Olympic experience, leaving a lasting legacy in the world of environmental graphic design.

    Cipe Pineles

    Cipe Pineles was a groundbreaking female art director and designer, breaking barriers in the male-dominated world of editorial design. As the first female art director at Conde Nast, she played a pivotal role in shaping the visual identity of publications such as Vogue and Glamour, paving the way for future generations of female art directors.

    Zuzana Licko

    Zuzana Licko is a pioneering type designer and co-founder of the digital type foundry Emigre. Her experimental approach to typography challenged traditional design norms, leading to the creation of groundbreaking typefaces that revolutionized the industry. Licko’s innovative designs continue to influence contemporary typography and graphic design.

  • Islamic Design

    Islamic Design

    • Colour in Islamic Traditions

      Colour in Islamic Traditions
    • Islamic geometric design

      Islamic geometric design
    • Islamic calligraphy

      Islamic calligraphy

    Modern Islamic Art

    Iran

    Iranian art: Miniatures

    Qalamkar (traditional woodblock printing in Farsi)

    Shahname by Firdausi: miniatures of Ancient Iran

    Iranian Art: Modern

    Siamak Filizadeh

    Shahname in Modern Iranian Art

    Ghalamdar

    Street Artist Ghalamdar Street Artist article

    Mansur Qandriz

    Blind

    http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/qandriz-mansur

    Oman

    Oman traditional art inspiration

    The Arabic Letter Series

    Alia Alfarsi
    Dr Hanan Al Shihi

    Saudi Arabia

    Saudi Arabian art includes both the arts of Bedouin nomads and those of the sedentary peoples of regions such as the Hejaz, Tihamah, Asir and the Najd. There is also a vibrant modern art scene in major cities highlighting social issues, with a number of prominent women artists.

    Architecture

    Interior Mosque al Nabawi
    Interior Mosque al Nabawi

    The first mosque of Islam was the house of the Islamic prophet Mohammed in Medina. It is the prototype of all later sacred architecture of Islam. In it are most important the floor and carpet that are touched in prayer with the head.

    Bedouin art

    Saudi Rock art

    Tribal symbols referred to as “wusum” were carved by Bedouins during prehistoric times and are found as rock art in the hills and deserts of Arabia.

    Modern Art Movement

    The Art Movement in Saudi Arabia started in the mid 60’s by a group of School Art Teachers and lasted till mid 80’s. Prince Khalid Al Faisal, himself a poet and artist, inaugurated a cultural centre in Asir Province to promote young fresh talent. It was from this project that one of Saudi Arabia’s most prominent contemporary artists, Ahmed Mater, emerged. In 1972 Mohammed Said Farsi became the mayor of the coastal city of Jeddah, making the city one of the largest open-air art galleries in the world. Artists incorporated media outlets such as photography and video technology.

    Recently, there has been an increase in public galleries exhibiting modern art in Saudi Arabia. This supported by the influx of commercial galleries and a growing grass-roots movement of artists who have acquired international status.

    United Arab Emirates

    Archaeological motifs

    Motifs from perfume bottles found at Tel Abrak
    El Hafit tombs

    Modern Art

    Myneandyours
    National Day lips: Sisters Beauty Lounge is located in five prestigious locations throughout the country: Al Bateen Abu Dhabi, The Village Mall in Jumeirah, The Dubai Mall, Mirdif City Centre, and the Mall of the Emirates.

    article Hazem Mahdy automatic art

    Hazem Mahdy Atman 2 automatic art
    Hazem Mahdy Atman 3
  • Colour in Islamic Traditions

    Colour in Islamic Traditions

    There is a lot of disagreement about ‘colour in Islam’. Some colours appear to be recommended or forbidden. But this often differs between Quran and Hadith and different Islamic sects. There is very rich use of colour in arts and crafts in Islamic cultural traditions and modern visual creativity.

    Pan-Arab colours

    • White, black, green and red, dominate the flags of Arab states.

    Green

    Green (Arabic: أخضر‎‎) is considered the traditional colour of Islam.

    • The Arabic word for “greenness” is mentioned several times in the Quran, describing the state of the inhabitants of paradise. Reclining on green Cushions and rich Carpets of beauty — Sura 55, verse 76. Upon them will be green garments of fine silk and heavy brocade, and they will be adorned with bracelets of silver; and their Lord will give to them to drink of a Water Pure and Holy. — Sura 76, verse 21. Al-Khidr (“The Green One”) is a Qur’anic figure who met and traveled with Moses.
    • The Green Dome, traditional site of the tomb of Muhammad, was painted green on the order of sultan Abdul Hamid II (r. 1876–1909).
    • Green was used as the colour of the banners of the historical Fatimid Caliphate. The Umayyads fought under  green and gold banners. Green is also used in several national flags as a symbol of Islam. These include: Afghanistan, Algeria, Azerbaijan, Comoros, Iran, Mauritania, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia. and Sri Lanka.

    Black

    • The Abbasids chose black (blue) and fought under black banners.
    • It is often worn by Shi’ite Muslims, who mourn the death of Husayn ibn Ali, killed at the Battle of Karbala. Black cloaks are worn by the ayatollahs, the Shi’a clergy. In many Shi’a countries, a black turban is worn only by male sayids, men who descend from Muhammad through his daughter Fatimah and his son-in-law Ali.
    • Symbol of modesty in some Muslim cultures.  It is the colour of the chador worn by devout Iranian Shi’ite women
    • Black is considered the colour of mourning in Western and Mediterranean countries. But this is seen as a Christian tradition.

    White

    The colour white symbolizes purity and peace.

    • Many Muslims wear the colour white when they attend Friday prayers and when performing sacred rites of pilgrimage.
    • In Sunni tradition, Muhammad wore a white kufi (head cap) with a black amaana (turban).
    • The Umayyads chose white for their battle standards when they fought the Abbassid during the Caliphate period
    • It has appeared on many Islamic flags since.

    Red

    Has no religious significance.

    • Some claim the hadith forbids the wearing of pure red clothing, it should be mixed with patches of other colours
    • Various countries on the Persian Gulf have chosen red flags

     Blue and turquoise

    many Islamic towns in the middle east, tend to have blue color? for example, the also many houses in sana city of yemen also painted the windows and the doors in blue color? even the villages in santorini Island of greece also painted in blue and white?………..the nazar bonjuk of turkey also in the blue color. Do you think is it possible that they painted the houses in blue, blue green, white and light yellow is because those soft colors are counteract the high color of the heat desert?

    Turquoise

    The colour turquoise greenish blue, has a special cultural place in Islam, though apparently not clear religious significance.

    • decoration of mosques and other buildings in Middle East: blue town of Chefchaouen in Morocco, blue town of Sidi bu Said in Tunisia, blue mosque and blue rooms in Topkapi palace of Turkey, blue in mosques of Isfahan and Shiraz in Iran
    • used in coats of arms, so that they could not possibly be mistaken for their Muslim opponents in the heat of battle.

    Yellow

    • The yellow colour of gold symbolizes wisdom.

    Brown

    • Brown is often believed to symbolize purity and peace.

     

     

    Colour in Shar’ia texts

     

  • Saudi Arabian women artists

    Women are at the centre of the contemporary Saudi art scene, posing questions on the current political climate and women’s rights.

    Alaan Artspace

    Riyadh’s first curated contemporary art platform. The name Alaan, meaning ‘now’ in Arabic, is supposed to represent the energy and power of the prevailing art scene in Saudi Arabia. The exhibition shows works entirely created by women, who are both diverse methodologically and in terms of their artistic style. Further, the founder, creative director and chief curator are all women. The gallery also hosts master classes and workshops, organized by Sara Raza (the former curator of public programmes for London’s Tate Modern Museum), teaching prospective artists about contemporary art. Moreover, Alaan Artspace funds its non-commercial exhibitions, commissions new works and offers free non-profit educational arts programming through revenues from its shop, restaurant and café.

    Manal Al Dowayan

    website

    Manal Al Dowayan (1973) was born in Dhahran, the Eastern province of Saudi Arabia. Initially she studied Systems Analysis (MSc) and worked as a Creative Director in an oil company. She was working and producing art for 7 years until she became a full time artist in 2010. This was a result of an active art industry that was evolving in her region. Dowayan has rapidly become one of the leading advocates of contemporary artists in the Middle East. She studied abroad in a number of art institutions including USA, London, Dubai and Bahrain. She works mostly with photographs and installations and her work is largely feminist in nature. Her most revered piece is ‘Suspended Together’, a flock of doves made from fiber-glass with stickers on their bodies . The doves are interlocked and made up of permission slips that women in Saudi Arabia must have signed by their husbands or male guardians to have permission to travel.

    An internationally acclaimed artist, she has exhibited her work at the Venice Biennial Collateral show “The Future of a Promise” in 2011 and at the Victoria and Albert Museum as part of exhibition that showcases their public acquisitions of Middle East Photography titled “Light From the Middle East” in 2013 and the American Biennial Prospect New Orleans in an exhibition titled “Notes For Now” in 2014 where she showed a collection of 20 photographs and 11 videos titled “If I Forget You Don’t Forget Me” she also participated in Fluid Form: Contemporary Art from Arab Countries (2010) in Seoul  at Freedom to Create (2011) in New York  and at Simply Words in Switzerland (2012)

    Samiah Khashoggi

    website

    Samiah Khashoggi, born 1958 in Abha, is an interior designer, painter, and organizer of Saudiaat, an art exhibition.  In 1982, she graduated from Kingston University in the UK with a bachelor’s degree in interior design, and in 2005 completed her Masters of Fine Arts from De Montfort University. She is an assistant professor of interior design at Dar Al Hekma College. For a few years starting in 1983, she worked as the first female designer at her brother’s furniture and design company.

    Working on her MFA required her to interview and organize an exhibit for local female artists. Her exhibition for her MFA turned into a regular exhibition called Saudiaat, featuring contemporary female Saudi Arabian artists. As well as featuring artwork, Saudiaat also supports local female artists and educates the public about the techniques involved in their work. As of 2012, the group has had four exhibitions, with the 2012 exhibition, titled “Directions”, having been held in Jeddah.

    Basmah Felemban The Hand

    Other women artists

    Important exhibitions

    Nabatt

    Nabatt: A Sense of Being (2010) is an exhibition of contemporary art from Saudi Arabia. It is presented by the Saudi Arabian Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo. Amongst the artists exhibiting, it features works by Shadia & Raja Alem, Reem Al Faisal, Lulwah Al Homoud, Jowhara Al Saud, Noha Al-Sharif] & Maha Mullah. The show attempts at engaging with the diverse nature of life, notably human relationships and the interactions amongst and within social groups and communities.

    Edge of Arabia

    Edge of Arabia (2003) is a UK independent non-profit organisation, founded by an artist collective.

    We Need to Talk: Jeddah

    In January 2012, it organised a 40-piece exhibition entitled ‘We Need to Talk’. More than a third of the works displayed were by women.

    Come Together: London

    In October 2012, it presented ‘Come Together’ curated by Stephen Stapleton displaying large-scale, multi-media work by leading Arab artists. The name of the exhibition, Come Together was a reference to social networking channels and their influence on individual expression in the Arab World. The show featured the work of 30 emerging artists which included works by Saudi Arabia’s Sarah Al Abdali and Manal Al Dowayan. In addition to the exhibition Edge of Arabia teamed up with The Crossway Foundation, Dar Al Mamûn and Future Shorts to incorporate an education programme comprising workshops, film screenings, topical discussions, and guided exhibition tours.

    Soft Power

    Soft Power (September 26 – December 10, 2012) was the inaugural show at Alaan Artspace. Soft Power represents an innovative project, looking at the complex domain of a woman’s role and the position of women within contemporary Saudi society. It features three Saudi female artists: Sarah Abu Abdallah, Sarah Mohanna Al-Abdali and Manal Al Dowayan. The exhibition, rather than being explicitly political, explores the subtleties of the political and social contentions prevalent in Saudi Arabia. Throughout the exhibition, there are references made to the guardianship laws adopted in Saudi Arabia. The female subjects represented are givers, consumers, objects, power-brokers and caretakers. As stated by the exhibitions website, the artists embrace ‘a nuanced and at times humorous approach towards exploring the position of women within contemporary society.’ The name of the exhibition encapsulates this stance, and the subjects of the works themselves, which attempt at reshaping the expected narrative. Moreover, it offers a platform for discussion and dialogue on matters concerning art in Saudi Arabia.

    Wadjda

    Wadjda, is the first feature film to be made in Saudi Arabia it was directed by a woman. Haifaa Al Mansour, made her debut at the Venice film festival. Her feature film explores the restrictions placed on women in the conservative Islamic kingdom. It took her three years to have the permission and backing to make. It is a Saudi/German co-production, produced by the Berlin-based Razor Film Produktions with support from Rotana Studios. It is the first film entirely shot in Saudi Arabia, documenting the everyday trials and tribulations of a young Saudi Arabian girl, Wadja. It encapsulates her childhood journey opposing social norms and restrictions both at home and school. Al Mansour hoped the film would help to change attitudes towards women and film both within and outside Saudi Arabia. However, the film is yet to be seen in Saudi Arabia until its subsequent television release. Al Mansour claims to have faced a number of challenges casting and filming in a country steeped in conservative attitudes. She aimed to depict the segregation of women in Saudi Arabia. Namely, the fact that women have lower legal status than men, are subject to guardianship laws and are banned from driving.

  • Islamic geometric design

    Islamic geometric design

    Islamic geometric patterns derived from simpler designs used in earlier cultures: Greek, Roman, and Sasanian. They are one of three forms of Islamic decoration, the others being the arabesque based on curving and branching plant forms, and Islamic calligraphy; all three are frequently used together.

    Many traditional patterns were based on is the division of the circle (as a symbol of unity and diversity) in nature into regular parts. From these divisions a regular grid of triangles and/or other polygons is established, on top of which the design is elaborated. Islamic designers used the full range of Archimedean tilings (comprised of simple polygons) first discovered by the Greeks, but added to and expanded upon these. The underling tiling pattern or ‘grid’ is usually hidden beneath the final design, but this hidden order gives the designs their meditative power.

    Evolution of Islamic geometric patterns Yahya Abdullahin and, Mohamed Rashid Bin Embi

    Islamic Geometric Patterns Wikipedia

    The art of Islamic Pattern by Richard Henry

    Geometric design in Great Mosque of Kairouan, Tunisia 836 ce
    Geometric detail Alaeddin mosque, Konya Turkey
    Girih pattern: Tomb of Hafez, Shiraz, Iran

    The earliest geometrical forms in Islamic art were occasional isolated geometric shapes such as 8-pointed stars and lozenges containing squares.

    Persian ‘Girih’ or knot designs: From 1086 7- and 10-point girih patterns (with heptagons, 5- and 6-pointed stars, triangles and irregular hexagons) appear in the Friday Mosque at Isfahan. 10-point girih became widespread. 8 and 12 point girih designs from 1220 onwards. Soon afterwards, sweeping 9-, 11-, and 13-point girih patterns were used in the Barsian Mosque, also in Persia.

     

    Drawing Islamic Geometric Designs

    Draw freehand

    Digital constructions

  • Islamic calligraphy

    Islamic calligraphy

    Islamic calligraphy, is the artistic practice of handwriting and calligraphy, based upon the alphabet in the lands sharing a common Islamic cultural heritage. It includes Arabic , Ottoman, and Persian calligraphy. It is known in Arabic as khatt Islami (خط اسلامي), derived from the word ‘line’, ‘design’, or ‘construction’.

    The development of Islamic calligraphy is strongly tied to the Qur’an; chapters, and excerpts from the Qur’an is a common and almost universal text upon which Islamic calligraphy is based. Deep religious association with the Qur’an, as well as suspicion of figurative art as idolatrous has led calligraphy to become one of the major forms of artistic expression in Islamic cultures.

    As Islamic calligraphy is highly venerated, most works follow examples set by well established calligraphers, with the exception of secular or contemporary works. In antiquity, a pupil would copy a master’s work repeatedly until their handwriting is similar.

    Some classical calligraphers: Medieval

    Ottoman era

    Instruments and media

    The traditional instrument of the Islamic calligrapher is the qalam, a pen normally made of dried reed or bamboo; the ink is often in color, and chosen such that its intensity can vary greatly, so that the greater strokes of the compositions can be very dynamic in their effect. Some styles are often written using a metallic-tip pen.

     Islamic calligraphy is applied on a wide range of decorative mediums other than paper, such as tiles, vessels, carpets, and inscriptions. Before the advent of paper, papyrus and parchment were used for writing. The advent of paper revolutionized calligraphy. While monasteries in Europe treasured a few dozen volumes, libraries in the Muslim world regularly contained hundreds and even thousands of books.

    Coins were another support for calligraphy. Beginning in 692, the Islamic caliphate reformed the coinage of the Near East by replacing visual depiction with words. This was especially true for dinars, or gold coins of high value. Generally the coins were inscribed with quotes from the Qur’an.

    By the tenth century, the Persians, who had converted to Islam, began weaving inscriptions onto elaborately patterned silks. So precious were calligraphic inscribed textiles that Crusaders brought them to Europe as prized possessions. A notable example is the Suaire de Saint-Josse, used to wrap the bones of St. Josse in the Abbey of St. Josse-sur-Mer near Caen in northwestern France.

    Main styles

    The most common style is divided into:

    1. Kufic: oldest angular style

    2. Naskh (نسخ nasḫ): cursive style . With variants Thuluth (ثلث ṯuluṯ)  Ruq‘ah (رقعة ruqʿah)
    With the spread of Islam, the Arabic script was established in a vast geographic area with many regions developing their own unique style. From the 14th century onward, other cursive styles began to developed in Turkey, Persia, and China.

    3. Nasta‘liq (نستعلیق nastaʿlīq) developed in Persia

    4. Diwani (ديواني dīwānī) developed in Ottoman Empire

    5) Sini is a style developed in China. The shape is greatly influenced by Chinese calligraphy, using a horsehair brush instead of the standard reed pen. A famous modern calligrapher in this tradition is Hajji Noor Deen Mi Guangjiang.

    Kufic – Iraq

     Kufic is the oldest form of the Arabic script developed around the end of the 7th century in the areas of Kufa, Iraq, from which it takes its name. It was the main script used to copy Qur’ans from the 8th to 10th century and went out of general use in the 12th century when the flowing naskh style become more practical, although it continued to be used as a decorative element to contrast superseding styles.

    The Archaic Kufi consisted of about 17 letters without diacritic dots or accents. Afterwards, dots and accents were added to help readers with pronunciation, and the set of Arabic letters rose to 29.

    There were no set rules of using the Kufic script; the only common feature is the rigid, angular, linear strokes and shapes of the characters – a modified form of the old Nabataean script. Through use in different regions, countries and calligraphers, the style later developed into several varieties, including floral, foliated, plaited or interlaced, bordered, and squared kufi.Common varieties include square Kufic, a technique known as banna’i. Contemporary calligraphy using this style is also popular in modern decorations.
    Decorative kufic inscriptions are often imitated into pseudo-kufics in Middle age and Renaissance Europe. Pseudo-kufics is especially common in Renaissance depictions of people from the Holy Land. The exact reason for the incorporation of pseudo-Kufic is unclear. It seems that Westerners mistakenly associated 13–14th century Middle-Eastern scripts as being identical with the scripts current at the time of Christ, and thus found natural to represent early Christians in association with them.

    Naskh

    The use of cursive script co-existed with kufic, but because in the early stages of their development they lacked discipline and elegance, cursive were usually used for informal purposes. With the rise of Islam, new script was needed to fit the pace of conversions, and a well defined cursive called naskh first appeared in the 10th century. The script is the most ubiquitous among other styles, used in Qur’ans, official decrees, and private correspondence. It became the basis of modern Arabic print.

    Standardization of the style was pioneered by Ibn Muqla (886-940 A.D.) and later expanded by Abu Hayan at-Tawhidi (died 1009 A.D.) andMuhammad Ibn Abd ar-Rahman (1492–1545 A.D.). Ibn Muqla is highly regarded in Muslim sources on calligraphy as the inventor of the naskh style, although this seems to be erroneous. However, Ibn Muqla did establish systematic rules and proportions for shaping the letters, which use ‘alif as the x-height.
    Variation of the naskh includes:

    Thuluth is developed as a display script to decorate particular scriptural objects. Letters have long vertical lines with broad spacing. The name reference to the x-height, which is one third of the ‘alif.

    Riq’ah is a handwriting style derived from naskh and thuluth, first appeared in the 9th century. The shape is simple with short strokes and little flourishes.

    Muhaqqaq is a majestic style used by accomplished calligrapher. It was considered one of the most beautiful scripts, as well as one of the most difficult to execute. Muhaqqaq was commonly used during the Mameluke era, but the use become largely restricted to short phrases, such as the basmallah, from the 18th century onward.

    Nasta’liq

    A cursive style developed in the 14th century by Mir Ali Tabrizi to write the Persian language for literary and non-Qur’anic works. Nasta’liq is thought to be a later development of the naskh and the earlier ta’liq script used in Iran. The name ta’liq means ‘hanging’, and refers to the slightly steeped lines of which words run in, giving the script a hanging appearance. Letters have short vertical strokes with broad and sweeping horizontal strokes. The shapes are deep, hook-like, and have high contrast.

    In the 17th century Morteza Gholi Khan Shamlou and Mohammad Shafi Heravi created a new genre called cursive Nastaʿlīq Shekasteh Nastaʿlīq. Almost a century later, Abdol-Majid Taleqani, who was a prominent artist at the time, brought this genre to its highest level. This calligraphic style is based on the same rules as Nas’taliq. However, cursive Nas’taliq has a few significant differences: it provides more flexible movements, and it is slightly more stretched and curved. Yadollah Kaboli is one of the most prominent contemporary calligraphers within this style.

    Diwani

    A cursive style of Arabic calligraphy developed during the reign of the early Ottoman Turks in the 16th and early 17th centuries. It was invented by Housam Roumi and reached its height of popularity under Süleyman I the Magnificent (1520–1566). 

    Spaces between letters are often narrow, and lines ascend upwards from right to left. Larger variation called djali are filled with dense decorations of dots and diacritical marks in the space between, giving it a compact appearance. Diwani is difficult to read and write due to its heavy stylization, and became ideal script for writing court documents as it insured confidentiality and prevented forgery.

    How to do it

    Edited and extended from Wikipedia

  • African Design forthcoming

    African Design forthcoming

    A history of African art (not graphic design contrary to the title) is:

    http://guity-novin.blogspot.nl/2010/03/history-of-graphic-design-african-art.html

    Interesting websites with artists are:

    Feature image generated in Adobe Illustrator AI: African colourful geometric design – after several iterations

    There is no Wikipedia on African Graphic Design!!!

    A Google search for African typefaces tend to be rather kitsch zebras and unusable. Not the typefaces more commonly used in Africa – these are the common Adobe and Microsoft ones. But African designers have used these with colours in slightly different ways that I have yet to properly analyse.

    !!Many images from my own travels to be inserted here.

    Textile designs

    Zulu House Pattern
    Zulu House Pattern
    Julio Senna, Brazilian inspired by Africa
  • Japanese Calligraphy forthcoming

    Videos of Japanese calligraphers