Art 1010: Week #8
Writing About Art
June 11th, 2009
TWTh 6:00 - 8:40 pm
Bryce Walker
Things to discuss today
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Quiz #4 (2D and 3D art)
Assignment #2 Review
Art News?
Review of Syllabus
Writing About Art
Museum Paper Handout Review
Exam #2 Study Guide
Andy Goldsworthy Video
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Writing About Art
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Items to be covered:
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6.
Diagnostic Test
Common Questions About Writing
Comparing
The Research Process
The Writing Process
Plagiarism
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Goals and Objectives
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6.
Learn proper grammar and writing techniques
Learn how to research art
Learn how to compare artworks
Learn the writing process
Learn how to determine and avoid plagiarism
Learn how to proof read and make revisions to
your paper
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Writing Communication
There are similarities and differences between spoken and written English. While
spoken language is freer, more colloquial, there still remains a broad relationship
between speaking and writing. Consequently, it often helps to read your writing out
loud to see if it sounds awkward or strange. However, unlike a casual conversation, a
paper must be refined and must be written in formal Standard English. It is built up in
much the same method as a painting, with the rough draft acting more as a sketch, or
casual conversation. Each rewriting will bring the paper closer to the ultimate goal of a
polished, finished product, similar to the difference between a sketch and a final
painting. Therefore, do not be surprised if you need as many as five or six revisions for
each academic paper you write.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Organization
Your papers must be clearly organized. The best way to do this is to create a simple
outline. Questions to ask:
What is your thesis?
What is the point of your paper?
Where are you going?
The best papers usually develop around a specific idea.
For instance, a paper about the life and times of Georgia O’Keeffe would be too broad a topic.
However, Georgia O’Keeffe’s Lake George paintings would be a better and more specific topic.
Then you would determine your basic premise: Lake George provided important visual inspiration for
O’Keeffe’s development as a landscape painter. This, then, is the point of your paper: to show how
the artist’s time at Lake George was critical to her development as a landscape painter. Following
this determination you would make an outline to lay out the key points. If the paper needed to be ten
to twelve pages, you would determine from the very beginning how many pages to devote to each of
the areas you wish to cover.
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Common Questions About Writing
Organization Outline
Ex. Topic: American painter Georgia O’Keeffe developed an unique
abstract vision of the American landscape which evolved and
matured during the 1920’s while at Lake George, New York.
 I. Introduction—Alfred Stieglitz and O’Keeffe. Stieglitz’s family home at Lake George.
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II. O’Keeffe’s move toward abstraction even before Lake George. Discussion of her
early style.
III. Lake George as a topic. Stieglitz’s images of Lake George. Discussion of several
key images by O’Keeffe.
IV. Summary of changes in O’Keeffe’s style during the Lake George time. Other key
images painted during these years that might be compared to the Lake George
images.
V. Conclusion: Significance of Lake George imagery for the later landscapes of
O’Keeffe. Importance of this body of work within her career.
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Common Questions About Writing
Organization (Conclusion)
The conclusion of a paper is not a repetition of the introduction, nor usually the
summation of the facts presented. A good conclusion does the following:
Takes the facts presented and evaluates them.
What can we deduce from the ideas presented in the body of the paper?
In the O’Keeffe example above the conclusion would deal with the role of the
Lake George paintings in the context of the artist’s career. Given all the previously
stated information, what can we conclude about the significance of these works?
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Maturity of Thought and Sophistication
of Vocabulary
While all sentence structures in your paper may be grammatically correct, if you
lack a deeper comprehension of your subject and employ inaccurate or immature
vocabulary, the resulting paper will not be successful.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Word Usage
Most students consider the first draft their final draft. The unfortunate effect of this
misunderstanding is that they often include awkward phrases, repetitive sentence
structure and duplicate words. Do the following:
Go through your draft and look for word or phrase repetition.
Have you used the word “painting” five times in the first paragraph?
Can you substitute the words “work,” “oil on canvas,” or “creation” in any these instances?
Did you start four sentences with the same word organization?
For instance, did four of the last five sentences start with the word “the?”... The artist
painted.... The painting is. . . The color in the right-hand corner is . . .etc. . . Words
that are commonly repeated: USES, ART, ARTIST, PAINT, PAINTED, PAINTING.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Sentence Weight
Writing is just like painting and drawing. In the visual arts different shapes, colors,
and lines hold different weights, drawing the eye through the composition with
each nuance. Writing is exactly the same. Don’t write with all short choppy
sentences or all long complex ones. Try to vary the weights of your sentences
just as you would vary color, line, and shape in a painting.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Verbs
Simple versus complex verb forms. Always try to make your
sentences interesting by looking for stronger, more complex verbs that
are accurate and descriptive.
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Ex. The nude is in the chair.
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Change to: The nude sits in the chair.
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Or even better: In this artist’s unusual composition a nude woman sprawls lazily
across an old wooden chair.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Subject/Verb Agreements
Make sure that your subjects and verbs agree.
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Ex. The artist paints at this location everyday.
Many artists paint at this location everyday.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Verb Tenses
Make sure that you stay within a single verb tense while writing your
paper. Generally write in the present tense except for events or
actions that took place in the past, although you can choose to keep
everything in the present tense.
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Ex. Mixed Tenses: Van Gogh applies his paint in a heavy impasto with thick rich
brushstrokes. He also used intense colors to activate the composition.
Change to: Van Gogh applied his paint in a heavy impasto with thick rich
brushstrokes. He also used intense colors to activate the composition.
Or: Van Gogh applies his paint in a heavy impasto with thick rich brushstrokes. He
also uses intense colors to activate the composition.
However, you can and should write in the present tense when it is an
observation you are making in the present.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Qualifying Verb
Do not use qualifying verbs like appears, seems, might be, etc... Qualifying verbs
actually weaken your statement.
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Ex. The figure in the lower left of the painting appears to be bathing.
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Change to: The figure in the lower left of the painting is bathing.
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OR: Perhaps the figure in the lower left of the painting is bathing.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Adverbs
Wrong form of adverb: It has become quite common to leave off the “-ly” ending
necessary in an adverb. The most common example of this is “fresh” baked bread
which should really be described as “freshly” baked bread. Although “fresh, baked”
bread is grammatically correct as long as the writer has used a comma, “freshly
baked” bread is more informative and demonstrates the correct adverbial form.
 Ex. Cassatt often painted charming, posed figures of mothers and their
children in her Impressionist interiors.
 Change to: Cassatt often painted charmingly posed figures of mothers and
their children in her Impressionist interiors.
Although “charming, posed” is grammatically correct in this case because both are
adjectives, it is not nearly as informative as “charmingly posed” which demonstrates
the correct adverbial form.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Run-On Sentences,Comma Splices, and
Sentence Fragments
Do not use “sentences” that are really two sentences run together, sentences in with only
a comma or no punctuation at all, or “sentences” that lack a subject and main verb.
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Ex. Run-on Sentence: Picasso created abstract compositions based on the human figure and
the still life with fractured forms and shallow flattened objects he exaggerated these shapes to
make a specific statement.
Change to: Picasso created abstract compositions based on the human figure and the still life
with fractured forms and shallow flattened objects; he exaggerated these shapes to make a
specific statement.
Ex. Comma Splice: Courbet painted realistic landscapes, however, he often created the final
work in his studio, not en plein air.
Change to: Courbet painted realistic landscapes. However, he often created the final work in his
studio, not en plein air.
Ex. Sentence fragment: Cézanne often included black enclosing lines. Even when painting the
landscape in greens and blues.
Change to: Cézanne often included black enclosing lines, even when painting the landscape in
greens and blues.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Non-Parallel Constructions
Different elements in a sentence connected by “and” or elements listed in a series
must be grammatically parallel.
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Ex. Abstract Expressionist paintings are large, powerful, and an American
statements(“Large” and “powerful” as types of words, adjectives, are not equivalent
to “statement,” a noun).
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Change to: Abstract Expressionist paintings are large and powerful; they make a
strong American statement of individuality, cultural iconoclasm, and independence.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Dangling Modifiers
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Ex. Demonstrating a unique creative surface, Van Gogh applied paint thickly and
emphatically to the canvas.
In this example Van Gogh himself has a unique creative surface, like a tattoo. What the writer really
means is that the surface of the painting is unique. You can generally fix the problem by matching
the first part of the sentence to the subject.
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Change to: Demonstrating a unique creative surface, Van Gogh’s canvases display
thickly applied paint and an emphatic hand.
Or change the phrase to a clause with a subject and verb.
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Ex. When Van Gogh emphatically applied thick paint to the canvas, he
demonstrated a unique creative vision.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Passive Voice
Stay away from complex verb forms and passive voice.
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Ex. The painting had been painted in France. (3 verbs, or three words to state
something that could be said with a single word)
Change to: The painting was painted in France. (2 verbs)
Or even better: The artist painted this particular piece while in France. (1verb)
Ex. This painting is considered to be an important one.
Change to: Scholars consider this painting important.
Passive voice is when the object is being acted upon instead of doing the action itself.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Illiterate Spelling
 Please use a dictionary to make sure that you spell correctly. Also, use the
spell check feature of your word processing program. Do not make the
following errors: homonym confusions such as affect/effect, all
ready/already, a/an, its/it’s, society’s/societies, than/then,
there/their/they’re, and to/too. Do not misspell basic words such as the title
of the work you are discussing or the artist’s name.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Reading is Related to Writing
 The more you read, the better you will write. If you do not already read for
pleasure, begin now. Make sure that you read a book you like for 15 minutes
everyday. This keeps your mind tuned up and ready to go. Not only will you
be reading with more comprehension, and faster, but your writing will develop
more quickly. Try not to fall asleep while reading. If you do, you may become
conditioned to do so whenever you read. This will make studying more
difficult for you.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Dash & Semicolon
 Dash: The dash may be used in place of a comma, or commas. Also, the dash is
two lines, while the hyphen is just one. Use the dash in moderation. It is best used in
sentences which already require many commas.
Ex. Although Picasso’s work evolved through many different periods—including the Pink, the
Blue, Analytic and Synthetic Cubism, Surrealism—his paintings always have an identifiable
style.
The Semicolon: The semicolon is probably one of the most misused marks of
punctuation. The semicolon is used between two main clauses arranged in a pair and
not coordinated by a pure conjunction (and, but, for, or, neither, nor). Specifically, you
must have a subject and a predicate in each clause. When you have two short
sentences that are interrelated you can join them with a semi-colon.
Ex. The color blue is extremely important in Cézanne’s work; he used it often and to great
effect.
Wrong: The color blue is extremely important in Cézanne’s work;
great effect.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
and he used it often and to
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Common Questions About Writing
Colon & Apostraphe
 The colon is used to introduce a quote or a series of elements.
Ex. Lichtenstein uses many devices borrowed from commercial art: benday dots, solid-black
enclosing lines, primary colors.
 The apostrophe is used in several different ways and is often misused by
students. First, the apostrophe is used to show where one or more letters have
been omitted from a word or words (a contraction).
Ex. O’Keeffe didn’t move out west until after Stieglitz had died.
can’t (cannot), won’t (will not), it’s (it is), isn’t (is not), didn’t (did not), shouldn’t (should not)
 PLEASE NOTE THAT IT’S IS NOT POSSESSIVE!
Ex. Possessive: The dog in the lower left corner of the painting wore its sweater.
Ex. Contraction: It’s a very small painting.
Second, the apostrophe is used in conjunction with s to form the possessive of any noun, singular
or plural, which does not end with the sound of s.
Ex. An artist’s style; women’s professions.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Apostraphe
You can even use an apostrophe and an s to form the possessive of a singular noun
ending in the sound of s. If the word is the name of someone quite famous, like Jesus or
Moses then you may use only the apostrophe if you so choose.
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Ex. Thomas Eakins’s paintings; or Jesus’ figure.
Use the apostrophe alone to form the possessive of a plural noun ending in s.
NEVER USE AN APOSTROPHE WITH THE POSSESSIVES ITS, HERS, HIS, OURS,
YOURS, THEIRS BECAUSE THEY ARE ALREADY POSSESSIVE (This rule does not apply to
one’s, other’s, another’s, either’s)
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Quotations
QUOTATIONS may be included in the body of the paragraph if they are
not too long. If they are longer than a phrase or sentence they should be
separated from the body of the paragraph by indentation. Quotation
marks are only used when the quote is NOT inset, that is when it is part of
the body of the paragraph. Insetting acts as quotation marks.
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Ex. Henri Focillon clearly defined the role of the architect in the medieval world when he
wrote that “the architect is simultaneously to a greater or less degree geometer,
engineer, sculptor and painter.”
Or
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Ex. Henri Focillon clearly defined the role of the architect in the medieval world when he
wrote:
“The architect is simultaneously and to a greater or less degree geometer, engineer, sculptor
and painter—geometer in the interpretation of spatial area through the plan, engineer in the
solution of the problem of stability, sculptor in the treatment of volumes, and painter in the
handling of materials and light.”
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Common Questions About Writing
Paper Format
 Your papers should be in normal Times New Roman, 12 point
font type with one inch margins all around. You may use either a
justified or unjustified right margin. You should double space
between sentences and paragraphs. Do not triple or quadruple
space between paragraphs.
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Common Questions About Writing
Underlining, Italicizing or Nothing
 In art and art history titles of paintings and sculptures
are either underlined or italicized. Titles of buildings,
however, remain unchanged, neither underlined nor
italicized.
 John Constable, The Hay Wain, 1821
 John Constable, The Hay Wain, 1821
 Frank Lloyd Wright, Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1956-59
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Reviewing the Museum Paper
Structure of Paper:
Introduction
Body
Brief description of both art works
In depth description of each Artwork. Always talk about the first artwork and
then the second. With each comparison, keep information in the same
paragraph. This includes:
Imagery
Medium
Elements
Space
Conclusion
Colored Prints
Bibliography
Let us practice verbally and written now.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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School of Athens
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The Last Supper
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Jan Van Eyck
The Arnolfini Marriage, 1434
Oil
on wood, 32 1/4 x 23 1/2 in; National
Gallery, London
Jan Van Eyck (IKE) was born in the
Netherlands. His paintings are very detailed. He
was not the first to use oil paint, but he perfected
the use of oil in paints. The colors in his
paintings are delicate and have a beautiful
shine. He was called "The King of Painters" by
people even hundreds of years after his time.
The painting we are studying; The Arnolfini
Marriage , is a record of the marriage of the two
people in the picture. In modern days, a couple
would hire a photographer to record their
wedding. Giovanni Arnolfini hired an artist to
paint the picture. In addition to being a portrait, it
is also a legal record showing that the marriage
took place. The artist signs it as a legal
document.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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Diego Velazquez
Las Meninas, 1656
Oil on canvas, 10'5" x 9'1"
Museo del Prado, Madrid
Painted in 1656, this extraordinary slice of
seventeenth century life in the royal court continues
to be studied today by students, critics and scholars
alike. Deciphering the true meaning of Las Meninas
is impossible and it seems that this was precisely
Velázquez's intention. Many questions are left
unanswered allowing each viewer to draw their own
conclusions regarding the true meaning and
intentions behind the painting.
The timelessness of Las Meninas is captured
perfectly by Velázquez because he has struck on a
topic that will never fall from favor. Breaking with the
norms of traditional portraits, Velázquez chooses to
show us 'behind the scenes.’ Velázquez truly broke
with tradition to let the world see a bit of normal life in
the palace of Philip IV of Spain. Las Meninas also
works to humanize the royals, suggesting that they
were just like any other family.
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The Research Process
1. Visit the museum and locate a work or works that interest you.
2. Take careful notes from direct observation of the work(s).
3. Go to the Library (or onto the computer) and look for articles and books about these
works and/or the artist that made them.
4. Collect your resource materials. Make sure you go beyond the holdings of PGCC
Library. Call in books from other libraries.
5. Read your gathered materials.
6. At this point you may want to go back to the museum(or visit NGA website) to take
more notes as you are now a more educated viewer.
7. Begin the writing process.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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The Writing Process
1.
Brainstorming: just write down ideas in any order that they come to you.
2.
Write a thesis statement: when looking at your ideas determine a direction for your paper. This
direction is stated in the thesis statement.
3.
Create an Outline: Expand upon the thesis and organize the ideas from brainstorming. Determine
the length of each section of your outline.
4.
Write the first draft. A good outline will take you quite naturally into your first draft.
5.
Edit the first draft. Usually the first editing is a self-editing process.
6.
Write the second draft.
7.
Edit the second draft. This could be a peer editing.
8.
Write the third draft.
9.
Tutorial with your professor for consultation and editing.
10.
Write the final draft.
11.
Review the final draft: look for any small errors or typos you might have missed.
ART1010- Intro to Art, Bryce Walker
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