This program explores the rites of imperial rituals, court painting, family life, and religion in the Forbidden City. Utilizing selected objects from the Palace Museum, Beijing, in addition to works from the permanent collection of the VMFA, this talk explores the visual and cultural landscape established by Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasty imperial patronage in a rapidly globalizing world. This program will also discuss the influence of Italian painters on Qing dynastic court painting.
Archives
Marking to the rhythm of the Beat
Explore the power of music as it effects our marks. In this workshop, participants will work with a variety of drawing materials to create a ‘marked’ composition. Measured and organic marks will be explored. An introduction of artists Julie Mehretu, Cy Twombly, Wassily Kandinsky will be addressed as it relates to mark and movement.
Pet Portraits
A Drawing and Painting Workshop. Participants will work from photographs of their own furry friends to create drawings and a large scale acrylic painting. Students will exercise contour, and shading techniques on a smaller scale and then move onto to color mixing and painterly texture techniques to create a large scale portrait of their furry friend. Students are asked to bring a photograph of their pet or favorite animal
Experimental Painting Applications
Participants will work with a variety of tools and techniques to create mini compositions from a variety of acrylic painting mediums and construction materials. Examples to note: joint compound, glue, heavy gel medium, isopropyl alcohol, sand/pumice.
Large scale Experimental Abstract Painting
In this workshop, participants with be working with acrylic to experiment with color, texture, traditional and non-traditional techniques. Participants will be introduced to various abstract painters as inspiration for their compositions on large-scale works.
How European Refugees Lifted 19th Century American Popular Art
The 19th Century was the Age of Pictures, when imagery of all types multiplied and entered everyday life. A key agent was the new medium of lithography. Lithographic printing was seen in postcards and letterheads, labels and wrappers, and tickets and show bills. Framed lithographic prints hung in parlors, lobbies, and offices. The marvelous world of American lithography reached its apex through the wave of Europeans who immigrated after the Revolution of 1848 and brought advances in technique and art.
“Let Us Now Praise Famous Men: Walker Evans and James Agee in the American South”
In 1936, Fortune magazine hired photographer Walker Evans and writer James Agee to do an article on the conditions among sharecropper families during the “Dustbowl.” Spending weeks living with three different sharecropping families, Agee and Evans captured more than just a standard documentary; the final photographs and paired language became poetry. Though the article was never printed, a final book was published in 1941 that was simmering with anger, beauty, and mystery. This lecture will explore the creation of this profound work of literature and its influence on artists as diverse as Arron Copeland and William Christianberry.
Location Digital Portrait Photography
This hands-on workshop teaches students the basic strategies of shooting street portraits (portraits outside). As a professional photographer himself, Glen McClure will share his own street portraits and ideas of how to help subjects relax in front of the camera. Students should bring a digital camera to class and be familiar with it.
The Bold and the Beautiful: A Survey of the Neoclassic and Romantic Movements
18th- and 19th-century Europe were captivated by two competing artistic movements: Neoclassicism and Romanticism. Neoclassic art inspired by the ancient world was undeniably en vogue for the majority of the 18th century, dominating every salon and private home throughout Europe. At the close of the century, Neoclassicism was met with a reactionary artistic movement: Romanticism. With shocking imagery and an emotionality previously unexamined, Romanticism was the polar opposite of Neoclassicism. Join Elizabeth Cruickshanks as she examines these two artistic movements and the fascinating hold they had on the European public.
Watchmen and The Dark Knight Returns
1986 was a pivotal year for comic books when DC Comics published Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, along with Batman: The Dark Knight Returns by Frank Miller. Never before had mainstream superhero comic books taken a novelistic approach to the genre. Both reinvented the superhero comic book for a more mature audience–and reinvented popular culture as we know it. This talk goes through both series in an in-depth nature to evaluate the changes that influenced the superhero world.