a3 blackface #59 
2003
acrylic on paper
Unframed: 49 3/4 × 38 in. (126.37 × 96.52 cm)
VMFA, Richmond, VA              

From Artspace @ https://www.artspace.com/artist/iona_rozeal_brown

The artist Iona Rozeal Brown uses her large-scale acrylic paintings to wryly comment on the ductile and ever-changing essence of cultural identity, most often by creating visual mash-ups of two disparate but in fact subtly harmonious subcultures: the samurai and geishas depicted in traditional Japanese ukiyo-e printmaking and the contemporary world of hip-hop. Trained in the art of ukiyo-e herself, Brown pursues a transcultural aesthetic in both her imagery and her technique, mixing the racial, gender, and class issues in her subject matter with the deftness of a DJ.

A recurring character in Brown's work is Yoshi, a wise female war hero—sporting an afro and classical Japanese garb—whose enlightened state allows her to exist as a communicant between divinities and mortals, guiding those still on earth. The artist's paintings have been widely exhibited, and she received a solo show at Cleveland's Museum of Contemporary Art in 2010. In 2011 she was commissioned to create a performance for the Performa biennial.                         

From VMFA @ https://www.vmfa.museum/piction/6027262-53207104/

Brown—who styles her name in all lowercase letters— uses a3 as an abbreviation for “Afro-Asiatic allegory,” her series of prints and paintings based on the style of the Japanese ganguro (literally “blackface”) girls. These young women reject Japanese conventions of beauty— dark, straight hair and pale skin—by lightening and perming their hair and darkening their skin. a3 blackface #59 borrows stylistically from Japanese woodblock prints of the Edo period (1615–1868). Known as ukiyo-e prints, these popular, middle-class images depicted the shifting fashions and chaotic lives of the Tokyo amusement district. Brown, who is also a disc jockey, found resonances between the transience of the contemporary entertainment industry and the “floating world” of Edo Japan.

​(adapted from http://www.artelino.com/articles/van_gogh_japonisme.asp)

With the treaty of Kanagawa in 1854 between the American delegation headed by Navy commander Matthew Calbraith Perry (1794-1858) and the Japanese shogunate government, a period of 216 years of Japanese isolation ended. In the years following, huge numbers of Japanese artifacts and handicraft articles flowed to Europe, mainly to France and the Netherlands. The Paris Exposition Universelle in 1867 had a Japanese stand and showed Japanese art objects to the amazed public.

All things Japanese were suddenly stylish and fashionable. Shops selling Japanese woodblock prints, kimonos, fans and antiquities popped up in Paris like mushrooms. The Impressionist painters and Post-Impressionists like Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, Toulouse-Lautrec or Paul Gauguin were attracted and impressed by Japanese woodblock prints. In 1875 Claude Monet created his famous painting La Japonaise, showing his wife dressed in a Kimono and holding a Japanese fan. 

The term Japonisme was created by the French journalist and art-critic Philippe Burty in an article published in 1876 to describe the craze for all things Japanese.

Van Gogh saw Japanese prints for the first time in 1885 in Antwerp and bought a few. In the years ahead he would buy many more. Japanese prints were cheap at that time. Many were reproductions made only for export to Western countries.

In 1886 Vincent van Gogh moved to Paris. Van Gogh's brother Theo ran an art gallery in Montmartre. He too brought Vincent in contact with ukiyo-e. In Montmartre there was a little shop with Japanese prints, called the Bing Gallery after its owner Samuel Bing. Mr. Bing kept thousands of Japanese prints on stock. The Bing Gallery was next to van Gogh's apartment and Vincent spent days in the shop and became an avid collector of ukiyo-e.

Van Gogh's admiration for Japanese art forms led him to paint copies of two famous designs of Hiroshige, the great Japanese landscape printmaker. These two paintings after Hiroshige are rather free transcriptions; Vincent added frames to the originals and decorated them with what he considered to be Japanese characters. And van Gogh's use of colors was not very close to the originals. Instead he used his concept of complementary colors like the green against the red.

"I envy the Japanese artists for the incredible neat clarity which all their works have. It is never boring and you never get the impression that they work in a hurry. It is as simple as breathing; they draw a figure with a couple of strokes with such an unfailing easiness as if it were as easy as buttoning one's waist-coat." In 1888 Vincent van Gogh moved to Arles in Southern France. He arrived in springtime and the strong colors and the light of the landscape gave him new energies. He painted continuously - landscapes, still life and portraits of ordinary people. The influence of Japonisme is obvious in his paintings. The use of black contours is a typical element of Japanese woodblock prints. It reinforced the expressive power of the paintings of his last 4 years.

AFTER CAREFULLY REVIEWING THE RESOURCES ASSIGNED ABOVE: Answer the following questions completely and with specificity to the provided resources, notes taken, personal reflection, and additional research as needed. Make sure to consider how this information is relevant to your current work and practice.
​
1. What event perpetuated the influx of Japanese art to Europe and beyond after it had been excluded from public view for so long? (after you write write your answer, just think about this....how fascinating is it that this political/historical event SO dramatically changed the art world???!!!).
2. List at least FOUR specific influences that van Gogh adapted from the Japanese printmakers whom he so admired.
3. Respond to this quote by van Gogh: "I envy the Japanese artists for the incredible neat clarity which all their works have. It is never boring and you never get the impression that they work in a hurry. It is as simple as breathing; they draw a figure with a couple of strokes with such an unfailing easiness as if it were as easy as buttoning one's waist-coat." ​

The Great Wave Off Kanagawa
From "Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji"
1823-29
Color woodcut
10 x 15 inches
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York 

Takes notes on the following resources:

• FIRST, See the 36 views of Mount Fuji (of which the above print is one).
• THEN, watch a virtual demonstration of woodblock printing as well as etching, lithography, and screen printing (if the page doesn't load, try a different browser).
• FINALLY, watch the video below:

AFTER CAREFULLY REVIEWING THE RESOURCES ASSIGNED ABOVE: Answer the following questions completely and with specificity to the provided resources, notes taken, personal reflection, and additional research as needed. Make sure to consider how this information is relevant to your current work and practice.

1. What does Ukiyo-e mean? What are some characteristics of Ukiyo-e prints?
2. List and briefly explain the four types of printmaking as described in the virtual demonstration.
3. Give some examples to show how Hokusai's Great Wave and other prints influenced European art and artists.

Fish Vase
1997
Oil on canvas























"Over the last fifty years, Janet Fish has drawn on her embrace of change and her belief in the underlying interconnectedness of things to fuel her remarkable painting practice.  She philosophizes that to stop changing is to die, a conviction that drives her unending formal experimentation and her mastery of multiple genres.  Change inhabits each painting as well.  The objects that serve as armatures for color and light in her work are exuberant in their state of flux.  The long conceptual, formal, and iconographic history of the still life genre confirms our own experience.  Though the artist works against the idea of capturing a photographic instant, she preserves a mood, a quality of light, and a sense of place to which we can continually return."

LOOK at more of Fish's work from the DC Moore Gallery, which represents her (this is also where the blurb above comes from)

READ this: Artist Profile: Janet Fish (as you read, make special note of the many connections between Fish and other artists we have discussed).
​
WATCH this:

AFTER CAREFULLY REVIEWING THE RESOURCES ASSIGNED ABOVE: Answer the following questions completely and with specificity to the provided resources, notes taken, personal reflection, and additional research as needed. Make sure to consider how this information is relevant to your current work and practice.
​
1. The paintings of Fish and Cézanne are different  -  and they lived and worked at very different times in history. Still, they share similarities. Explain using points from the reading to support your answer.
2. Her work has been described as "photorealist" but she disagrees with this assertion. Explain using points from the reading to support your answer.​
3. The assigned reading, video, and gallery link provided many more topics than those addressed in questions #1 and #2​. Take this opportunity to explain what you found to be of particular interest.

Still Life
1955
12” x 16”
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.

READ THIS article (and study the pictures) to get to know Giorgio Morandi and his fascination with still life. Think about HIS explorations with THIS subject as you think about what YOU want to make art about....

New article:  https://mobile.nytimes.com/2008/09/19/arts/design/19mora.html?

Watch this short video - it's an old exhibit but the info. and images are still relevant.

AFTER CAREFULLY REVIEWING THE RESOURCES ASSIGNED ABOVE: Answer the following questions completely and with specificity to the provided resources, notes taken, personal reflection, and additional research as needed. Make sure to consider how this information is relevant to your current work and practice.
​
1. Look carefully and thoughtfully at Morandi's work. What words or phrases come to mind? What feeling do you get from the composition, colors, and the work in general?
2. List the artists who inspired Morandi.  What did he take from these artists, in order to finally develop his own style?
3. He called himself a "monk" and others agreed with this nickname, also calling him a "zen master"....why?

CURIOUS? Here's more:
Morandi @ MoMA
Morandi @ TATE

Still Life with Chair Caning
1912
Oil and oilcloth on canvas, with rope frame
10 5/8 x 13 3/4 in. (27 x 35 cm.)
Musée Picasso, Paris

WATCH THESE VIDEOS and take good notes: 

The Basket of Apples
1893
Oil on canvas, 2’ 2” x 2’ 7”
The Art Institute of Chicago

READ THIS and take notes.

Watch this video:

AFTER CAREFULLY REVIEWING THE RESOURCES ASSIGNED ABOVE: Answer the following questions completely and with specificity to the provided resources, notes taken, personal reflection, and additional research as needed. Make sure to consider how this information is relevant to your current work and practice.
1. a) List and explain the hierarchy of subject matter found in paintings at the time in which Cézanne was working. b) Considering where still life lands on this list, why would Cézanne even bother with it?
2. The introduction of photography dramatically changed the way that artists were able to work. With this in with this in mind,  what - specifically - did Cézanne attempt to do in his paintings that was such a drastic change from the norm?
3. Cézanne has been called the "Father of Modern Art." This is a pretty lofty title...what did he do to earn it? 

Still-Life with Fruit and Insects
1711
Oil on wood, 44 x 60 cm (approx. 18” x 24”)
Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

READ: Adapted from the National Museum of Women in the Arts):

• Rachel Ruysch was successful for nearly 70 years as a specialist in flower paintings. 
• Ruysch's maternal grandfather, Pieter Post, was an important architect,and her father, Frederik Ruysch, an eminent scientist. From him, she learned how to observe and record nature with great accuracy.
• At 15, she was apprenticed to the well-known Dutch flower painter Willem van Aelst. From that point on, she produced various kinds of still lifes, mainly flower pieces and woodland scenes.
• In 1701, Ruysch became a member of the painters' guild in The Hague. At that time, she began producing large flower works for an international circle of patrons. Several years later, Ruysch was invited to Düsseldorf to serve as court painter to Johann Wilhelm, the Elector Palatine of Bavaria. She remained there from 1708 until the prince's death in 1716.
• After returning to Holland, Ruysch kept painting fruit and flower pictures for a prominent clientele. She remained artistically active, proudly inscribing her age on a canvas she completed in 1747, at age 83.
• Despite the changes in popularity of flower paintings during the years since her death, Ruysch's reputation has never waned.

LOOK AT THIS PAINTING CLOSELY AND READ ABOUT IT'S COMPOSITION (make sure to click on the photo to see it in full)

WATCH BOTH VIDEOS:

Below: Contrast Angelica Kaufmann's Neoclassical work, Cornelia, Mother of the Gracchi, Pointing to her Children as Her Treasures, ca.  1785,  with that of Chardin:

Art and art history are inextricably linked... This series will take you through selected periods of art history and will allow you to consider how and why art has changed over the years. This investigation may help you to answer the questions above, although you'll likely change and refine your answers throughout the year. As you consider the life, times, and innovations of each artist, think also about how this knowledge can affect the art that YOU will make.

PLEASE NOTE:

• The thumbnail sketches associated with these sketchbook entries will serve as opportunities to draw every day but they are separate from your "Daily Drawings."
•  A thumbnail sketch is small and quickly done BUT it should still be completed with effort and observation. Pay attention to contours, shapes, proportion, composition, etc. This type of observation helps you to better understand the work of art and how the artist may have approached their work.
• Pay special attention to the ways that art has changed over the years - but perhaps you'll also notice similarities... what drives ALL artists?
• We will only scratch the surface - art history is HUGE and it keeps growing. Take any opportunity to be curious about things that we are not able to cover in this course.

To get us started:

1. Watch the videos below
2. Take notes to document important/interesting facts, bits of information, thoughts, etc.
3. Write a reflective response, which may include some or all of the following:

• ​What did you already know - what information was review from Art 1 or other courses?
• What information was totally new to you - what would you like to investigate further?
• Any other connections or reactions.

The video below is best watched in VR...otherwise, use a smart phone and physically move it around or use the track pad/mouse on a computer.