In art, a title is a word or phrase used to identify and distinguish a particular work of art from others. These titles can be descriptive, indicative of the content or theme of the work, or they can be more abstract and open to interpretation. Titles can be designated by the artists themselves, or by curators or other third parties, and can affect reception and interpretation. [1] [2]
Traditionally, only works of art in the fine arts are titled, but convenient descriptive titles may be needed for works in the decorative arts, for cataloging, museum labels and similar fields.
It may be discovered or argued that the subject of a work has been wrongly identified. A painting by Titian has been argued to show both Salome or Judith with the Head of Holofernes . The Arnolfini Portrait by Jan van Eyck in the National Gallery has been given several different titles by the museum over recent decades, as opinions as to the nature of the occasion and the people shown have changed. [3]
In the ancient world, artworks were not typically given a proper title, the identification of something like a cult image being self-evident in a particular sociocultural context, [4] [5] akin to the concept of the Poor Man's Bible . They were sometimes inscribed by epigraphy with the signature of the artist and/or the subject of the piece such as a titulus, but a titulus served simple utilitarian functions and was not a true title. [4] [6] Subsequent art history, beginning with Pliny's chapters that gave common names to works such as by Praxiteles. [7] [8]
The relatively small group of narrative religious subjects in Western medieval art were and are referred to by the standard names for an event shown, and used in theological and devotional literature. [5] The need for an agreed-upon title only emerged in a Western context in the 18th century, with more secular subjects, and more printed literature of art criticism, and Age of Enlightenment cataloging of the first museums and first exhibitions. [5]
In modern times, titles of artworks are usually chosen by the artist. They can also have been assigned by galleries, private collectors, printmakers, art dealers, or curators, this historical process being the subject of a book by Ruth Yeazell. [1] The onomastician Adrian Room compiled an encyclopedic dictionary in this area. [2] John C. Welchman has written Invisible Colors as a critical history of modern titles, after an aphorism by Duchamp. [9]
Some artworks have had their museum label names changed as new art history research emerges [10] or as a modification of an offensive or pejorative name. [11] Curating institutions are responsible for thorough documentation of all title variants, including translations of an artwork title into one or more languages. [12] As a proper title is considered the default for modern works, others may be designated "Untitled" (by secondary sources or by the artist as a conscious choice), and are sometimes also assigned a parenthetical name for clarity. [5]
From Gustave Courbet's L'Origine du monde (1866), to Marcel Duchamp's Fountain (1916) and L.H.O.O.Q. (1919), to Freytag-Loringhoven and Schamberg's God 1917, to Maurizio Cattelan's America (2016), artists have used artwork titles to provide additional meaning and/or context to their works of art. [13] [14] [15] [16]
The title of a work of art can have an impact on its reception and aesthetic interpretation, and can also be an aspect of the artist's overall vision for the piece. This can be particularly the case for abstract art. [17] [18] Some artists choose to title their works with a simple descriptive phrase, such as "Portrait of a Woman" or "Landscape with Trees." Other artists may use more abstract or symbolic titles, such as The Scream by Edvard Munch or The Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dali. In some cases, the title of a work of art may be a quote or homage to another work of art or literature. Conversely, ekphrastic literature often repurposes the title of an artwork. [19]
The choice of title for a work of art, akin to an artist's statement, can be a personal decision for the artist, and can reflect their own interpretation or intentions for the piece. It can also serve as a way for the artist to engage with the viewer and invite them to consider the work from a particular perspective. Philosophically, Jacques Derrida compared an artwork's title to a parergon [20] and considered it similarly to a simulacrum, and Jean-Luc Nancy took a comparable approach. [21] The title of a work of art is a part of its identity and can influence its reception and interpretation by audiences, as noted by art critic Arthur Danto, [22] who made a thought experiment of a particular abstract mural being named after either the first or third of Newton's laws of motion; however, titles can be more impactful on the interpretation of some works than others. [23]
Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related artistic movements in music, literature, and architecture. In Cubist works of art, the subjects are analyzed, broken up, and reassembled in an abstract form—instead of depicting objects from a single perspective, the artist depicts the subject from multiple perspectives to represent the subject in a greater context. Cubism has been considered the most influential art movement of the 20th century. The term cubism is broadly associated with a variety of artworks produced in Paris or near Paris (Puteaux) during the 1910s and throughout the 1920s.
Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. He is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, as one of the three artists who helped to define the revolutionary developments in the plastic arts in the opening decades of the 20th century, responsible for significant developments in painting and sculpture. He has had an immense impact on 20th- and 21st-century art, and a seminal influence on the development of conceptual art. By the time of World War I, he had rejected the work of many of his fellow artists as "retinal", intended only to please the eye. Instead, he wanted to use art to serve the mind.
Jasper Johns is an American painter, sculptor, draftsman, and printmaker. Considered a central figure in the development of American postwar art, he has been variously associated with abstract expressionism, Neo-Dada, and pop art movements. Johns was born in Augusta, Georgia, and raised in South Carolina. He graduated as valedictorian from Edmunds High School in 1947 and briefly studied art at the University of South Carolina before moving to New York City and enrolling at Parsons School of Design. His education was interrupted by military service during the Korean War. After returning to New York in 1953, he worked at Marboro Books and began associations with key figures in the art world, including Robert Rauschenberg, with whom he had a romantic relationship until 1961. The two were also close collaborators, and Rauschenberg became a profound artistic influence.
Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic combination of materials, methods, concepts, and subjects that continue the challenging of boundaries that was already well underway in the 20th century. Diverse and eclectic, contemporary art as a whole is distinguished by the very lack of a uniform, organising principle, ideology, or "-ism". Contemporary art is part of a cultural dialogue that concerns larger contextual frameworks such as personal and cultural identity, family, community, and nationality.
Conceptual art, also referred to as conceptualism, is art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work are prioritized equally to or more than traditional aesthetic, technical, and material concerns. Some works of conceptual art may be constructed by anyone simply by following a set of written instructions. This method was fundamental to American artist Sol LeWitt's definition of conceptual art, one of the first to appear in print:
In conceptual art the idea or concept is the most important aspect of the work. When an artist uses a conceptual form of art, it means that all of the planning and decisions are made beforehand and the execution is a perfunctory affair. The idea becomes a machine that makes the art.
Postmodern art is a body of art movements that sought to contradict some aspects of modernism or some aspects that emerged or developed in its aftermath. In general, movements such as intermedia, installation art, conceptual art and multimedia, particularly involving video are described as postmodern.
František Kupka, also known as Frank Kupka or François Kupka, was a Czech painter and graphic artist. He was a pioneer and co-founder of the early phases of the abstract art movement and Orphic Cubism (Orphism). Kupka's abstract works arose from a base of realism, but later evolved into pure abstract art.
Willem de Kooning was a Dutch-American abstract expressionist artist. He was born in Rotterdam and moved to the United States in 1926, becoming an American citizen in 1962. In 1943, he married painter Elaine Fried.
Maurizio Cattelan is an Italian visual artist. Known primarily for his hyperrealistic sculptures and installations, Cattelan's practice also includes curating and publishing. His satirical approach to art has resulted in him being frequently labelled as a joker or prankster of the art world. Self-taught as an artist, Cattelan has exhibited internationally in museums and Biennials.
Fountain is a readymade sculpture by Marcel Duchamp in 1917, consisting of a porcelain urinal signed "R. Mutt". In April 1917, an ordinary piece of plumbing chosen by Duchamp was submitted for an exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists, the inaugural exhibition by the Society to be staged at the Grand Central Palace in New York. When explaining the purpose of his readymade sculpture, Duchamp stated they are "everyday objects raised to the dignity of a work of art by the artist's act of choice." In Duchamp's presentation, the urinal's orientation was altered from its usual positioning. Fountain was not rejected by the committee, since Society rules stated that all works would be accepted from artists who paid the fee, but the work was never placed in the show area. Following that removal, Fountain was photographed at Alfred Stieglitz's studio, and the photo published in the Dada journal The Blind Man. The original has been lost.
Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2 is a 1912 painting by Marcel Duchamp. The work is widely regarded as a Modernist classic and has become one of the most famous of its time. Before its first presentation at the 1912 Salon des Indépendants in Paris it was rejected by the Cubists as being too Futurist. It was then exhibited with the Cubists at Galeries Dalmau's Exposició d'Art Cubista, in Barcelona, 20 April–10 May 1912. The painting was subsequently shown, and ridiculed, at the 1913 Armory Show in New York City.
A work of art, artwork, art piece, piece of art or art object is an artistic creation of aesthetic value. Except for "work of art", which may be used of any work regarded as art in its widest sense, including works from literature and music, these terms apply principally to tangible, physical forms of visual art:
Sherrie Levine is an American photographer, painter, and conceptual artist. Some of her work consists of exact photographic reproductions of the work of other photographers such as Walker Evans, Eliot Porter and Edward Weston.
The Zachęta National Gallery of Art is a contemporary art museum in the center of Warsaw, Poland. The Gallery's chief purpose is to present and support Polish contemporary art and artists. With numerous temporary exhibitions of well-known foreign artists, the gallery has also established itself internationally.
L.H.O.O.Q. is a work of art by Marcel Duchamp. First conceived in 1919, the work is one of what Duchamp referred to as readymades, or more specifically a rectified ready-made. The readymade involves taking mundane, often utilitarian objects not generally considered to be art and transforming them, by adding to them, changing them, or simply renaming and reorienting them and placing them in an appropriate setting. In L.H.O.O.Q. the found object is a cheap postcard reproduction of Leonardo da Vinci's early 16th-century painting Mona Lisa onto which Duchamp drew a moustache and beard in pencil and appended the title.
Thirteen Most Wanted Men was a large 1964 mural created by Andy Warhol for the New York State Pavilion at the 1964 World's Fair at Flushing Meadows, New York. The mural was painted over with silver paint before the fair opened, probably due to official objections, but other reasons have been suggested.
Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa is one of the most recognizable and famous works of art in the world, and also one of the most replicated and reinterpreted. Mona Lisa replicas were already being painted during Leonardo's lifetime by his own students and contemporaries. Some are claimed to be the work of Leonardo himself, and remain disputed by scholars. Prominent 20th-century artists such as Marcel Duchamp and Salvador Dalí have also produced derivative works, manipulating Mona Lisa's image to suit their own aesthetic. Replicating Renaissance masterpieces continues to be a way for aspiring artists to perfect their painting techniques and prove their skills.
New possibilities opened up by the concept of four-dimensional space helped inspire many modern artists in the first half of the twentieth century. Early Cubists, Surrealists, Futurists, and abstract artists took ideas from higher-dimensional mathematics and used them to radically advance their work.
Charles W. Duncan (1887–1970) was an American avant-garde painter in the circle of artists that gathered around the photographer and art promoter Alfred Stieglitz. He is now known primarily as the subject of one of Charles Demuth's famous poster portraits.
America is a sculpture created in 2016 by the Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan. An example of satirical participatory art, it is a fully functioning toilet made of 18-karat solid gold. It was stolen in 2019 from Blenheim Palace, where it was exhibited on loan from the permanent collection of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.
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