Category: Art Dictionary

Pastel: Crayon made from pigment mixed with gum and water and pressed into a stick-shaped form, or work executed in this medium. Because pastel tends to be light and chalky in tone, the word is also used to describe pale, light colours.

Parietal Art: Prehistoric paintings, engravings or relief sculptures on cave walls and ceilings.

Papier Colle (“pasted paper”): collage of paper/card, first used in 1912 by Georges Braque.

Panorama: painting of a view or landscape; especially large-scale painting around a room, or rolled on a cylinder.

Panel painting: refers to the use of wooden panels, as support: a practice which was widespread until the appearance of canvas during the 15th century. In Flanders, Holland, France and England, oak panels were most popular; in Germany and Austria oak, beech, lime, chestnut, and cherrywood was used; while in Italy poplar was also employed. Dry seasoned planks were primed with several coats of “size” – a glue derived from animal skins – and gesso, a combination of powdered calcium sulfate (gypsum) and animal glue. One advantage of panels, was their extremely smooth surface, which made them ideal for painting fine detail.

Palette knife: spatula-shaped knife for mixing or applying thick, bodied paint.

Palette: slab of wood, metal or glass used by the artist for mixing paint. Also: figuratively: the range of colours used by the artist. See: Colour Mixing Tips.

Painting: process of applying paint. Also: object produced by applying paint to a flat support, e.g. a wall or canvas.
For history and famous painters, see Fine Art Painting.

Paintbrush: Bristles may derive from a variety of animals including boar, wolf, squirrel and badger as well as synthetic. Red sable hair is considered the finest. Different shapes are employed for different types of painting tasks: larger, more indistinct areas of painting such as the sky in landscapes were typically done with flat or round-tipped hogs hair brushes, while specific detail was painted with fine pointed sable brushes. In addition, feathers were sometimes employed to smooth out areas of paint to remove visible brushwork. Badger Brushes were used to blend adjacent areas of different tones.

Overpainting: The final layer of paint that is applied over the under painting or under layer after it has dried. The idea behind layers of painting is that the under painting is used to define the basic shapes and design so that the overpainting can be used to fill in the details of the piece.

Outsider art: Refers to works by those outside of mainstream society. Outsider art broadly includes folk art and ethnic art as well as by prisoners, the mentally ill and others neither trained in art nor making their works to sell them.

Ottonian art: Murals, illuminated manuscripts and architectural sculpture of the period 919 to early 11th century, under the Ottonian emperors.

Origami paper folding: Reputedly invented in Japan around 1600, the the Chinese version known as “zhezhi” may be older.

Orders of Architecture: the five Classic orders, each composed of a column, having a base, shaft, capital, and entablature with architrave frieze, and cornice. There are three orders of Greek architecture: Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian. These were adapted by the Romans, who added Tuscan and Composite.

Oils: There are various types of oil which are used as binders and drying agents (oil plus pigment dries by a process of oxidation by absorbing oxygen from the air) by oil painters. Linseed oil, made from flax seeds, adds gloss and transparency to paints and dries very thoroughly (within 3-5 days), making it ideal for underpainting. Stand oil is a thicker type of linseed oil, with a slower drying time (7-14 days), which is often diluted with (eg) turpentine, and used for glazing to produce a smooth, enamel-like finish with minimal traces of brushmarks. Poppyseed oil, much paler, more transparent and less likely to yellow than linseed, is often employed for white or lighter colours. Poppyseed oil takes longer to dry than linseed oil (5-7 days), so it is perfect for working wet on wet. Walnut oil is a thin, pale yellow-brown oil (dries in 4-5 days) which is commonly used to make oil paint more fluid.

Oil painting: A medium where pigments are mixed with drying oils, such as linseed, walnut, or poppyseed, which found great favour due to its brilliance of detail, its rich colour, and its wider tonal range. Popularized during the 15th century in Northern Europe (whose climate did not favour fresco works), foremost pioneers of oil paint techniques included (in Holland) Hubert and Jan Van Eyck, and (in Italy) Leonardo Da Vinci.

Offset litho: lithographic technique in which ink is transferred from a plate to a rubber roller, and then onto the paper.

Oeuvre: the total output of an artist. Also: a work of art.

Oceanic art: From the South Pacific, including Australasia.

Objet trouve, see: Found Object.

Nude genre: For a brief survey of nudity in painting and sculpture, see: Female Nudes in Art History (Top 20). See also Male Nudes in Art History (Top 10).

Non-representational art: Also called non-objective, this style consisted of works which had no reference to anything outside themselves. In practice, it was mainly geometrically abstract.

Non-objective art: A 20th century term applied to visual art which is not based on existing, observable forms, but rather on abstract or idealized forms, such as geometric, mathematical, imaginary, etc. An early pioneer of non-abstraction is Piet Mondrian.

Nazi Art: Mostly architecture, film, photography, sculpture and poster art serving Nazi’ propagandist needs.

Naturalism: Accurate, detailed representation of objects or scenes as they appear, whether attractive or otherwise. (compare Realism).

Nashki: The flowing form of Arabic calligrahic script (compare Kufic).

Naive: The work, style, or art of untaught artists, usually crudely naturalistic.

Nail Art: A form of body painting.

Mythological painting: Pictures of subjects chosen from Greek and Roman Classical mythology, popular from the 15th century to the 19th. Also called History Painting.

Mural Painting: pictures painted on walls or ceilings, traditionally in fresco.

Mughal art: art and architecture of the courts of the Muslim rulers in India, 1526-1707, as exemplified by Mughal painting and by the Taj Mahal in Agra, Uttar Pradesh.

Motif: a repeated distinctive feature in a design.

Mosaic Art: designs formed from small pieces of stone, glass, marble, etc.

Monumental: connected with, or serving as, a monument. Also: used figuratively of paintings and other art forms to mean imposing or massive.

Monotype: printing process that takes an impression from a metal or glass plate, producing only one print of each design, which must then be redrawn.

Modern Art: Traditionally starts with Impressionism, from about 1874 onwards, until the early post-world war II period. Late Pop-art then ushers in contemporary or post-modern art.

Modernism: the theory of modernist art that rejects past styles, and promotes contemporary art as the true reflection of the age, hence modernist.

Modeling: three-dimensional representation of objects.

Mobiliary Art: Prehistoric portable artworks.

Mobile: Kinetic sculpture probably originated by Alexander Calder in 1932; the sculpture is hung from wires so that it is moved by air currents.

Mixed Media: the combination of different materials in the same work, sometimes including performance.

Minimalist art: modern art that rejects texture, subject, atmosphere, etc and reduces forms and colours to the simplest.

Miniature Painting: very small piece of work, such as a Medieval Manuscript Illumination. During the Renaissance and the 18th and 19th centuries, the term was more specifically applied to small portraits painted on ivory.

Mimesis: is a term which describes the artistic imitation of nature, rather than its interpretation: in order words, the showing of things as opposed to the telling of things (diegesis).

Mezzotint: method of copper engraving, Also: a print produced by this method.

Metalwork: Decorative precious metals art developed in Sumer, Egypt and Crete, before being refined by Celtic, Byzantine and Romanesque artists in Belgium.

Medium: the means or material with which an artist expresses himself. In painting, the medium is the liquid in which pigment is mixed and thinned, e.g. linseed oil.

Medieval art: church architecture, illuminated manuscripts, stone sculpture, murals, metalwork and goldsmithery from the period of the Middle Ages (c.450-1450).

Masterpiece: originally a test piece of work done by the medieval apprentice in order to qualify as a Master of his Guild. The term is now used more freely to mean a work of oUbtanding importance or quality.

Marine art: painting or drawing of a sea subject.

Marble Sculpture: Made from limestone. It occurs in various colours, from pure white to black, often veined.

Maquette: model made on a small scale by a sculptor or a stage-designer as a preliminary three-dimensional “sketch'” for the final work.

Maniera: according to the writings of Georgio Vasari (1511-74), the “stylishness” associated with the art of 16th-century Italy, epitomized in the work of Raphael and Michelangelo. Known as Mannerism.

Luminism: Style of light-related 19th century American landscape painting.

Lithography: printing method in which a design is drawn on stone with a greasy crayon and then inked.
Lost Wax Method, see: Cire Perdue.

Lino cut: print produced by carving a design into a block of linoleum.

Line engraving: the art or process of hand-engraving in Intaglio and copper plate, using a Burin. Also: a print taken from such a plate.

Linear perspective: method of indicating spatial recession in a picture by placing objects in a series of receding planes; parallel lines receding from the onlooker’s view-point will appear to meet at a vanishing point. Pioneers included Renaissance painters Masaccio and Andrea Mantegna.

Linear: artistic style that emphasizes lines and contours; hence linearity and linearism.

Life drawing: drawing from a live human model.

La Tene Style: style of decorative art that appeared c.5th century BCE in Europe and was fully developed in Celtic art of the pre-Roman period; the name is derived from a site in Switzerland where metal objects and weapons in this style have been found.

Lapis Lazuli: deep-blue semiprecious stone, used for jewellery, and from which the pigment ultramarine is extracted.

Landscape painting: Composition in which the scenery is the principal subject. Also: scenic areas of a painting or drawing.

Land Art (earthworks, environmental art): A form of contemporary art dating from the 1960s and 70s created in the landscape, either by using natural forms, or by enhancing natural forms with man-made materials. Famous pioneer environmental artists include Robert Smithson, and Christo and Jeanne-Claude.

Lacquerware: Objects (wood, bamboo, metal and other materials) coated in resinous decorative finish. Speciality of Chinese art.

Kufic script: angular, square type of Arabic script (the more flowing script is NASHKI); sometimes found in decorative Romanesque and Gothic art.

Krater: ancient Greek storage vessel; different shapes were used for water and wine.

Kouros: Archaic Greek statue of standing youth (pl. kouroi).

Kitsch: mass-produced vulgar craftwork articles of the kind manufactured for souvenirs; the word has now become a pejorative term for whatever is thought to be in flamboyant bad taste.

Kinetic art: most commonly sculptures (eg. mobiles, stabiles) designed to move and thus produce optical effects; first made in the 1920s, but most popular from 1950 onwards.

Key design: geometrical pattern of repeated horizontal and vertical straight lines, found in ancient Greek and Celtic art.

Kaolin: also known as China clay; used in the manufacture of hand-paste porcelain and sometimes in the GROUNDS of paintings. Chemically it is hydrated silicate of aluminium.

Junk Art: A sub-species of “found art”, typically sculpture or assemblage, sometimes also called “funk art” or “trash art”.

Jewellery Art: decorative art typically crafted from precious metal (gold, silver, platinum etc.) and gemstones like diamonds, sapphires, rubies, pearls and the like.

Jasper Ware: type of stoneware pottery introduced by Josiah Wedgewood in 1774. Originally pure white but sometimes stained with cobalt oxide to produce “Wedgewood blue”.

Japonism: the craze for Japonaiserie – Japanese imports e.g. prints and furniture, brought to Europe in the mid 19th century – and its effect on European painting and decorative art.

Japanese Art: Yamato-e, and Ukiyo-e painting, Buddhist Temple art and Zen ink-painting.

Jade Carving: sculpture of extremely hard stone, which may be blue, green, white, or brown; highly prized in Chinese art.

Ivory Carving: Form of sculpture made using animal tusks and teeth, notably from elephants, whales and walruses.

Italian Primitives: artists and their works in Italy prior to 1400.

Italianate style: in an Italian manner. Also: in architecture, the adaptation of Italian Renaissance palace styles, especially so in America c.1840-65.

Islamic Art: Includes architecture, pottery, faience mosaics, lustre-ware, relief sculpture, drawing, painting, calligraphy, manuscript illumination, textile design, metalwork, gemstone carving, and other crafts.

Irish School: For details, see: Irish Painting and Irish Sculpture.

Intonaco: the smooth layer of lime plaster that receives the paint in fresco painting.

International Gothic: since the 19th century, used to describe the style of art prevalent from c.1375 to 1425, balanced midway between naturalistic and idealistic values and characterized by delicate and rich colouring.

Interiors: a style of genre-painting perfected by Dutch Realists of the later 17th century; later taken up by Danish artists like Peter Vilhelm Ilsted (1861-33) and Vilhelm Hammershoi (1864-1916).

Intarsia: the decoration of wood with inlay work, especially in 15th-century Italy.

India Ink: In fine art, a drawing ink made from a black pigment consisting of lampblack and glue.

Illusionism: The use of optical and perspectival principles to create the illusion of painted objects being three dimensional; hence illusionist, illusionistic.

Illumination: The decoration of manuscript texts which may have started from the simple addition of minium to the script, the general part being written in black. From this grew quite extraordinary elaboration, fantastic interwoven strap patterns, decorative motifes, zoomorphic imagery, plant forms. miniature portraits of religious figures. It was one of the most important arts of the Middle Ages. Wherever there were monasteries the art seems to have been practised. The monastic scribe worked about six hours a day. After he had finished the work was proof-read. Then the sheets went to a rubricator who put in titles and headlines, then to the illuminator. The last worked miracles of miniature presentation with the materials at his command. The oldest known illumination is an Egyptian papyrus, the ‘Book of the Dead’. The Greeks and Romans produced some work, but very little survives. The Byzantine manuscripts contain some perfect examples. Fourteenth-century Persian editions of the Koran, exquisite delicate designs. Among the famed European manuscripts are the ‘Book of Hours’ of the Duc de Berry produced by the Limbourg brothers (1410-13), and ‘The Book of Kells’, 8th century, now in Trinity College Library, Dublin. The manuscripts were worked on vellum, using not only colours, but also gold-leaf and other metals, tiny fragments of precious and semi-precious stones and raising paste.

Ideal art: Painting of various periods that is based on the artist’s conception rather than visual perception, e.g. the art of the High Renaissance, or of 17th-century classicism.

Icons (Icon Painting) (Greek, “image”, “portrait”): in Byzantine, Greek and Russian Orthodox church art, the representation of Christ or the Virgin, or saints, in mosaic or painting; tending to be stereotyped or hieratic; hence iconic.

History of Art Timeline: Chronological list of dates about the evolution of painting, sculpture and pottery.

How to Appreciate Paintings: Explains how to analyse painterly skills and narrative content.

History Painting: painting whose subject is some significant historical event, preferably Classical, mythological, actual or literary. From the 16th century to the 19th, history painting was more highly esteemed than other forms of painting, especially by the academies.

History of Art: Guide to the origins, evolution and development of the fine and visual arts.

Historiated: architecture or sculpture decorated with narrative subjects. A historiated initial is an initial in an illuminated mansuscript containing a narrative scene.

Hieratic: style in which certain fixed types, often sacred, are repeated, e.g. in Egyptian or Byzantine art. It may also be applied to any art that uses severe, rigid figures rather than naturalistic ones.

Hieroglyphs: pictorial form of writing, as used by the Egyptians.

Happenings: Type of Performance art. Spontaneous artistic event or display.