Descriptive Essay on Emil Nolde's "Masks"

Your final exam for the course is your Descriptive Analysis Paper on a new piece of art. As you did in the earlier Descriptive Essay assignment, you're going to create your descriptive analysis as a presentation. This time you will be including more information and doing much more detailed analysis. Open the Descriptive Analysis Paper Instructions. Use these questions to guide you in writing your analysis. You may also want to refer to the Duke University Visual Analysis document. DESCRIPTIVE ANALYSIS PAPER Choose a work of art that you have physically experienced. Choose a work of art that influences or informs or assists or connects the work of the group project. Please begin your descriptive analysis with a thesis statement. Writing in college often takes the form of persuasion—convincing others that you have an interesting, logical point of view on the subject you are studying. Persuasion is a skill you practice regularly in your daily life. You persuade your roommate to clean up, your parents to let you borrow the car, your friend to vote for your favorite candidate or policy. In college, course assignments often ask you to make a persuasive case in writing. You are asked to convince your reader of your point of view. This form of persuasion, often called academic argument, follows a predictable pattern in writing. After a brief introduction of your topic, you state your point of view on the topic directly and often in one sentence. This sentence is the thesis statement, and it serves as a summary of the argument you’ll make in the rest of your paper (http://writingcenter.unc.edu/handouts/thesis-statements/). Please always conclude. The following questions are to assist in your analytical observation of the work. a·nal·y·sis/?'nal?sis/ Noun: 1. Detailed examination of the elements or structure of something, typically as a basis for discussion or interpretation. 2. The process of separating something into its constituent elements. QUESTIONS TO ANSWER DESCRIPTION - NO MEANING 1. What is the work (drawing, painting, sculpture)? 2. What is the medium - what can you describe about the medium or the application of the medium? 3. What specifically is the work: portrait, landscape, still life, etc.? 4. What is the subject matter? 5. Describe each thing - visually and physically. Imagine that you are a sports’ announcer doing the playby-play, describing, and then commenting on the function of the thing; except in this case it’s your chosen artwork and you are describing, and commenting on, the physical attributes of the work. 6. Describe the placement of each thing. A reader should be able to re-create the piece by your description. 7. Are there multiple planes and what is in them, (foreground, middle ground, background)? 8. Describe the axis (how the overall image is divided or angled). 9. Is the view frontal, three-quarter, or profile? 10. Describe how the rule of thirds is functioning, or not. 11. Describe how the golden mean is functioning, or not. 12. What moves, how do they move, where do they point? (These are the lines). 13. Are there contour lines (outlines of shapes), if so are they strong and hard, or are they irregular, indistinct, fusing the objects or figures with the surrounding space? 14. Are there any objects acting as lines? Are there things, like an ore or an arm, that are directing us? Where is the viewer being directed? 15. Are there any implied lines? Is anyone in the image looking at anything? Or is anyone looking out of the picture? 16. List the colors descriptively. Is the color (if any) imitative of appearances, or expressive, or both? 17. Is there a pallet in use with the color choices? 18. What is the effect of light in the picture? Does it produce sharp contrasts, brightly illuminating some parts and throwing others into darkness, or does it, by means of gentle gradations, unify most or all of the parts? 19. What is the scale of the image? Actual size, describe how big or small it is. 20. What is the scale IN the image? Are the things super close up? Or, is the viewer far away from the things? 21. What things are big and what things are little? 12. Where do you rest? These are the “points”. 22. Are any of these things acting as an element of or principle of design? The elements and principals of design are listed in the book, in Chapter 5. 23. Does anything repeat or create a path? 24. Are their areas of pattern or texture? Do these draw your attention or push/direct your attention to something else? 25. If there are areas of texture is the texture actual or optical? CONTEXT 26. When and where was the work made? 27. What of significance was happening during the time and place of production? 28. Who is the artist? What is the background of the artist, the teachers, pertinent information that adds to understanding the choices made in the production of the work? 29. Is the work connected to a movement? Define and describe pertinent information about the movement. 30. Where would the work have been originally seen? 31. What purpose did the work serve? This is from Chapter 1. 32. Is the work similar to work from a past time period? Define and describe pertinent information about the referenced time period. 33. Does the work seem to have similar themes, values, or compositional structures to work from a specific time period from the past? Define and describe pertinent information. ANALYSIS 34. What is the title of the work? Is there any information on why the work is titled as it is? 35. What is your first response - your gut response? 36. What if anything is happening? Is there a story? Tell it even if there is an assumption of “everyone knowing the story”. 37. If the picture is a portrait, how much of the figure is shown, how much of the available space does it occupy? 38. Is there a hierarchy to the arrangement of figures? 39. Is there a familiar pattern or familiar purpose presented in the arrangement? Define and describe. 40. What effects are gained by the arrangement of the figures? 41. Go back to each thing listed in describing the composition - what are the specific materials or specific designs? Do the materials or designs or particular object portrayed have meaning? For example, if there is a car in an image… the car being a hearse vs being a corvette tells a very different story. 42. Look up each object for its symbolic potential. A dog may not just be a pet in a portrait. 43. What do the clothes, furnishings, background, angle of the head, or posture of the head and body, as well as the facial expression, contribute to our sense of the character (intense, cool, inviting) of the person portrayed? 44. Is there a strong sense of social class, or a strong sense of an independent inner life? 45. Is the figure related to the viewer perhaps by glance or gesture? 46. If frontal, does the face seem to face us in a godlike way, seeing all? 47. If three quarter, does it suggest motion? 48. If the figure is a double portrait, does the artist reveal what it is that ties the two figures together? 49. It is sometimes said that every portrait is a self-portrait; does this portrait reveal the artist in some way? 50. If the picture is a still life, does it suggest opulence, or humble domesticity and the benefits of moderation? 51. Does it imply transience, perhaps by a clock or burnt out candle, or even by the perishable nature of the objects (food or flowers) displayed? Describe and define - look up each objects symbolic potential. Do those meanings fit the image? 52. In a landscape, what is the relation between human beings and nature? 53. Is a viewer placed close up to things to observe closely or is everything set far away? 54. Are the figures at ease in nature, or are they dwarfed by it? 55. Are they earthbound, beneath the horizon, or do they stand out against the horizon and perhaps seem in touch with the heavens? 56. Is the image threatening or is it inviting? 57. What exactly makes it threatening or inviting? 58. Is the image of a vulnerable place or is it a refuge? 59. What specifically makes the image vulnerable or a refuge? 60. What does the medium contribute? What actions or meaning can be inferred out of the process of production? 61. Does the light seem theatrical or natural, disturbing or comforting? 62. What is the focus of the composition? 63. Is the composition symmetrical and perhaps therefore monumental, or quiet, or ridged and oppressive? 64. Is it diagonal and therefore dramatic or even melodramatic? 65. Does the artist convey depth? If so how? If not, why not? 66. What is the effect of the size and shape of the work? 67. What do the colors remind you of? 68. Could the colors be symbolic of anything? 69. What effects are gained by the arrangement of the figures? 70. If there are no planes or no depth - why or what do you understand because of that? 71. Does the image capture a “decisive moment”? The term alludes not only to action at its peak but also to the moment when all elements in the composition come together to reveal a formal beauty. 72. If you have used the term “beautiful” anywhere in the paper - define and describe your definition of beauty.