Featured Art Terms

  • Mona Hatoum, ‘Performance Still’ 1985, 1995

    Performance art

    Artworks that are created through actions performed by the artist or other participants, which may be live or recorded, spontaneous …
  • Sir John Everett Millais, Bt, ‘Ophelia’ 1851–2

    Pre-Raphaelite

    The Pre-Raphaelites were a secret society of young artists (and one writer), founded in London in 1848. They were opposed …
  • Claude Monet, ‘Water-Lilies’ after 1916

    Impressionism

    Impressionism developed in France in the nineteenth century and is based on the practice of painting out of doors and …
  • Richard Long, ‘Sahara Circle’ 1988

    Land art

    Land art or earth art is art that is made directly in the landscape, sculpting the land itself into earthworks …

Browse 463 Art Terms

Albert Gleizes, ‘Portrait of Jacques Nayral’ 1911

A Abbaye de Créteil

Established in 1906, the Abbaye de Créteil was a group of French writers, artists and composers who were inspired by …
See 63 art terms
John Singer Sargent, ‘Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose’ 1885–6

B British impressionism

British impressionism describes the work of artists working in Britain in the late nineteenth-century who were influenced by the ideas …
See 21 art terms
Leon Kossoff, ‘Self-Portrait. Verso: Untitled (Two Figures)’ 1967

C Charcoal

Charcoal is a black crumbly drawing material made of carbon and often used for sketching and under-drawing for paintings, although …
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Wassily Kandinsky, ‘Cossacks’ 1910–1

D Der Blaue Reiter

Der Blaue Reiter was a German expressionist group originating in Munich in 1909
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Bruce Nauman, ‘Violent Incident’ 1986

E Electronic media

The most common examples of electronic media are video recordings, audio recordings, slide presentations, CD-ROM and online content
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Philip Mercier, ‘The Schutz Family and their Friends on a Terrace’ 1725

F Fancy picture

Fancy picture refers to a type of eighteenth century painting that depict scenes of everyday life but with elements of …
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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Decline of the Carthaginian Empire ...’ exhibited 1817

G Genres

Genres are types of painting. These were codified in the seventeenth century as (in descending order of importance) history, portrait, …
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Minoru Hirata, ‘Kyushu Faction Street Happening at the Tenjin Intersection of Fukuoka, 26 February 1970’ 1970, printed 2011

H Hi-Red Center

Hi-Red Center was a short-lived radical art collective that emerged in post-war Japan and was active between 1963 and 1964
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Cornelia Parker, ‘Cold Dark Matter: An Exploded View’ 1991

I Installation art

The term installation art is used to describe large-scale, mixed-media constructions, often designed for a specific place or for a …
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James Abbott McNeill Whistler, ‘Three Figures: Pink and Grey’ 1868–78

J Japonisme

Japonisme is a French term coined in the late nineteenth century to describe the craze for Japanese art and design …
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Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson, ‘Study for ‘Returning to the Trenches’’ 1914–15

K Kinaesthetic art

Kinaesthetic art is art that deals with the body in movement
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John Constable, ‘Flatford Mill (‘Scene on a Navigable River’)’ 1816–7

L Landscape

Landscape is one of the principal types or genres of subject in Western art
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Robert Morris, ‘Untitled’ 1965, reconstructed 1971

M Minimalism

Minimalism is an extreme form of abstract art developed in the USA in the 1960s and typified by artworks composed …
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John Constable, ‘Flatford Mill (‘Scene on a Navigable River’)’ 1816–7

N Naturalism

Naturalism was a broad movement in the nineteenth century which represented things closer to the way we see them
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Rodrigo Moynihan, ‘Objective Abstraction’ c.1935–6

O Objective abstraction

The term objective abstraction refers to a non-geometric style of abstract art developed by a group of British artists in …
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George Stubbs, ‘Haymakers’ 1785

P Pendant

A pendant picture is one of two pictures designed to hang together as a matching pair
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Natalia Goncharova, ‘Rayonist Composition’ c.1912–13

R Rayonism

An early form of abstract art characterised by interacting linear forms derived from rays of light
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Henry Moore OM, CH, ‘Recumbent Figure’ 1938

S Sculpture

Three-dimensional art made by one of four basic processes: carving, modelling, casting, constructing
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George Richmond, ‘Christ and the Woman of Samaria’ 1828

T The Ancients

The Ancients were a group of artists who formed around the visionary artist and poet William Blake in the last …
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Tania Bruguera, ‘Tatlin’s Whisper #5’ 2008

U Useful Art Association

The Useful Art Association was started in New York by the Cuban artist Tania Bruguera and promotes the idea of …
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Jeff Koons, ‘Three Ball Total Equilibrium Tank (Two Dr J Silver Series, Spalding NBA Tip-Off)’ 1985

V Vitrine

A large, glass cabinet used for displaying art objects
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Edward Calvert, ‘The Brook’ 1829

W Wood engraving

A printmaking method distinct from woodcut in that the line is incised into the woodblock, rather than the background being …
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Damien Hirst, ‘Mother and Child (Divided)’ exhibition copy 2007 (original 1993)

Y Young British Artists (YBAs)

The label Young British Artists (YBAs) is applied to a loose group of British artists who began to exhibit together …
Heinz Mack, ‘Light Dynamo’ 1963

Z Zero

Group of artists who practised a form of kinetic art using light and motion

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0–9 43 Group

43 Group was a modern art movement formed in Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in 1943 by a group of …