How To Talk About Art History

Artist Feature: Who was Anna Ancher?

On July 17, 2015

Anna Ancher, Denmark’s most famous female artist

Anna Ancher is famous in Scandinavia, but basically unknown in the rest of the world. Which is a shame because we always need more discussion on awesome female artists in art history.

Movement/Style: Part of the Skagen artists’ colony. She’s usually associated with Naturalism, and sometimes with Realism and Impressionism.

Country: She traveled a bit around Europe, but lived, worked and died in the small town of Skagen in Denmark.

Years: 1859 – 1935

Well, who was she?

Anna Ancher (1859 – 1935) was a Danish painter active in the late 19th and early 20th century. She was part of a group of artists and other creative people who briefly lived and worked in the small fisherfolk village of Skagen in Northern Denmark, known as the Skagen colony.

“I’m wondering about cobalt and the story about blue colours being so expensive in the past”: A Very Short History of Colours.

By admin

On July 9, 2015

In Reader Questions

The super-beautiful and expensive ultramarine colour can be seen in the headdress of Vermeer’s Girl With A Pearl Earring from 1665.

Reader question: “I’m wondering about cobalt and the story about blue colours being so expensive in the past – is that true and does it have any importance for the evolution of art?”

It is true! But it’s actually not cobalt blue that you’re thinking of, it’s ultramarine.

The history of colours in art is really weird and interesting. It’s true that the availability of various colours has often determined which ones are used and what importance they have. This is especially true the further back we go in history, when all colours were not readily available in the nearest art shop.

A surprising variety of methods were used to make different colours. To make bright red, for example, an early 8th century process was described by Persian alchemist Jabir ibn Hayyan: you had to heat mercury and sulfur in a flask, vaporize and recondense it, and then grind it to create a red colour.

“Are all artists and their works classified as part of a particular art movement?”

By admin

On July 7, 2015

In Reader Questions

Strolling About In Spring by Zhan Ziqian can be classified as “Sui Dynasty Chinese art” – not really a well-known “art movement” according to mainstream art history.

Reader question: “Are all artists and their works classified as part of a particular movement? Like, are all artists Impressionists, Romanticists, etc.?”

The short answer is: no.

The long answer is: no, but the fact that so much of art history is focused on “movements” reflects a great deal about the way that mainstream Western art history operates. The reason for this focus on art movements is that this sort of classification means that it’s easier to talk about an artwork’s style, influence and cultural meaning. It’s useful. But it’s also pretty limiting if it’s the only way that we look at art history.

How To Talk About Art History

By admin

On July 3, 2015

In Site Updates

I love talking about art history.

Although I’m currently working with contemporary art, I love to ramble on about art history to anyone who will listen. As a result, my friends sometimes come to me with questions about it. Like, “Was Picasso a Surrealist?” (No.) “Were Monet and Manet the same person?” (No, but they knew each other very well.) “Was Leonardo da Vinci gay?” (Well, he was arrested for having sex with men, so make of that what you will.) These are the sorts of questions I’m interested in on this blog.

One of the things I don’t like about art history is that many people are excluded from it. It’s not taught thoroughly at most high schools, it’s a university degree for those who are not in need of a high-paying job, and it has a language that you can’t participate in unless you’ve been specifically educated in it.