The museum paper is largely a task of looking, comparing, and analyzing works you have seen first-hand. You may use some research skills and documentation through footnotes and bibliography. Minimum 4 pages of analysis. You must cite your sources as bibliography. But this page does not count as one of the pages of text. It must be on a separate page.
Important: use 12pt font, 1” margins all around; double spaced.
Your heading or title page should include: course number and section number, and date. Be sure to NUMBER your pages.
Consider the following:
- How do the works represent the period or time they were created?
- Compare composition, treatment of space (Is a third dimension created? How?)
- How is the human form articulated? What is happening?
- How is color and light handled? Distribution of color – quality and direction of light
- Point of view / use of perspective
- LOOK at painting – What can you see / notice in person: look at surface / medium / follow edges of painting around figures / notice possible changes
- Finally, how do they differ in total effect? (important)
Please be specific. Refer to the works, not your feelings about them.
Format:
*Title Page indicate which pair is your subject
your name
HA 112, Section 03 or 04
Text 4 pages—not counting the title page and not counting the bibliography page.
Footnotes or You may include footnotes at “foot” – bottom – of pages or as “end”
EndNotes notes at end of paper, or parenthetical notes–if you include page numbers. At least 2 footnotes must be cited.
SAMPLE FOOTNOTE: Amy Louise Wood, Lynching and Spectacle: Witnessing Racial Violence in America, 1890-1940, 271-318. (Chapel Hill: North Carolina Press, 2009), http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5149/9780807878118_wood.13.
SAMPLE BIBLIOGRAPY:
Wood, Amy Louise. Lynching and Spectacle: Witnessing Racial Violence in America, 1890-1940. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2009. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5149/9780807878118_wood.13.
Bibliography: include 2 books and/or articles – not from the Web !
Illustrations if you wish to include images, they follow all text and bibliography (or can be on your title page). 2 sources means that you create 2 footnotes or endnotes (the note must include page information).
- You must cite it to avoid plagiarizing someone else’s work.
- The footnotes/endnotes may be quotes or paraphrases of your sources.
- Be concise.
- Be sure the first sentence of each paragraph is a topic sentence that explains the subject of the paragraph and introduces it—and that all other sentences in the paragraph relate to that. (If not, then it belongs in another paragraph –and even in another section.)
Do have a final paragraph that summarizes your findings in a conclusion.
- Use paragraphs to contrast works and for each of the points you are discussing.
- This is not solely a description of the works–bring them together to explain or analyze their correspondences or contrasts.
Use Jstor to find articles or essays about your artists or topics. The Pratt librarians will assist you with this and any other sources. You can use general books (above the “survey” level); they may be monographs, that is, books on individual artists; they may be books on the theme or the period, etc.
Do not use web sources— www.metmuseum.org only for additional information. Articles from Jstor and other vetted articles are fine; they are not considered web-sources.
WRITING THE PAPER
The purpose of this paper is to describe in your own words the differences and similarities (if any) in style and subject matter of the two paintings or sculptures that you have chosen. Use the vocabulary you understand and construct your own descriptive phrases. I am interested in how you reason about the work and how you evaluate what you read. (Please note: titles of art works are underlined or italicized!)
Your conclusions will be based on your own observations together with information which you have read about the artists and their work.
- Examine carefully the pairs and choose the one which seems most interesting, exciting, engaging to you.
- After you decide which pieces you will be working on write your impressions for each work. Be alert and honest to yourself – what is it that caught you eye, mind, imagination?
- Get the full information of the work: title, artist, date, medium, size, accession number.
- Consider the following elements and write down some of your visual observations as you compare the two works:
* Medium and materials: Do these elements shape the work’s effect on you.
* Dimensions: Ask yourself about the physical relationship between you and the work. Does size and proportion play a role in the effect of the work on you?
* Display of the Object: How is your object displayed? What was its original context?
* Elements of Artistic Form:
Lines: What are the dominant lines of the work? Do some of them suggest movement? Do forms seem planted in the ground? To where do lines lead your eye?
Shape and Space: What shapes are used in this painting? Does the pictorial space suggest three dimensions? How? Is it consistent? How are mass and volume conveyed?
Light: What is the quality and direction of light? What role does light play in the works you have chosen? Is it uniform and gentle? Dramatic and theatrical? Physical or symbolic? Where does it lead your eye and what effects does it have?
Color: What is the dominant palette of the chosen pieces (warm or cool)? Is color used to help convey the work’s theme or message? How? Compare how each artist has applied the paint and consider the appearance of the surface of the paintings.
Style: Are there naturalistic elements? (What are they? What seems “real” about them?) Consider how the human form is articulated and how closely (or not) the artist follows observations of nature. Are there idealized forms (e.g. certain features have been suppressed or exaggerated in order to emphasize beauty)?
Composition: How do various elements of form interact? Are they integrated in a uniform manner? How? Is the organization and arrangement of forms orderly? Symmetrical? What is the focal point (if there is one) and how is it achieved? What of the theme/idea/effect are conveyed by the focal point?
A good idea is to draw a small sketch for each of the works while in the museum. Skill and quality of your drawing are irrelevant – but by doing this you will observe more closely the formal elements of the paintings you have chosen. If you make such sketch, please attach it to your paper.
