Interrelationships of light and space within the still-life painting and the figure drawing

UNCG Author/Contributor (non-UNCG co-authors, if there are any, appear on document)
Gretchen Van Loon Williams (Creator)
Institution
The University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG )
Web Site: http://library.uncg.edu/
Advisor
Walter Barker

Abstract: My Master of Fine Arts thesis is built around two genre, still-life and the human figure, in a representational style that is catagorically classical with an impressionistic skew. It implies, however, neither a singularly literal rendering nor a deliberately analytical diffusion of forms or colors. It is, rather, a very general composite of both resolutions employed with care not to pin-point either in such a way as to risk "freezing" the work in a kind of stylistic rigidity that does a direct disservice to both classicism and impressionism. The still-life presentation of oil paintings emanates from the investigation of two types of objects and surroundings propounding one theme. Themetically the paintings depict the nuances of natural daylight upon objects - most of them near white in color and in an environment of similar color. The two divisions of still-life subject matter circumscribed within this theme are as follows: 1. Objects and their settings carefully selected and arranged to form a unified grouping in a specific space and light situation in order to capture a particular spatial and luminary effect. 2. Objects (basically immovable or fixed) found within their preexistent environment and chosen because of the way in which they work with their already established space and light as a unit controlled only by the ways I have transferred their united image to the canvas. The arranged objects are, for the most part, organic, natural forms against a setting of manufactured forms put together in such a way as to allow the light not only to fuse these disparate elements, but also to give these immobile objects a sense of suspended animation.

Additional Information

Publication
Thesis
Language: English
Date: 1976

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