While much of modern lace is loomed by machine, until the mid-nineteenth century, the art of lacemaking was a painstaking and time-consuming craft produced predominantly by women. Despite being a product of a domestic pastime, lace ruled both fashion and international markets for centuries. Flourishing trade and boosting economies, lace was highly sought after by monarchs, clergy, and the working class. Through the study of its inception, tools, and techniques, this article presents a brief history of lace and its unknown makers.
Art News
As our access to open air and meeting in public places returns, we can look to these artists to remind us what summer is for after the trying year of 2020.
The story of the Last Supper is a pivotal one in the Bible and Christians view it as the basis for the Holy Communion rite. Leonardo da Vinci’s fresco adorns a wall of the refectory at Santa Maria delle Grazie, in Milan. Despite immense damage sustained over the years, the work attracts hundreds of thousands of viewers each year.
The Chavín are perhaps best known for their peculiar artistic style and iconography—one that depicts amalgamations of humans, plants, and animals in tortuous and stylized forms that act as both a puzzle for the viewer and a detailed map of the cosmological and spiritual ideologies of the Chavín.
Gentileschi’s Judith stands out because it shows the act of a woman forcefully decapitating a man. One could argue that any depiction of this tale is inherently violent. And yet, many believe Gentileschi’s deliberate inclusion of female brutality sends a feminist message that is absent from other iterations.
Monet was a master painter whose works are synonymous with the Impressionist movement he helped found. An avid experimenter, he was known for painting the same subjects over and over, drawing inspiration from the unique qualities of color and light he observed each time he sat down to paint.
Copying within the context of the art world has evolved over the centuries. What was once understood as a vital tool for study and learning is now often perceived, especially by laymen, as a kind of cheating. Even so, copying sometimes is ethically questionable.
Regardless of gender, ethnicity, creed, or political ideology, one thing for certain is we are going to die. Death is the inevitable fate in the plight of man and the great equalizer to all. Consequently, themes of death are richly scattered throughout the art-historical timeline.
Dadaism or Dada is an art movement of the early twentieth century characterized by irreverence, subversion, and nonsense. Dada art, performance, and poetry emerged in Zurich as a reaction to the horror and misfortune of World War I.
These eight artists bent the rules when branding themselves. Although they worked across two centuries, all chose to adopt their mother’s family names instead of abiding by the traditional patriarchy, and—quite often—made the change at a point when they were making breakthroughs in the studio.
