Top Ten Art Movement Terms You Need to Know

Top Ten Art Movement Terms You Need to Know

Top Ten Art Movement Terms from mere expression to terms. Throughout history, artists have produced art in a variety of media and styles following different philosophies. Although labeling them may result in being reductive, but different artistic tendencies or styles can be grouped in collective titles known as art movements. If speaking art seems like a discipline in itself to you, here we provide you with the top terms of art movements and styles, from Cubism to Expressionism, from Baroque to Minimalism.

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1. Abstract expressionism:

Top Ten Art Movement Terms



Abstract expressionism was a movement of abstract painting that presented a broad range of stylistic diversity. And it was basic to the most abstract expressionist painting were the attention paid to surface qualities. For instance the qualities of brushstroke and texture; the use of huge canvases, and the adoption of an approach to space where in all parts of the canvas played an equally vital role. Apart from this, the harnessing of accidents that occurred during the process of painting and also the glorification of the act of painting itself was important as a means of visual communication. So, this in entirety was always an important attempt to transfer pure emotion directly onto the canvas, and had an inestimable influence on the many varieties of work that followed it.

2. Baroque: one of the top Ten Art Movement Terms

Top Ten Art Movement Terms

Baroque, in art and architecture, a style developed in Europe, England, and the Americas during the 17th and early 18th centuries. And today it finds its place in the top ten art movement terms. Now, the baroque style is characterized by laying emphasis on unity among the arts. So, with their technical brilliance, the baroque artists have achieved a remarkable harmony between paintings, sculpture, and architecture. And brought them together in a different spatial relationship, for both real and illusionary. Hence, Baroque art was very ornate, dramatic and realistic. And the Palace of Versailles near Paris is considered to be the greatest example of baroque architecture.

3. Cubism– Top Ten Art Movement Terms

Top Ten Art Movement Terms

Cubism was a style of art that stressed on the basic abstract geometric forms. And often very artistically presented the subject from many angles at the same time. For instance, the well renowned Pablo Picasso was a cubist painter. Cubism is an early-20th-century art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture. It inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture. And has been considered the most influential art movement of the 20th century. The term is broadly used in association with a wide variety of art produced in Paris (Montmartre and Montparnasse) or near Paris (Puteaux) during the 1910s and throughout the 1920s.

4. Expressionism:

Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, that originated in Northern Europe, around the beginning of the 20th century. So, its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subject’s perspective, and distort it radically for an emotional effect. So, in addition, it evokes moods or ideas for a greater effect. Expressionist painters have interpreted things around them in exaggerated, distorted and also emotional ways. Say for instance, Edvard Munch was one of the best-known Expressionist painters till date.

5. Impressionism:

Top Ten Art Movement Terms

Impressionism, a major movement, first in painting and later in music, that developed chiefly in France during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Impressionist painting comprises the work produced between about 1867 and 1886 by a group of artists who shared a set of related approaches and techniques. The most conspicuous characteristic of Impressionism in painting was an attempt to accurately and objectively record visual reality in terms of transient effects of light and colour. In music, it was to convey an idea or affect through a wash of sound rather than a strict formal structure.

6. Minimalism:

Minimalism, schools of contemporary art and music, with their origins in the 1960s, that have emphasized simplicity and objectivity. This style was popular from the 1950s through the 1970s. Minimalist paintings and sculpture were very simple, both in how they were presented and what they represented. Richard Serra was a Minimalist artist, and Frank Stella devoted part of his career to Minimalism. And, hence making “minimalism” as one of the top ten art movement terms.

7. Pop art:

Top Ten Art Movement Terms

Pop art is an art movement that emerged in the United Kingdom and the United States during the mid- to late-1950s. The movement presented a challenge to traditions of fine art by including imagery from popular and mass culture. For instance advertising, comic books and even mundane mass-produced objects. In conclusion it has made its spot in the Top Ten Art Movement Terms.

8. Post-impressionism:

Top Ten Art Movement Terms

Post-Impressionism is a predominantly French art movement that developed roughly between 1886 and 1905.  The movement emerged as a reaction against Impressionism and its concern for the naturalistic depiction of light and color. Post-Impressionists both extended Impressionism while rejecting its limitations: the artists continued using vivid colors, a thick application of paint and real-life subject matter, but were more inclined to emphasize geometric forms, distort forms for an expressive effect and use unnatural and seemingly random colors. The foremost of these were Cézanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Matisse, Picasso, and Braque.

9. Romanticism:

Romanticism (also known as the Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe. And its time period is towards the end of the 18th century, in most areas being its peak in the period from 1800 to 1850. So, romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism as well as glorification of all the past and nature. The term was partly a reaction to the Industrial Revolution, the aristocratic social and also the political norms of the Age of Enlightenment. And above all, it was embodied strongly in the visual arts, music, and literature. But also had a major impact on historiography, education, chess, social sciences, and the natural sciences.

10. Surrealism:

Top Ten Art Movement Terms

Surrealism was a cultural movement which developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I. And the movement is best known for its visual artworks and writings and the juxtaposition of distant realities. In addition to this, it acts to activate the unconscious mind through the imagery. And Artists have painted unnerving, illogical scenes, sometimes with photographic precision, creating strange creatures from everyday objects. So, according to leader André Breton, its aim was to “resolve the previously contradictions of dream and reality into an absolute reality. Sometimes a super-reality”, or even a surreality.

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