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Baroque
Baroque was an art movement which was known for exaggeration the motiom of subjects and used clear details to produce drama, tension and gradeur in a sculpture or painting. Baroque however did not restrict itself to art itself, instead it went beyond to influence literature, dance, theater and music. In art, Baroque upheld a style which featured extreme lighting, intense emotions and release from traditional restraints. The art produced would uphold the splendor of religion. -
Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) - Baroque Artist
Rubens was a German Baroque painter who helped push the extravagent style of the Baroque movement, which emphasized movement, colour and emotion. Many of his works were nide portraits which depicted various biblical and mythological men and women. His nudes emphasiezed the concepts of fertility, desire and physical beauty and the women were probably created to appeal to his large male dominated audience. -
Caravaggio (1571-1610) - Baroque Artist
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio as an Italian painter who had an influence on the Baroque style of painting. His works became popular due to the Tenebrism technique he used - which used a darker pallette and shadows to drastically emphasize the lighter areas in the piece. Caravaggio's works combined observations of both the physical and emotional human state to create a realistic painting - these would help to influence the Baroque painting style. -
Rembrandt (1606-1669) - Baroque Artist
Rembrandt Harmenszoon vsn Rijn was a Dutch painter and etcher and is also considered one of the greatest painters and printmakers in European art. Throught his carrer, Rembrandt chose his primary themes of portraiture, lanscape and narrative painting. His is most synonymous with his narrative biblical paintings and for the fine, smooth technique used in these imaginative works. Rembrandt had a delicate attention to detail, a tendency to create mood by using strong contrasts of light and shadow. -
King James Bible Published
The King James BIble is an English translation of the Chirstian Bible for the Church of England. The books of the King James Version include 39 books of the Old Testament and 27 books of the New Testament. After its publication in England, 1611, it has become the most preferred version of the Bible to date. -
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Thirty Years' War
The Thirty Year's War was intially a war between various Protestant and Catholic states which would break up the Holy Roman Empire. However, the war gradually dissolved into a general conflict involving most of the great powers within Europe. This war was purely based on different religious beliefs rather than political beliefs, as during the 17th Century religion held a larger influence on the average person compared to today. -
Mayflower Arrives in America
The Mayflower was the first ship to transport the first English Pilgrims into the New World (today's America). The ship held 102 passengers and around 30 crew members. The passengers on the ship would become the first people that would colonise America. -
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English Civil War
The English Civil War was a series of conflicts between Parliamentarians (those who wanted Parliament to rule England), and Royalists (those who believed only the King could govern England) over the manner of England's government. The war ended with a Parliamentarian victory at the Battle of Worcester on 3rd September 1651. As a result King Charles I was executed, his son Charles II was exiled, and the monarchy was replaced with parliament and eventually Oliver Cromwell's personal rule. -
Charles II crowned King
After the death of Oliver Cromwell, the Puritan Parliament invited the exiled Charles II to return from France. The restoration of the monarchy and the coronation of Charles II resulted in public joy through the country. Charles' reign would be known for its over extravagence and richness, a stark contrast to the plain Puritan rule that had occurred under Oliver Cromwell -
Influence of Baroque
Baroque art allowed for a new subject of painting to come out and become popular, rather than show the moment before an event - Baroque artists chose the moment where the action actually occurred in order to create emotion and movement. Caravaggio's intense use of the technique Tenebrism showed other emerging artists that they could create mood by using shadows to highlight light areas. The extravagence of the later Baroque style gradually paved the way to the more decoartive style of Rococo. -
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American Revolution
The American Revolution was a political upheaval during which colonists in the American Colonies rejected the British Monarchy and its rule over the New World and declared independance - resulting in the founding of the United States of America. -
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Romanticism
Romanticism was an artistic and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th Century. Romanticism put a stress on strong emotions, the imagination and freedom from the classical ideas of form in art. The movement first showed itself in lanscape paintings, around the early 1760's, where Birtish artists began to paint wilder landscapes, storms and Gothic architecture. Once it reached France, the subject began to focus on current events, rather than mythology. -
J.M.W Turner (1775-1851) - Romantic Artist
J.M.W Turner was an English landscape painter who is now regarded as the aritst who elevated the view of lanscape painting to rival that of historical paintings. Turner was also considered one of the greatest masters of British watercolour landscape paintings. Turners style was often characterised by a chromatic palette and broadly applied washes of paint to create atmosphere. This style was applied to his usual subjects of shipwrecks, fires and natural phenomena such as storms and sunlight. -
Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840) - Romantic Artist
Caspar Friedrich was a Germian lanscape painter and considered the most important German artist of his generation. Friederich is best known for his muted landscapes which typically featured figures silhouetted against night skies, mists, trees or gothic ruins. He was heavily influenced by nature and worked to convey an emotional response to the natural world. -
Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) - Romantic Artist
Delacroix was a French Romatic artist, who from the outset of his career was known as the leader of the French Romantic School. He took his inspiration from the art of Rubens and painters from the Venetian Renaissance - which influenced his emphais on colour and movement rather than the clarity of a form. Delacroix often romantised content, and was inspired by the exotic country of Africa and the works of Lord Byron. -
Invention of the Steam Powered Printing Press
German printer, Friedrich Koenig, created an improved printing press. The press itself was a basic hand press which was connected to a new invented steam engine. The result of which meant that the machines could create several prints at once and at a higher speed - which would improve productivity. Koenig eventaully went on to improve the model, allowing both sides of the page to be printed at once. -
Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was fought near Waterloo in present-day Belgium between a French army, under the command of Napoleon Bonaparte, and a English-led army, under the command of the Duke of Wellington. The battle resulted in a victory for the Duke of Wellington and his allies, and the end of Napoleon Bonaparte's reign of the Emperor of France. -
First Photograph Taken
The first photgraphy was taken by Nicephore Niepce, a french inventor. The photographs were taken of a real world scene, a view from Niepce's window, using a camera obscura - taking over 6 hours to develop the picture. -
Influence of Romanticism
The impact of Romanticism upon the arts has been immense. The echoes of emotional intensity and the smallness of man in the natural world are often seen in today’s contemporary work, where concerns about the environment and the need to appreciate it shine through. Romantics also embraced the foreign and the exotic, which led to an interest in the far reaching countries and in Orientalism. Romantic artists helped position landscape paintings as a viable major aspect within Western art. -
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Impressionism Movement
Impressionism began in France during the 19th Century and was based on the idea of painting outdoors and on the spot. By doing this impressionists found that they captured the momentary and gradual effects of the sunlight by working quickly. As a result of working quickly to capture a single moment in the landscape, brushwork became rapid and broken into small dabs to suggest the fleeting quality of light. The preffered subjects of the impressionists were landscapes and scenes of the everyday. -
Edouard Manet (1832-1883) - Impressionist Artist
Manet was a French painter and considered a pivotal figure in helping art move from Realism to Impressionism. His works were based on the composition of light and shadow, as well as a constricted pallette. Manet also preferred painting directly from the model/scene rather than in a studio and from a series of sketches. Unlike the rest of the main Impressionist group, Manet believed that modern artists should still exhibit in the Paris Salon rather than at independant exhibitions. -
Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919) - Impressionist Artist
Renoir was a French painter and another of the leading painters who helped develop the Impressionist style. Renoir's works routinely showed a celebration of female beauty and sensuality, with nude females being one of his primary subjects. His paintings are known for their vibrant, saturated colour and intense light. In the Impressionist style, Renoir would only suggest the detail of the scene with spontaneous touches of colour so his figures would fuse with one another. -
Claude Monet (1840-1926) - Impressionist Artist
Claude Monet was a French painter and one of the founders of Impressionist painting. His works are also considered the most consistent in terms of expressing the movement's ideas of showing an artist's perceptions about nature. Monet wanted to constantly document the French countryside, which led him to painting the same scene repeatedly in order to capture the changing of the light and the passing of the seasons. -
Invention of Dynamite
Dynamite was invented by Alfred Nobel and was the world's first safely manageable explosive. Nobel originally intended for dynamite to be used as a way of blasting rock away, however he was horrified when he relised others were beginning to use it for more malicious means. -
Arthur MacKmurdo (1851-1942) - Arts and Crafts Designer
MacKmurdo was an english architect, designer and a forerunner of the English Arts and Crafts movement. His most notable work were his plans for the Savoy Hotel, London, but he also built 12 privates houses - including 25 Cadogan Gardens. In 1882, he founded the Century Guild of Artists, the guild was based upon the teachings of William Morris, and it aimed to prodcue better quality furniture and decorative accessories than were currently commericially available. -
First Impressionist Exhibiton
The first impressionist exhibition took place between 15th April and 15th May 1874, in Paris. The exhibition displayed 165 works from 30 artists, including Monet, Degas, Renour and Pissarro. The works were displayed in photographer Nadar's former studio, which allowed the moderness of the building to bring out the modern, contemporary paintings inside. Louis Leroy, an art critic, entitled his review "Exhibtion of Impressionists" meaning to discredit their work, instead he gave them an identity. -
Gustav Stickley (1858-1942) - Arts and Crafts Designer
Gustav Stickley was an American entrepreneur, designer and furniture manufacturer, who defined the Arts and Crafts Movement in America. Although Stickley was fully subscribed and worked by the Arts and Crafts ideals, his approach was more commercially aware. He founded the Craftsman Workshops, 1898, for the production of furniture, metal work and textiles. In 1901, Stickley began to publish The Craftsman - a magazine in which he illustrated his own and other designs of affordable homes. -
Invention of the Telephone
After several years of experimenting, Alexander Graham Bell succeeds in the invention of the practical telephone -
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Arts and Crafts Movement
The Arts and Crafts movements began in Britain around 1880 and quickly spread to other continents such as America and Asia, the movement itself was considered one of the most influential design movements of the modern times. The movement grew out of a concern for the effects of industrialisation - therefore the focus was placed on the rebirth of traditional handicrafts and an improvement in the design of ordinary and domestic objects. -
Influence of Impressionism
Impressionism was able, through spontaneously painting in the open, to set new standards on how artists saw and would depict nature. Post Impressionism began to evolve off of Impressionism, developing slightly different presets for colour, pattern, form and line. -
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Post Impressionism Movement
Post-Impressionism incorporates a wide range of distinct styles that all share the singular motivation of responding to the naturalism and look of the Impressionist movement. Post Impressionist art rejects the natural conventions and limitations of the Impressionist Movement. The artists involved continued using vivid colour palettes and real life subjects but they also placed an emphasis on abstract qualities or symbolic content. -
Paul Cezanne (1839-1906) - Post Impressionist Artist
Paul Cezanne was a French painter who was considered the first artist to mark the transition away from the conventions of Impressionism. He considered the study of nature essential to painting but wasn't concerned with representing his subject matter in a realistic way. Cezanne's works embraced being vigorous and expressive, he used a thick Impasto style to apply the paint - because of the way he applied his paint Cezanne was able to suggest various moods and his own emotions within the piece. -
Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) - Post Impressionist
Vincent van Gogh was a Dutch painter who helped create the Post Impressionist style. Van Gogh painted from nature, like the Impressionist ancestors before him, but developed an extremely personal use and style of colour and brushwork which would correspond with his emotional response to the subject he was viewing and his mental state at the time. Like Cezanne, Van Gogh used the Impasto technique vigorously and also squeezed paint directly onto the canvas in order to put across his emotions. -
Paul Gauguin (1848-1903) - Post Impressionist
Paul Gauguin was an amateur post-impressionist painter who was key in influencing modern artitsts such as Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse. Gauguin retained the intense light and colour used in Impressionist art but rejected creating works with a natural subject - instead he painted from imaginary subject matter. His experiments with colour led to the influence of the Synthetist style of Modern Art. -
Creation of The Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society
The Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society was formed in London in 1887 to promote the exhibitions which contained decorative arts alongside the traditional fine arts. Its exhbitions were held annually at the New Gallery, Regent Street, between 1888-90 and every three years after that. These exhibtions proved to be influential in making the decorative arts more mainstream and more accessible to the general public. -
Invention of Motion Picture
Many films were seen via storefront spaces or within travelling exhibitions. A film would be under a minute long and would usually present a single scene in black and white and with no sound. -
William Morris (1834-1896) - Arts and Crafts Designer
William Morris was an English painter, designer, poet and social reformer - he is most notable known for being the leader of the Arts and Crafts movement. Morris held the view that art should be both beautiful and functional. In holding this view, he also rejected the "opulence" surrounding the Victorian era and urged a return to older costoms of design, craftsmanship and community. -
Psychology - Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud was a psychologist who become popular around the turn of the 20th century. He founded the method of psychoanalysis - a method for treating mental illness through dialogue between the patient and the doctor. Around the time of Post-Impressionism, Freud was looking at Case Studies which he believed the cause were due to either the Oedipus/Electra Complex. -
Marie and Pierre Curie win Nobel Prize
Marie and Pierre Curie shared the Nobel Prize for Physics for their work on radioactivity. -
Invention of Powered Flight
Wilbur and Orville Wright made the first controlled, sustained flight of a powered aircraft. The test flight lasted only 12 seconds and covered 120 feet, just four miles south of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. -
Influence of Post Impressionism
Cezanne's idea that the simplest geometrical shapes form the underlying structure of any subject linked Post Impressionism to the new and growing Cubism Movement. This idea helped to influence the geometric styles of Matisse and Pablo Picasso. The focus of the importance of the individual (both the artist and viewer) and the way the artist expressed emotion onto canvas helped to shape the ideas of the Expressionist Movement. -
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Cubism Movement
The Cubism Movement was an attempt to bring life to the exhausted traditions of Western Art. The Cubists broke centuries of tradition by rejecting the idea of a single viewpoint, instead they used a system in which 3D subjects were fragmented and reconstructed from several different view points simultaneously. -
Georges Braque (1882-1963) - Cubist
Braque began to become most influenced by the works of the late Paul Cezanne, as his works were exhibited in Paris for the first time in 1907. Compared to Picasso, Braque exhibted a freer style of Cubism, intensifying the chosen colour palette and using a looser style of rending objects. -
Juan Gris (1887-1927) - Cubist
Juan Gris was a Spanish painter and sculptor who was closely linked to the Cubism movement. Among the handful of well known Cubist artists, Gris are the most distinctive and unique in comparison, as his works were painted with bright harmonious colours in new combinations. Originally Gris painted in the style of Analytical Cubism but after 1913 he began moving towards Synthetic Cubism with him extensively using collage with his preferences for order and clarity still underlying it all. -
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) - Cubist
Pablo Picasso was a spanish painter and printmaker who is known for being the co-founder of the Cubist Movement. Picasso's work is often categorized into several periods; the Blue Period, Rose Period, African-Influenced Period, Analytic Cubism and Synthetic Cubism. In an attempt to revitalise the Cubism Movement in 1912, Picasso began pasting printed images onto the surface of his still lifes - the first example of collaging. -
Manet and the Post-Impressionists Exhibition
This exhibition focused on the work of Cezanne, Vang Gogh, and Gauguin, who were considered the leaders of the Post Impressionism Movement. However the exhibition also wanted to represent the most recent Post Impressionist artists, Matisse and Picasso. By the time of the exhibition in 1910, many art critics were still trying to understand the Impressionism movement of Monet and Renoir, the new exhibition which was rejecting Impressionism as old fashioned confused even the most sympathetic. -
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First World War
With the assination of Archduke Ferdinand of Austria by a Serbian, Gavrilo Princip, in Sarajevo - leading to a diplomatic crisis between Austra-Hungary and Serbia. It was the first and largest global war in history, with more than 70 million military personnel being used to serve and defend their respective country. Over the four years the war lasted over 16 million people died as a direct result of the fighting. -
Influence of Arts and Crafts Movement
Arts and Crafts went on to heavily influence of movements such as Bauhaus and Modernism, movements that followed their belief in the simplicity of design and that a piece could looked aesthetically pleasing without alot of detail. Both of these movements also followed in the beliefs that a piece of artwork should be afforded be the general public. -
Women win the right to vote in New Zealand
Prior to World War One women had only been granted the right to vote in Australia (1902), Finland (1906) and Norway (1913). Even in Britain, where the monarch was female, woman could not vote or serve in Parliament -
Russian Revolution
After the events of the First World War, an outcry was firected at Tsar Nicholas II. After their entry into the war, Russia was deprived of major trade and there was a large disruption in agriculture - which lead to starvation. In order to fund the war, the government was printed out more money than needed - therefore inflation occured and no one but the rich could afford the neccessities. The revolution led to the dismantling of the royal family and to the rise of the Sovient Union. -
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Art Deco Movement
The term Art Deco refers to a movement and spanned the boom of the roaring 1920's and the low of the Depression-ridden 1930's. Art Deco works exhibit aspects of Cubism, Constructivism and Futurism - with abstraction, distortion and simplification, along with intense colours - celebrating the rise of commerce and technology. The style was deeply patriotic and thus quickly spread across the globe from New York to Shanghai. -
Prohibtion begins in the United States.
Prohibition was a period of American history in which for 14 years the manufacture, sale and transportation of liquor was made illegal. Although the period is often glamourised by gangsters and the wealthy, even the average American broke the law. Prohibition marks the first and only time an Amendment to the U.S. Constiution was repealed. -
Psychology - "Little Albert" - Proving Classical Conditioning
The Little Albert experiment was a case study designed to test whether a fear response could be taught (Classical Conditioning). After studying that children were innately fearful of loud noises, psychologist Watson decided to see if this response could be transferred to other stimuli that would not normally be feared. This hypothesis was tested on a young boy called Little Albert, and involved making loud noises as the boy viewed fluffy white animals. The test was successful. -
Tomb of King Tut is Discovered
Howard Carter and his sponsor, Lord Carnarvon, spent a number of years searching for any tomb in Egypt's Valley of the Kings. On November 4th, 1922, they discovered an unknown ancient Egyptian tomb that had lain undisturbed for over 3,000 years. The discovery of King Tutankhamun's tomb led to a craze for all things Egyptian and motifs began to appear on clothes, jewellery, fabrics, furniture and architecture. -
Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) - Pop Art
Roy Lichtenstein was an American pop artist, who during the 1960's was the leading figure in the new art movement. His work defined the basic idea of Pop Art, which was using everyday objects and media to produce a parody on popular culture. Lichtenstein's work can easily be identified from other pop artists as his subject matter was based around comic strips which were precise and often had a tongue-in-cheek feel about them. -
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Surrealism Movement
The Surrealist Movement was launched by poet Andre Breton in Paris during 1924. The movement was strongly influenced by the founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud and his theories about the unconcious mind. Due its influences, the aim of the movement was to reveal the artists unconcious and renconcile it with the life around them. There are two types of Surrealism: the oneiric(dream-like and unrealistic imagery) and automatism(a process which allows the unconcious to come out through drawing). -
Max Ernst (1891-1976) - Surrealist Artist
Max Ernst was a German painter, sculptor, graphic artist and a poet, he was also known as being a primary figure of both the Dada and Surrealism movements. He invented two art techniques; frottage, which used the pencil rubbings of objects as a base for an image, and grattage, where paint is scraped across the canvas to reveal imprints of the objects placed underneath. -
Rene Magritte (1898-1976) - Surrealist Artist
Magritte was a Belgian Surrealist artist. His work frequently displayed an assortment of ordinary, commonplace objects in an unusual context - allowing them to acquire a new meaning. Magritte's style is said to evoke mystery and, due to the illusionist nature of his paintings, make the viewer ask what the painting means. -
Influence of Cubism
The movement itself lies at the root of several early 20th Century styles including Constructivism, Futurism, Suprematism, Orphism and De Stijl. Many artists went through a Cubist phase in their development, such as Piet Mondrian who ending up moving and helping push the De Stijl movememt. The ideas of the movement also fed into a more popular phenomena, such as Art Deco design. Later movements such as Minimalism were influenced by the use of the grid within Cubism paintings. -
Jean Dupas (1882-1964) - Art Deco Designer
Jean Dupas was a french painter, post artist and decorator whose work and style perfectly encompasses that of Art Nouveau and Art Deco. Dupas preffered to work on large scale projects so its not suprising that some of his works include the decor of the famous steamships, SS Liberte and SS Ile-de-France. -
The Great Gatsby Published
Written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby was considered the “great American novel”. Although it perfectly encompassed the glamour and style of the 1920’s, the novel was not an instant sensation. Although all 20,870 copies from the first run sold, many copies from the novels second run were left in warehouses until Fitzgerald’s death in 1920. It wouldn’t be until the mid-1940s that a resurgence of interest in The Great Gatsby would occur. -
Pierre Patout (1879-1965) - Art Deco Designer
Pierre Patout was a French architect and designer who was a part of the Art Deco movement and was particularly active during the interwar period. He was responsible for designing the layout and decoration of a number of first-class public spaces on cruise liners. Patout is mainly known for designing the Pavillon de Collectionneur, part of the Hotel d'un Collectioneur exhibit from the 1925 Paris Exhibition. -
Salvador Dali (1904-1989) - Surrealist Artist
Salvador Dali was a Spanish painter who was known for being one of the key figures of the Surrealist Movement. He is best known for his painting "The Persistence of Memory" which showed clocks in various states of melting on a landscape setting. His works contained obvious classical techniques and a sense of realism which contradicted the dreamlike space and imagery Dali created. -
Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann (1879-1933) - Art Deco Designer
Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann was a renowned French Art Deco designer of furniture and interiors. His strongest inspiration came from the classical design elements and craftsmanship found in 18th Century furniture. Ruhlmann would use the basis of this inspiration to create his "precious pieces". These were made of the rarest woods, like Macassar Ebony, and had simple forms with gentle, imperceptible curves. The pieces would be embellished in ivory - giving them a timeless and elegant feel. -
Andy Warhol (1928-1987) - Pop Art
Andy Warhol was an American artist who was considered the most prominent figure within the Pop Art movement.To distinguish himself from other pop artists, Warhol decided to paint subjects tha he loved - for Warhol this was the celebrity. Although he had chosen a signature subject to work on, he focused more on a signature style, slowly removing the handmade look from the process and bringing in assistants to produce mutiple prints and varients for him. -
The Great Depression
The Great Depression, which lasted for 12 years, was a severe economic downtown which was caused by over confidence in the stock market and a drought in stocks that struck the South. After a decade of optimism and prosperity, the United States was thrown into despair on October 29th 1929, as the stock market crashed and the Great Depression begun. As stock prices plummeted, panic struck. It would be the increased production needed for World War II that would finally end. -
Influence of Art Deco
Art Deco, during its time, was a globally popular style and was intergrated into various areas of Art and Design. It was used in a wider range of consumer products such as; automobiles, furniture, china, textiles and clocks. It also heavily influenced architecture and interior design with many examples still being visable today. However, the Art Deco movement never pushed anymore movements due to the austerities imposed by World War II and it was seen as inappropriately luxurious. -
Splitting the Atom
Scientists Ernest Walton and John Cockcroft successfully split a lithium atom's nucleus by bombarding it with highly accelerated protons - more commonly known as "splitting the atom". This event caused both scientists to be the reciepients of the Nobel Prize in Physics, 1951. -
James Rosenquist (1933-) - Pop Art
James Rosenquist is an American artist, and also one of the four protagonists in the Pop Art movement. His origins as a billboard painter meant that, as he began creating works of art, he was able to apply sign-painting techniques in order to set his work apart from other artists. His work is normally large scale, often covering one wall of a room, and incorporates bright, vivid colours alongside the layering of popular imagery which may have no relationship to each other. -
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Second World War
The Second World War was a global war which lasted just over six years. It involved the majority of the world's nations - including all of those considered to be the "great powers". Therefore it is considered the most widespread war in history. The war itself is known for the high levels of civilian death, including the Holocaust, and the strategic bombings of population centres - including the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki- resulting in an estimated 50-85 million fatalies. -
Polaroid Cameras Invented
Polaroid Cameras were a type of camera which used self developing film to create a photgraph shortly after taking the picture. The invention of the commercially viable instant polaroid camera is credited to American scientist Edwin Land who unveilied the model 95 land camera in 1948. -
Nineteen Eighty-Four Published
Ninteen Eighty-Four is a dystopian novel by author George Orwell. The protagonist, Wiston Smith works for the Ministry of Truth, his job is to rewrite past newspaper articles and history books so that they always support the party line. Smith secretly hates the Party, and dreams of rebelling against the leader of the Party, the omnipresent Big Brother. Since its publication, many of its terms and concepts such as Big Brother, Room 101 and 2+2=5 have entered into common use. -
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Pop Art Movement
Pop Art was a movement marked by a fascination with popular culture and reflecting the wealth of a post-war society. Pop Art presented a challenge to the traditions of fine art by including imagery from popular culture such as advertising and news. One of its aims is to use everyday objects and emphasizing their kitschy elements through the use of irony. -
Princess Elizabeth crowned Queen Elizabeth II
During 1951, King George VI's health grew gradually worse and Elizabeth frequently stood in for her father at public events and country visits. In early 1952, Elizabeth and her husband Philip set out for a tour of Australia and New Zealand, via Kenya. During a night at their Kenyan home word arrived of the death of King George and consequently Elizabeth immediately accessended to the throne becoming Queen Elizabeth II -
DNA Structure Discovered
The famous double helix structure we associate with DNA, was identified by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953. Their double helix model was based on a single X-ray diffraction image taken by Rosalind Franklin and Raymond Gosling. -
International Exhibtion of the New Realists
In 1962, the Sidney Janis Gallery organised, what was considered to be, the groundbreaking exhibition for new-to-the-scene American, French, Swiss, Italian and British Pop Art. The show contained fifty four artists, including Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, Peter Blake and James Rosenquist. The New York based show stunned the audience by the sheer size and look of the artwork on display. -
Andy Warhol's First Exhibition
In Los Angeles, California, Warhol held his first exhibition at the Ferus Gallery. The exhibtion soley included 32 paintings of Campell's soup cans - one for every flavour. Warhol sold the set of paintings to the owner of the gallery, Irving Blum, for $1,000. When the Museum of Modern Art acquired it in 1996, the 32 piece set was valued at $15 million. -
Marcus Harvey (1963-) - YBA
Marcus Harvey is an Engish painter and a member of the Youbg British Artists. Harvey did not take part in the Freeze exhibition as he had graduated from Goldsmiths earlier than the others, however Hirst included him in a later exhibition called "Some Went Mad, Some Ran Away" (1994). Harvey's work combines painting, photofraphy and sculpture whilst exploring British Icons in pop culture, the landscape and cultural history. -
Tracey Emin (1963-) - YBA
Tracey Emin is an English contemporary artist who produces work in a variety of media including drawing, paitning, scultpure, neon text and sewn applique. Emin wanted to move away from the convential works which would "only be hung up in rich people's houses" instead she decided to make her work autobiographical and extremely confessional. Although she was linked and a part of the Young British Artists for the best part of 20 years she is now an Academician of the Royal Academy of Arts. -
Damien Hirst (1965-) - YBA
Damien Hirst is a British artist, entrepreneur and art collector, who is the most prominent member of the Young British Artists and is also reportedly the United Kingdom's richest artist. Death is a constant and centeral theme in Damien Hirst's work, and his most famous work is for a series of dead animals being placed into formaldehyde. Although his works are unique, they are often surrounded in controversy and Hirst has been sued for copying other artists ideas several times. -
Influence of Surrealism
The influence of Surrealism does not confine itself to only the art world, instead it effect all subjects of the arts. The influence as a style of art can be found in a variety of modern, contemporary movements such as Pop-Art and Conceptualism and it filtered itself through all contemporary art forms. Some of the major concepts taken on by Post Modernist art, such as the concepts of the Young British Artists, would have fitted perfectly into the dreamlike state of Surrealism. -
Influence of Pop Art
Pop Art has influenced what can be used as a subject, rather than the traditional subjects of portraiture/landscape many artists now choose to create works that are full of commercial products,domestic items and well-known faces. Pop Art has also inspired the aspect of advertisement, the bright colours and graphic lines that are linked with Pop Art, have been used as they bring interest and bring life to the subject. -
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Young British Artists
The label "Young British Artists" is applied to a group of artists who began to exhibit collectively in 1988 and who became known for their openess to materials and processes, shock tactics and entrepreneurial attitude. This label, coined by Michael Corris in Art Forum (1992), turned out to be a powerful and recognisable brand which was known globally and seen as a powerful marketing tool. -
"Freeze" - Damien Hirst Exhibition
Freee was an exhibition organised by Damien Hirst, who was still a student of Goldsmiths Art College. The collaboration of Hirst and other artists intentially imitated the look and atmosphere of Charles Saatchi's first gallery. The exhibition had high production values for something run by students and it helped put the artists in the spotlight. Many of the artists featured would end up being apart of the YBA movement. -
Influence of Young British Artists
Whilst many art galleries now consider the YBA movement "dead", art critics do not consider that the cut off point of their influence to others. What the Young British Artist movement brought to art was the belief that anything you could create could be cosnidered art to someone.
