ococo and Neo-Classical
Two styles became very popular in Europe during the 1700s. One, the ococo style was characterized by fluidity, asymmetry, and the extremely ornate. This style would come to dominate France during the period and stretch out across Europe and into ussia. ococo has come to mean "busy" in the modern vernacular and seem a criticism but at the time, this was just what fashionable people wanted. Homes were decked out with intricately scrolled metal works, porcelain figures, frills and laces, and exquisitely designed furniture. The other was the Neoclassical style. This was inspired by ancient art and architecture of Western Culture, such as the Greeks and omans. Whereas many of the period thought of Neoclassism as the anti-ococo, they both took inspiration from ancient styles.

Examples of ococo-style architecture include the Queluz National Palace in Portugal, one of the last ococo-style buildings to be constructed in Europe. These buildings,….

This painting shows the philosopher, unjustly condemned to die for his beliefs by the government, as a kind of pagan saint, statue-like and stoic in his beliefs and powerful and noble in the dark, stark anatomical shadings of the work. David's Death of Marat (1793) shows the French Revolutionary hero as a kind of political saint.
One interesting contrast between the rococo and the neoclassical is the period's differing depictions of women. In the rococo, the female was often central as an object of ornamental desire. Rococo celebrated femininity, the feminine form and a color palate that enhanced the delicacy of its subjects. Even its male rococo subjects were often highly feminized. hen neoclassical works depicted women, in contrast, they tended to be idealized representations of freedom, as in the case of Marianne in the symbolic, bare-breasted depiction of Delacroix's Liberty Leading the People (1830). "It shows the allegorical figure….

The most famous genre painting by David is undoubtedly the Death of Marat (1793) which depicts French radical Jean-Paul Marat slumped over in his bathtub while holding a letter which he obviously was writing just before being killed by Charlotte Corday. The overall narrative of this painting -- the knife/murder weapon lying on the floor, the entry wound just above Marat's heart, his right arm draped over the edge of the bathtub and the writing quill and inkwell -- are all intentionally and vividly placed details intended to "sharpen the sense of pain and social outrage" over the murder of Marat, considered as one of the pivotal rebel leaders of the French Revolution. Clearly, David the artist was attempting to illustrate his own personal feelings concerning the social decay of French culture under King Louis XVI and how rebels like Marat are not exempt from the violence of human nature,….

aroque vs. Rococo
The aroque style in art dates its earliest manifestations to the later years of the 16th century, when the Catholic Church launched the Counter-Reformation. Faced with the growing wave of simple, unsophisticated art style promoted by Protestantism and the Reform, the Catholic Church opposed an opulent style, full of richness and grandeur. In architecture, for example, the constructions dating from the aroque period are richly decorated, statues, sculptures, paintings, all gathered to meet the final scope of the aroque style: achievement of a structure meant to bring forward the glory of the Church. As the aroque swept into other countries, such as France, it gave way to memorable architectural realizations, such as Versailles, used to express royal glory. aroque predominated in Catholic countries, including here Flanders with the perfect Rubens expression, but never gained ground in Protestant countries such as Holland or England, where at that time, the….

This structure contains a colonnaded dome, a Neoclassical version like that found at St. Peter's in Rome. However, although the entire building, both inside and out, reflects the Roman style, it is essentially Gothic. Another example is the Virginia State House in Richmond, designed by Thomas Jefferson (1743 to 1826) which resembles a Roman temple and is based on Jefferson's "admiration for the pure beauty of antiquity and as a symbol of an idealized Roman Republic government." 6 a prime example of sculpture from this period can be found in the works of Antonio Canova (1757 to 1822), specifically his Pauline Borghese as Venus (1808) which shows "the victorious Venus personified as the goddess of love with all of her voluptuousness and exquisite beauty" and recalls the earlier Rococo style when important women of society were often represented as semi-nude goddesses. 7
After 1750, another new style of artistic expression….

William Blake's works included writings and illustrations, some of which were a bit moody and gothic, which also characterized this era. It was a time of modernization, when the opulence of the past simply did not seem relevant or even desirable any more, and it again illustrates just how different eras and ideas about society and money can alter art and artists' works. Art mirrors society and society's interests, which is why it has always changed through time, and will continue to do so.
eferences

2007). The restored hall of mirrors revealed to the public. etrieved from the Chateau Versailles Web site: http://www.chateauversailles.fr/fr/Panoramiques/Pano_GG_b1500.htm27 July 2007.

Blake, W. (2007). Infant joy (From Songs of Innocence). etrieved from the Mark Harden Artchive Web site: http://www.artchive.com/artchive/B/blake/blake_songs_25.jpg.html27 July 2007.

Fuseli, H. (2007). Satan starting from the touch of Ithuriel's spear. etrieved from the Tate Britain Museum Web site: http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/exhibitions/gothicnightmares/infocus/satanspear.htm#t27 July 2007.

Harden, M. ococo. etrieved from the Mark….

cultural movements of European art after the Renaissance, namely those style periods of Mannerism, Baroque, and Rococo. In the late sixteenth century, Mannerism was a unique artistic technique that made use of distortions of scale and viewpoint. The Baroque movement in art and architecture enhanced Europe between the early seventeenth and middle eighteenth centuries as it emphasized dramatic and at times tense affects. The Baroque artists and sculptures consistently used very bold, curving forms, and extremely elaborate ornamentation. However, unlike Mannerism, they emphasized balance of incongruent parts. The Baroque musicians of the period also flourished throughout Europe and were known for their expressive dissension and complex embellishment of tones. Rococo, which originated early in eighteenth century France and may be considered by some experts as merely an extension of the Baroque movement, was an artistic approach used to create beautiful architecture and art works that were often based on….

According to Henry a. Millon, the sparkling gaiety of this style "was cultivated by a new age associated with the regency that followed upon the death of Louis XIV and then with the reign of Louis XV," meaning that these two French kings and their opulent lifestyles highly influenced the art that came about during the beginning and middle years of the 18th century in Europe (156).
Essentially, the Rococo is an interior style or, in other words, pertains mostly to the decoration of objects designed for the interior of palaces and royal residencies. As compared to the art of the aroque Era, that of the Rococo style is far removed from religious and national influences. Architecturally, one of the best examples of the Rococo style can be found in the Rococo room of the Salon de la Princesse at the Hotel de Soubise in Paris, decorated by Germain offrand….

David, Napoleon in His Study
The Emperor Napoleon in His Study at the Tuileries is an 1812 painting done by Jacques-Louis David. It is not just a normal painting but it is vertical in format, plus displays Napoleon standing, three-quarters life size, dressed in the uniform of a colonel of the Imperial Guard Foot Grenadiers that showed of this blue with white facings and flashy red cuffs. Napoleon also wears his Legion d'honneur and Order of the Iron Crown features, alongside with gold epaulettes, white stockings and French-style culottes. Also, his face is rotated towards the spectator and his right hand placed inside his jacket. However, it is undoubtedly a portrait that is a political vacuum following the French Revolution. However, in this essay, this portrait of Napoleon will compared to Madame Bergeret by Boucher and then the difference between the portrayal of men and women will be discussed.

hen it comes….

art is changed by the changes that occur in political culture. The writer presents examples and contrasts two of the following areas Baroque, ococo, Neoclassicism, and omanticism and argues the point of how the eras drive changes in artwork. In addition the writer devotes two pages to comparing three works of famous artists.
Art has always been influenced by the masses. Political culture, and change have been driving forces behind the changes in art that history has witnessed. When political and cultural changes occur it is generally because of changing attitudes of those who live in the era and drive those changes. This extrapolates to changes in many things including taste in artwork. Two periods in history provide classic examples of such change occurring and being directly related to political and cultural changes that were taking place in society during the time.

The Neoclassical period and the omantic era are both….

Art of classical antiquity, in the ancient cultures of Greece and ome, has been much revered, admired, and imitated. In fact, the arts of ancient Greece and ome can be considered the first self-conscious and cohesive art movements in Europe. Style, form, execution, and media were standardized and honed to the point where aesthetic ideals were created and sustained over time. The art of classical antiquity in Greece and ome reverberated throughout history, impacting the art of subsequent eras in Europe. In fact, there can be no absolute "neoclassical" era in art history because of the way neoclassicism evolved throughout the centuries since the fall of the oman Empire. The arts of the enaissance borrowed heavily from classical antiquity, as can be seen in enaissance icons such as Michelangelo's David. Some suggest that medieval art pays homage to classical antiquity, even if the quotations from classical Greek and ome are….

ather, the vines and clusters f grapes on the tree give the piece its true softness and roundness. This is mirrored by the effect of the figures' hair. Both faun and children all possess curling flowing ringlets that seem to hang as loosely as do the grapes, emphasizing a sense of liberty in the work.
The sense of softness and liberty bestowed upon the piece by the line and texture is oddly juxtaposed with the impressions created by other elements of Bacchanal: A Faun Teased by Children. Most obviously, the piece is composed in a way that makes the faun's posture seem unnaturally contorted, as if the scene has moved beyond teasing and into torment. The extreme angle of the head and neck, especially with the backwards-arcing back, evince more of a struggle to get away than the softer elements of the sculpture suggest. The same is true of the….

Metropolitan Museum of Art: The Love Letter
This paper examines the piece The Love Letter, created in 1770 by Jean -- Honore Fragonard. The painting consists of oil on canvas and is 32 3/4 x 26 3/8 in. (83.2 x 67 cm) and originates in France. The painting was originally part of a series of decorative panels which were commissioned by Madame du Barry, one of the loves of Louis XV, for her house which was located at Louveciennes. However, once the panels were finished, she rejected them as being unsuitable for her tastes. This painting was executed before the entire series as a pitch to acquire her commission. The Love Letter in many ways is characteristic of Fragonard's style as a whole: it has warm and muted coloring with a strong eroticism which is present, though somewhat hidden. Fragonard is one who made an entire career from portraying the eroticism….

(269)
It would seem that the artists and the press of the era both recognized a hot commodity when they saw one, and in this pre-Internet/Cable/Hustler era, beautiful women portrayed in a lascivious fashion would naturally appeal to the prurient interests of the men of the day who might well have been personally fed up with the Victorian morals that controlled and dominated their lives otherwise. In this regard, Pyne (2006) reports that, "hen scandalized critics attacked Rodin's nudes, Camera ork defended the drawings by a strategy of veiling the body with the soul, praising them as 'the perception of the mystery of surfaces.... The adventure of the mind in matter... The divinizing of the sensual and the materializing of the sensuous.' Stieglitz thus used a histlerian gloss of shadows and music to mystify the eroticism of Rodin's 'pagan' figures" (44).

The portrayal of women was even regarded as a measure….

The painting captures a very specific kind of aristocratic pastoral leisure, and it accomplishes this by insinuating a number of activities without actually showing them. Firstly, while Mr. Andrews holds his gun, he does so comfortably as he leans against a bench, seemingly indifferent to the prospect of hunting. Mrs. Andrews holds a quill, but she is not paying attention to whatever she might be writing, instead choosing to glance up at the reader. The wheat and penned animals insinuate the work of a farm, but the wheat has already been collected, thus further imbuing the image with a sense of relaxation and leisure. Because it is first and foremost a portrait, the painting serves to portray its main characters as hardworking yet not at all focused on the work itself, but rather the enjoyment that comes from its completion. Furthermore, the characters' relationship with nature is a complex one,….