Frequently Asked Questions - Glossary

descriptive of artwork in which the realistic depiction of objects ranges from secondary to non-existent; exaggerated (abstracted) to emphasize emotion rather than visual reality; Impressionism was the first major step into Abstraction and a critical break; with Realism. Most Non-Objective artwork is based upon the assumption that a work of art is worth looking at primarily because it presents a composition or organization of color, line, light, and shade.

a person in charge of collecting and cataloguing archives; A place or collection containing records, documents, or other materials of historical interest.

Limited-edition prints, exclusively for the artist's own use or sale. They are marked A/P and typically are not numbered.

A three-dimensional art object usually constructed from a variety of common materials and found objects material to make art works; creative idea that caught on midway thru the mid 20th century.

A work of art that claims and is verifiably true to it's origin; original, not counterfeit or copied. In traditional African art the distinction is often made between authentic art made for cultural, religious and other social purposes and commercial art which is made primarily for sale.

1. Art made by any person of African descent without regard to the form, genre or medium. 2.An object of any medium that is inspired directly or indirectly from African American culture, history and/or experience without regard to the ethnic origin of its creator.

A technique of creating a visual two-dimensional image from photographs, torn and cut sheets of paper from newspapers, magazines and other printed papers; paint and other media may be employed. Reference Romare Bearden and Sam Middleton.

A person in charge of maintaining or restoring valuable items, as in a museum or library. One that conserves or preserves from injury, violation, or infraction; a protector.

Usually taken to mean works of art produced since 1960.

A nonobjective school of painting and sculpture developed in the early 1900s; modern art movement focused on exploring relationships between images, perspectives and materials. Cubism opened the door to Abstraction and was so revolutionary to western art that it has been compared to the Italian Renaissance. Cubism began in Paris, France where leading figures were Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque. The term 'Cubist' was a derisive description of a geometric landscape painting done by Braque in 1908. Picasso's development of cubism stemmed from his great interest in the abstraction he perceived in African tribal masks.

One that manages or oversees a collection; the administrative director of a museum collection or library.

a person who specializes in purchasing and selling art requiring aesthetic, historical and oftentimes pricing evaluation ; A dealer differs from an agent in that a dealer acts as a principal in a transaction. An individual or a firm that buys assets for and sells assets from its own portfolio as opposed to bringing buyers and sellers together. In practice, many dealers operate as broker-dealers and perform both services depending on the market conditions and on the size, type, and security involved in a particular transaction. Dealers are sometimes able to offer investors better prices.

Art that represents recognizable images of nature and objects. Often referred to as realism and the opposite of abstract art.

A term traditionally applied to visual expression that is created for aesthetic significance and distinct from craft, which has practical use. The modern notion of 'fine art' can demonstrate works as intellectual rather than a manual skill. Fine art is often used to distinguish those artists who are formally trained from those who are self taught. The distinction between fine art and craft or folk art is increasingly blurred since the latter can also be a matter of intellectual expression and skill.

A term which is commonly used interchangeably with outsider, nave, primitive and self-taught art. Art originating among the common people of a nation or region and usually reflecting their traditional culture.

A building or other physical space for the exhibition of artistic work. An establishment that displays and sells works of art.

A literary and artistic movement that flourished in Harlem, New York, in the mid and late 1920s. Among it members were the painters Aaron Douglas (1899-1979), Romare Bearden (1914-1988) and Jacob Lawrence (1917-2000). Though Harlem is notable for this golden period of creativity among African Americans, many other cities across the nation experienced a simultaneous "renaissance" during this time.

A edition of a specific number of prints, each one numbered and marked. Thus 7/50 means the 7th print out of a limited number of 50.

A printing process in which the image to be printed is rendered on a flat surface, as on sheet zinc or aluminum, and treated to retain ink while the non-image areas are treated to repel ink.

Art of the 20th century which combines different types of physical material;, the term has traditionally been applied to combined mediums in two-dimensional work such as acrylic and watercolor or gouache and tempera. However, with contemporary artists, especially sculptors, the term is applied to the combining into a single work of art a variety of materials, many of them groundbreaking. Examples of combinations that fall into the newer definition are wood, pebbles, bones, glass, plastic, paper, oil paint, found objects and metals.

As an art-history term focused on a period in western art from the 1860s through the 1970s. The word is difficult to define because it embraced the state of mind of being non-traditional, which meant that a variety of styles came under the label.. When Modernism came to America, it was shaped by much of what was going on in Europe, especially with Impressionism at the turn of the 19th Century.

A print where the artist originates the image to be printed using a printmaking technique rather than a reproduction of an already existing painting or image.

An acronym for Works Progress Administration.; the WPA was a federal program established with a budget of thirty-five million dollars by the U.S. government in August 1935 during the Depression. The program, which lasted until April 1943, provided employment for millions of people including artists under its division called Federal Arts Project.