Tuesday, July 12, 2011

The Introduction Of Mixed Media Art

By Clara Berta


Everything we know nowadays as mixed media art began in early twentieth century, when artists in search of an alternative to the things they saw as hidebound academicism began including things as well as images that were not regarded as art materials in their works. Examples of everyday materials being included in ceremonial or aesthetic objects are available dating back to prehistory, however, these were made with various intentions, and provided an extremely different social purpose than the objects referred to as "art."

In the year 1912, Picasso incorporated a chair caning into one of his many works. While this act would seem tame these days, it was actually quite radical at that time, when the idea of art needed a removal from the day-to-day world. By linking the divide between reality and paint, Picasso helped to bring on a time of radical change in art, when rules were trashed and materials of all kinds started to be seen as capable of turning into art. Five years later, in 1917, Marcel Duchamp exhibited a urinal in an art show. Regardless of whether he was trying to make the point that all things are art, or that not a single thing art, has been the subject of debate ever since. Duchamp's uncovering of the "readymade," as he named the urinal as well as other objects that he chose, removed the line between art and life more completely than Picasso had done.

In the 1920s, members of the Dada movement involved newspapers, detritus off the street, as well as pieces of wood, dressmakers' dummies and many other things in their artwork. Although Dada was a self-proclaimed anti-art movement, their continuation of Picasso's and Duchamp's usage of "non-art" things in the artistic context served to promote the creation of mixed-media art, inducing the continuation, rather than the destruction, of art.

In the 1950s, Arman became very flourishing as an artist primarily by assembling many things in just one place. His signature style was a bunch of objects like wrenches, cutlery or shoes contained inside a plexiglass box. Many have viewed his art as either a condemnation or a celebration of mass consumption, the true beauty of it being it could be either. In the 1960s, Jean Tinguely built sculptures out of bits of steel and other metals, found things as well as gears. The distinguishing feature of Tinguely's creations was that they were animated and self-destroying. When Tinguely had finished a work, he'd organize a performance to which hundreds of individuals would come and watch his chaotic creations break themselves into oblivion.

Mixed media art is any form of art that combines two or more mediums in a single work. Assemblages and collages are varieties of mixed media which have been widely used in the twenty-first century. The combination of painting media such as oil, acrylic and watercolour in a single work has become a popular practice among artists. The combination of various drawing media, along with the mixture of drawing with media like painting, is yet another common form of mixed media art. The combination of printmaking techniques, like lithography and woodcuts, has a long history, and advancements in technology have motivated printmakers to experiment with mixing conventional techniques with digital printing as well as photography.




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