Understanding Art

If you do wish to start art collecting you are, in all probability, fairly well versed in some aspects of art history, theory, the art market and...

Iconography is both used to refer to the art-historical study of symbols within art and the practice of producing and receiving (viewing or praying...

The Renaissance period (from the 15th to 16th Century) is characterised by high innovation within both the arts and sciences. In terms of the...

The role of the artist and the collector is possibly the least defined of all of the central roles that play a part in the art-world. The collector...

Along with a host of clichés that make up popular (particularly filmic) presentations of the artist is the image of the starving artist being taken...

Philosopher Theodor Adorno (b. 1903; d. 1969) saw art as both inextricably linked to society and separate from it. This double character of art is...

Art has no discernible first date. There is no first painting or sculpture as such. However it is possible to argue that art has a quite discernible...

An interesting thing about money is the way in which its relationship to us is completely upturned in relation to reality. Take for example a £5 bank...

The relationship between the artist and the gallery is perhaps the longest standing artist/institution relationship in art’s brief history (the...

The answer to the question ‘What is Art?’ is difficult to discern from a mere survey of all of the objects – and indeed concepts – that are grouped...

Modernism as a term refers both to a specific period in history and to particular impulse. As a period in history, modernism is largely agreed to...

Postmodernism is the period that we are in now, provided you are of the opinion that Modernism has actually ended (more about that later)! Whereas...