Владимир Аракин - Практический курс английского языка 3 курс [calibre 2.43.0]

you know about the portrait of Jonathan Buttall ("The Blue Boy")? 12. Who was Sir Joshua Reynolds? What role did he play in the

history of English art? 13. How did Constable and Turner distinguish themselves?

3. Summarize the text in three paragraphs specifying the contribution Gainsborough made to the English arts.

4. Use the Topical Vocabulary in answering the questions:

1.

What service do you think the artist performs for mankind? 2. Historically there have been various reasons for the making of

pictures, apart from the artist's desire to create a work of visual beauty. Can you point out some of them? 3. How does pictorial art

serve as a valuable historical record? What can it preserve for the posterity? 4. There are certain rules of composition tending to give

unity and coherence to the work of art as a whole. Have you ever observed that triangular or pyramidal composition gives the effect

of stability and repose, while a division of the picture space diagonally tends to give breadth and vigour? Be specific. 5. The painter

who knows his own craft and nothing else will turn out to be a very superficial artist. What are some of the qualities a true artist must

possess? 6. Why does it sometimes happen that an artist is not appreciated in his lifetime and yet highly prized by the succeeding

generations? 7. The heyday of the Renaissance is to be placed between the 15th and 16th centuries. Artists began to study anatomy

and the effects of light and shadow, which made their work more life-like. Which great representatives of the period do yoy know? 8.

What national schools of painting are usually distinguished in European art? 9. Classicism attached the main importance to com -

position and figure painting while romanticism laid stress on personal and emotional expression, especially in colour and dramatic

effect. What is typical of realism/impressionism/cubism/expressionism/surrealism? 10. What kinds of pictures are there according to

the artist's theme? 11. Artists can give psychological truth to portraiture not simply by stressing certain main physical features, but by

the subtlety of light and shade. In this respect Rokotov, Lev- itsky and Borovikovsky stand out as unique. Isn't it surprising that they

n/anaged to impart an air of dignity and good breeding to so many of their portraits? 12. Is the figure painter justified in resort ing to

exaggeration and distortion if the effect he has in mind requires it? 13. Landscape is one of the principal means by which artists

express their delight in the visible world. Do we expect topographical accuracy from the landscape painter? 14. What kind of painting

do you prefer? Why?

5. Give a brief talk about an outstanding portrait painter. Choose one you really have a liking for.

6. You are an expert on an outstanding landscape painter. Note down about five pieces of factual information and five pieces of personal

information. Your fellow-students will ask you questions to find out what you know about it.

7. Make a note of the title of the picture that is reasonably well known. Tell the others in the group about the picture. See if they can guess the

title.

8. You are an expert on the Peredvlzhniki/the Society of Travelling Art Exhibitions. Your partner is a foreigner who is completely ignorant of

this period in Russian history.

9. A painting can be studied on several levels and from a variety of perspec tives. Here are a few examples of how pictures can be described,

analyzed, interpreted and evaluated. Use the following texts for making imaginary dialogues about the pictures and act them out in class.

A

"Lady Elizabeth Delme and Her Children" by Reynolds is a typical family group portrait in the Grand Style of English portrait

painting. Lady Delme was the wife of a member of Parliament and belonged to the privileged class of the landed nobility. Here, with

an air of apparently casual informality, she is shown on the terrace before her country-house, while behind stretch the broad acres of

her family estate.

Reynolds has taken care that the gestures, facial expressions, and poses of his subjects are appropriate to their age, character, and

social status. "The joy of a monarch," Dryden once wrote, "for the news of a victory must not be expressed like the ecstasy of a

harlequin on the receipt of a letter from his mistress." So, in this portrait, Lady Delme is dignified and gracious, secure in the

knowledge of her beauty and wealth. Her son John, aged five, as if sensing the responsibilities of manhood, gazes sternly toward the

distant horizon. Her other son, Emelias Henry, in unmasculine skirts as befits his three years, is coy and winsome. The fourth

member of the group, the unkempt Skye terrier, is the embodiment of loyal affection. Note the simplicity of the pyramidal design and

the low-keyed colour scheme. These features were for Reynolds symbols of dignity and good taste.

B

The "Mrs. Sarah Siddons" by Gainsborough has the distinction of being not only a remarkable work of art, but a unique

interpretation of a unique personality. It is not only one of the artist's finest portraits, but also one of the best of the many likenesses

of the great tragic actress, who sat to most of the celebrated masters of her day. It was painted in 1783—1785, when the queen of the

tragic drama was in her twenty-ninth year and at the zenith of her fame.

An enthusiastic admirer who saw it in the Manchester exhibition of 1857 wrote as follows: "The great tragic actress, who inter-

preted the passions with such energy and such feeling, and who felt them so strongly herself, is better portrayed in this simple half-

length in her day dress, than in allegorical portraits as the Tragic Muse or in character parts. This portrait is so original, so individu al,

as a poetic expression of character, as a deliberate selection of pose, as bold colour and free handling, that it is like the work of no

other painter.

C

"Dedham Lock and Mill" (1820)

This is a brilliant example of Constable's view painting at its complete maturity. The salient features of the landscape are treated in

sharp relief— even those not strictly necessary— yet they merge perfectly under a serene, perfect light. This painting contains, in

synthesis, all the elements of landscape which Constable loved best: the river, the boats, the soaked logs, the river vegetation, the sun

shining through the foliage of the tall trees, the scenes of rural life and, above all, Dedham Mill. The cultural origins of this work are

apparent in the traditional composition, in the use of chiaroscuro, in the way the landscape fades into the distance, after the Dutch

manner, and in the complex, laboured palette. The compact tree mass in the foreground is blocked in against a sky filled with

movement, reflected in the calm and transparent waters over which plays a pallid sun, as we find in Ruisdael.

D

For Constable I have an affection that goes back to my earliest reco^ections. In the first years of my childhood, there hung in the

halls of my father's house a large steel engraving of "The Cornfield". Often in the long hot summers of the Middle West, I used to lie

on the floor, gazing for hours into this English landscape carried from the dry and burning world around me into a vista of blessed

coolness, thick verdure, dampness and everlasting peace.

I lived in that picture. To me it was more beautiful than a dream: the boy, flat on the ground drinking from a running brook; the sheep