My friends and I at College Night at the Getty Center!
On Monday, April 27th, I attended College Night
at the Getty Center! The Getty Center is a museum in Brentwood that shows
several art exhibits for free, and College Night was a specific event geared
towards college students. In addition to the regular exhibits, there was free
food, live music, selfie booths, and live drawing of models.
Out of all the exhibits, the one I enjoyed the most was Painting Set Free, which featured the works of the late British painter, J. M. W. Turner. His artwork differed from the other paintings I saw at the Getty. Whereas most of the other paintings were very detailed and focused, Turner's artwork was often hazy, with only certain elements outlined.
Venice: An Imaginary View of the Arsenale by J.M.W. Turner
The haziness of his artwork made understanding perspective even more important. In the painting above, the slant of the lines delineating the buildings on the left and right of the river appear to converge in the distance, giving the perspective that the wall in the back is farther away from the viewer than the river.
Regulus, by J. M. W. Turner
As my friends and I walked around the exhibit, we experienced opportunities for divergent thinking! With artwork, there is usually no "right" interpretation. The Getty Center has plaques explaining the artists' intentions beside each painting, but my friends and I would always try to analyze and guess the meaning before reading the plaque. I thought the painting above had the most interesting interpretation. When I saw it, I thought it depicted the people of a city witnessing the descent of some supernatural being from heaven. My friend interpreted it as the divide between the people of the sea and people from the city. The plaque explained the painting as the return of Regulus, a Roman general who failed to negotiate for peace, and was subsequently punished by having his eyelids cut off. The bright light in the picture represents the sunlight blinding him.
These two paintings were just a sample of Turner's artwork, but overall I really enjoyed his exhibit and College Night in general. It was awesome to see how artists employed angles to establish perspective, and it was really fun to come up with different interpretations of the artwork with my friends.
Works Cited
"J. M. W. Turner: Painting Set Free." Getty Museum. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 May 2015.
Turner, J. M. W. Regulus. Digital image. Tate. N.p., Sept. 2004. Web. 4 May 2015.
Turner, J. M. W. Venice: An Imaginary View of the Arsenale. Digital image. Tate. N.p., Sept. 2004. Web. 4 May 2015.
Vesna, Victoria. Mathematics - Zero Perspective Golden Mean. UCLA, 9 Apr. 2012. Web. 12 Apr. 2015.
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