Visual analysis: A visual analysis or formal analysis is an examination of a work of art
that explores the meaning of the work and analyzes how that meaning is conveyed in
terms of the work’s visual components including composition (how the elements of the
work are put together), style (the use of color, line, form and shape), media (what
materials are used? Why is it made from these materials? How do these materials affect
the image?), the subject (here landscape), the size, how does it communicate with the
viewer? Your goal is to use visual evidence and your general knowledge of Chinese art to
explain what the work might mean. The paper should be more than a detailed description
of your object, it should say how choices in scale, composition, color, patterns, shapes,
line, movement, sound, etc., create a certain kind of image with particular meanings: use
your observations to explain to the reader what you think the work is about. Again: your
paper should be more than a description – you should be framing an argument on what
the work is about and support that argument with specific observations about the piece.
Your paper thus should have a clear thesis and every paragraph of your paper should
support that thesis from different angles, i.e. you should have an argument. Your paper
should be organized as a logical whole centered on this thesis and argument.
Begin by choosing the landscape that intrigues you the most. In this case, these are
contemporary landscapes that explore new ideas of Chinese landscape (we will start
discussing landscape in week five and six). How does Zheng Chongbin or Yang
Yongliang examine or refer to the idea of landscape, and the idea of tradition?
To think about these questions, expect to spend some time looking. Take careful, detailed
notes about your picture and think about how and why the work inspires a particular
response from you and how this serves the work’s message (or what you think its
meaning to be). Consider how each visual aspect of the work creates meaning. Think
about the choices the artist has made in terms of shapes, texture, lines, silhouette,
patterns, motifs, light, and how these different things relate to each other, and how all of
these make up the work’s meaning and impact. Make a sketch – a sketch is useful in
gaining a better understanding of the work, especially its composition.
For an example of a formal analysis paper, please see the pdf on the class website,
“Formal Analysis and Style” which also explains what a formal analysis is.
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