Op Art

Op art, also known as optical art, is a genre of visual art, especially painting, that makes use of optical illusions. Op art is also known as geometric abstraction and hard-edge abstraction, although the preferred term for it is perceptual abstraction.

"Optical Art is a method of painting concerning the interaction between illusion and picture plane, between understanding and seeing.“ Op art works are abstract, with many of the better known pieces made in only black and white. When the viewer looks at them, the impression is given of movement, hidden images, flashing and vibration, patterns, or alternatively, of swelling or warping.

Bridget Riley, Movement in Squares, 1961. OP ART

Bridget Riley, Movement in Squares, 1961. OP ART

Op Art is derived from the constructivist practices of the Bauhaus. This German school, founded by Walter Gropius, stressed the relationship of form and function within a framework of analysis and rationality. Students were taught to focus on the overall design, or entire composition, in order to present unified works. When the Bauhaus was forced to close in 1933, many of its instructors fled to the United States where the movement took root in Chicago, where Anni and Josef Albers would come to teach.

An optical illusion by Hungarian-born artist Victor Vasarely

Bridget Riley, Cataract 3, 1967.OP ART

Bridget Riley, Arrest 1, 1965.OP ART

Jenny HolzerAs a graduate of Ohio University, the main focus of Jenny Holzer has been on the investigation of ways to disseminate ideas within public space. Since the late seventies, she has been working in the street and in public buildings, using media such as, LCD displays (e.g., in Times Square, New York) posters and stickers (applied to such urban elements as telephone booths or parking meters), these artworks art intended to stimulate awareness of our social conditioning as conveyed by the very landscape in which we may be confronted by them."

EXPRESSING ANGER IS NECESSARY

LABOR IS A LIFE-DESTROYING ACTIVITY

DECENCY IS A RELATIVE THING

LEISURE TIME IS A GIGANTIC SMOKE SCREEN

IDEALS ARE REPLACED BY CONVENTIONAL GOALS AT A CERTAIN AGE

FEAR IS THE GREATEST INCAPACITATOR

THE WORLD OPERATES ACCORDING TO DISCOVERABLE LAWS

REVOLUTION BEGINS WITH CHANGES IN THE INDIVIDUAL

DISGUST IS THE APPROPRIATE RESPONSE TO MOST SITUATIONS

IT IS MAN'S FATE TO OUTSMART HIMSELF

IT'S VITAL TO LIVE IN HARMONY WITH NATURE

MONEY CREATES TASTE

MOSTLY YOU SHOULD MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS

OLD FRIENDS ARE BETTER LEFT IN THE PAST

YOUR OLDEST FEARS ARE THE WORST ONES

Land Art, Earthworks or Earth Art is an art movement which emerged in America in the late 1960s and early 1970s, in which landscape and the work of art are inextricably linked. Sculptures are not placed in the landscape, rather the landscape is the very means of their creation. The works frequently exist in the open, located well away from civilization, left to change and erosion under natural conditions.

Earthworks

Robert Smithson, Spiral Jetty, 1970. EARTHWORKS

Robert Smithson, 1969.

Unidentified,Marree Man(Stuart’s Giant)Discover June 26, 1998

EARTHWORKS

Andy Goldsworthy

Walter De Maria, The Lightning Field, 1977. EARTHWORKS

Four cast concrete, 18 ft. tunnels with open ends aligned with the points on the horizon where the sun rises and sets at the winter and summer solstices. Penetrating the tunnels are holes with diameters of 7 to 10 inches in the patterns of the four constellations of; Capricorn, Draco,

Columbia and Perseus.

Nancy Holt, Sun Tunnels, 1973-76. EARTHWORKS

Nancy Holt, Sun Tunnels, 1973-76. EARTHWORKS