International Fine Art Academy

ABC art: a 1960's art movement and style that attempts to use a minimal number of textures, colors, shapes and lines to create simple three-dimensional structures. Also known as minimalism.

Abstract: art that looks as if it contains little or no recognizable or realistic forms from the physical world. Focus is on formal elements such as colors, lines, or shapes. Artists often "abstract" objects by changing, simplifying, or exaggerating what they see.

Abstract Expressionism: art that rejects true visual representation. It has few recognizable images with great emphasis on line, color, shape, texture, value; putting the expression of the feelings or emotions of the artist above all else.

Accent: to stress, single out as important. As applied to art it is the emphasis given to certain elements in a painting that allows them to attract more attention. Details that define an object or piece of art.

Accession: a process of increasing an art collection by addition; something added to what you already have ("the art collection grew through accession").

Free From errors, Mistakes or distortion

Brown discoloration on paper, resulting from acidic matting or mounting materials.

Water-based plastic paint consisting of pigments bound in an acrylic resin mixture. Can be thinned with water while wet, but becomes tough and water resistant once dry.

Acrylic paint: a fast-drying synthetic paint made from acrylic resin. Acrylic is a fast-drying water-based "plastic" paint valued for its versatility and clean up with soap and water.

 Occurs when the adhesive deteriorates to the point of collapse. Can be found in works on paper (e.g., prints that have been mounted or collaged).

Aerial perspective: refers to creating a sense of depth in painting by imitating the way the atmosphere makes distant objects appear less distinct and more bluish than they would be if nearby. Also known as atmospheric perspective.

Aerial view: refers to viewing a subject from above, looking downward. Also called "birds-eye view".

An albumen print is created by the process developed by Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard in 1850, which uses egg whites and photographic chemicals to produce a print on paper from a negative.

Alla prima: the method of oil painting in which the desired effects of the final painting are achieved in the first application of paint as opposed to the technique of covering the canvas in layers with the final painting being achieved at the end.

Analogous colors: any set of three or five colors that are closely related in hue(s). They are usually adjacent (next) to each other on the color wheel.

Applied art: the use of the principles and elements of design to create functional pieces of works of art.

Approximate symmetry: the use of forms which are similar on either side of a central axis. They may give a feeling of the exactness or equal relationship but ar sufficiently varied to prevent visual monotony.

In this intaglio method of printmaking, a porous ground coats a metal plate, which is then immersed in acid allowing an even biting of the plate. The resulting image has a grainy and textural effect. 

Art: the completed work of an artist which is the expression of creativity or imagination, or both that portrays a mood, feeling or tells a story; works of art collectively.

Art brut: French for "raw art", the art of children and outsiders (naive artists and the mentally ill); actually, anyone not producing art for profit or recognition

Art deco: a style of design and decoration popular in the 1920's and 1930's characterized by designs that are geometric and use highly intense colors, to reflect the rise of commerce, industry and mass production

Art nouveau: a decorative art movement that emerged in the late nineteenth century; art characterized by dense asymmetrical ornamentation in sinuous forms, it is often symbolic and of an erotic nature.

Artist: a practitioner in the arts, generally recognized as a professional by critics and peers.

Asymmetrical balance: placement of non-identical forms to either side of a balancing point in such a way that the two sides seem to be of the same visual weight.

Atmospheric perspective: a technique used by painters for representing three-dimensional space on a flat two-dimensional surface by creating the illusion of depth, or recession within a painting or drawing. Atmospheric perspective suggests that objects closer to the viewer are sharper in detail, color intensity, and value contrast than those farther away. As objects move closer to the horizon they gradually fade to a bluish gray and details blur, imitating the way distant objects appear to the human eye. Also called aerial perspective.

Autochrome refers to the color “screen-plate” process developed by the Lumière brothers in 1903. It was the principal color photography process until it was replaced by color film in the mid-1930s.