International Fine Art Academy

Developed in 1930, the c-print is the most universal type of color photograph, created using at least three emulsion layers of light sensitive silver salts. Each layer is sensitized to a specific primary color. As a result, each layer records different information for the color make up of an image.

Calligraphy: a distinctive style of artistic handwriting created by using special pen nibs that allow a calligrapher to vary the thickness of a letter's line elements; an elegant, decorative writing, developed to an art form itself, used to enhance the artistic appeal and visual beauty of handwritten papers and manuscripts.

A calotype is a photomechanical method for reproducing photographic images. While it is no longer practiced as a commercial process, it was considered the height of fine art photography beginning in the 1970s.

Canvas: a heavy, closely woven fabric; an oil painting on canvas fabric; the support used for an acrylic or oil painting that is typically made of linen or cotton, stretched very tightly and tacked onto a wooden frame. Linen is considered far superior to the heavy cotton for a canvas.

First produced in 1864 by Joseph Wilson Swan, a carbon print is a photographic print created by immersing a carbon tissue in a solution of potassium bichromate, carbon, gelatin and a coloring agent.

Center of interest: an emphasized are of the composition

Ceramics: the art of making objects of clay and firing them in a kiln. Wares of earthenware and porcelain, as well as sculpture are made by ceramists. Enamel is also a ceramic technique. Ceramic materials may be decorated with slip, engobe, or glaze, applied by a number of techniques, including resist, mishima, and sanggam. Pots made can be made by the coil, slab, some other manual technique, or on a potter's wheel.

The most widely used form of pastel, soft chalk pastels are brightly-colored and easily blended. 

Charcoal: Compressed burned wood used for drawing.

A chine colle print is created by affixing layers of thinner sheets of paper to a heavier sheet, and then making an intaglio impression. The thinner top sheets take the impression much more easily than a heavier paper, creating a sense of depth in the printed image, both physically and visually.

CMYK: the abbreviation for cyan (C), magenta (M), yellow (Y) and black (K). It is the colors used in a four color printing process.

Collage: introduced by the Cubists, the technique of creating a work of art by adhering flat articles such as paper, fabrics, string or other materials to a flat surface such as a canvas whereby a three-dimensional result is achieved.

A collodion negative is produced by the colorless, high quality duplication process developed by Frederick Scott Archer and Gustave Le Gray in 1850.

Color: a visual attribute of things that results from the light they emit or transmit or reflect; the visual response to the wavelengths of light, identified as red, blue, green, etc.; primary and secondary colors; warm, cool, and neutral colors, color value; hue; and intensity.

Color permanence: refers to a pigment's lasting power. Tubes and other containers of paint are sometimes labeled with a code indicating a color's degree of permanence.

Color separation: A traditional photographic process of separating artwork into component films of cyan, magenta, yellow, and black in preparation for printing to ultimately create a full-color printed product. Recent computer innovations have obviated the need for separated film negatives in certain applications.

Color wheel: a round diagram that shows the placement of colors in relationship to each other. It is from the color wheel that “color schemes” are defined (see illustration).

Commercial art: refers to art that is made for the purposes of commerce. The term is somewhat obsolete and is currently being replaced in many colleges with the term "Visual Communication."

Commission: refers to the act of hiring someone to execute a certain work of art or set of artworks.

Complementary colors: two colors directly opposite one another on the color wheel. When placed next to one another, complementary colors are intensified and often appear to vibrate. When mixed, brown or gray is created. Red and green, blue and orange, and yellow and violet have the greatest degree of contrast. Red-violet and yellow-green, red-orange and blue-green, and yellow-orange and blue-violet are also complementary colors.

Composition: the arrangement of the design elements within the design area; the ordering of visual and emotional experience to give unity and consistency to a work of art and to allow the observer to comprehend its meaning.

Computer graphics: refers to visual images made with the assistance of computers. Computer graphics are often made with software called drawing, painting, illustrating and photographic programs or applications.

Contrast: the difference between elements or the opposition to various elements.

Cool color: colors whose relative visual temperatures make them seem cool. Cool colors generally include green, blue-green, blue, blue-violet, and violet.

 Corrosion is a chemical reaction between a material (usually metal) and its environment, which produces a deterioration of the material's properties. In some instances, corrosion can occur in a small or confined area in the form of pits on a metal surface. Pitting is an extreme, concentrated attack on a material which may take months, or even years, to become visible.

The network of fissures or cracks in a finish layer such as varnish, lacquer, or shellac, due to age degradation, expansion and contraction from climate changes, and other causes.

Craquelure: A network of fine cracks on a paintings surface, typically due to elemental expansion, contraction , and age.

In ceramics, a mismatch in the thermal expansion between the glaze of an item and its physical body often causes small hairline cracks of the glazed surface, which can potentially compromise the pieces structural integrity.

Cropping: the cutting out of extraneous parts of an image, usually a photograph; excluding part of a photo or illustration to show only the portion desired or to fit a given space requirement.

Cubism: art that uses two-dimensional geometric shapes to depict three-dimensional organic forms; a style of painting created by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque in the early 20th century whereby the artist breaks down the natural forms of the subjects into geometric shapes and creates a new kind of pictorial space.

Cyanotype is an older printing method which uses a monochrome photographic process to produce a cyan-blue print.