Super Realism - Visual Art Theory Notes and Summary
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Course
Visual Arts and Music
Institution
12th Grade
Simple key points as well as a deeper understanding of this art movement can be found in this document. The most influential artists of this movement as well as their works have been analysed and images of each artwork is shown (two artists and two works per artist). Information is taken from the I...
Super realism
● Super Realism, Photo Realism or Hyperrealism, started in the late 1960s and peaked in
the 1970s. The artists made large scale paintings directly from photographs.
● The style developed out of Pop Art in terms of the choice in subject matter. The
paintings showed a cold objectivity and lacked emotion, an attitude associated with
Minimalism. As with Pop Art, Super Realism was popular with the uninformed public
who easily understood and interpreted the exact replication of photographs.
● Super Realism also hints at the fascination of the public with images in the media,
especially films and advertisements. It suggests that there should be an awareness of
visual indoctrination.
Characteristics
● Super Realism is an impersonal and precise style of painting and sculpture that drew
attention to the effect of photography on the perception of reality.
Subject matter: Objects, places and people from American suburban and urban everyday life
that were not perceived as visually enchanting, were captured in photographs that were then
replicated as closely as possible. The artists also worked with the concepts of reality and
artificiality as they replicated an image that was already replicated from real life as a
photograph. The result of copying a photograph as a painting or sculpture was therefore seen
as an important part of the subject matter.
Composition: Some artists used traditional, balanced compositions. Some artists used
photographs that are similar to the compositions of the Impressionists in which the
composition is chosen for the variety of surfaces and light effects in it and is seemingly
random. And others deliberately chose random parts of photographic material such as
postcards and advertisements in magazines to reproduce.
Shape: The realistic shapes of people, objects and the surroundings are precisely painted with
sharply defined edges showing a detailed illusion of the three-dimensional world. Some of the
Super Realists also included photographic effects such as blurry areas, as part of their
paintings.
Colour: The use of colours depends on the kind of photographs used as a source by the artists.
Flack's paintings are usually very brightly coloured, while Estes' works have a tendency towards
colder colours as he concentrates on the reflections in city windows as his subject matter.
Application: The application of paint is extremely smooth showing no visible brush-strokes.
The use of airbrush by some artists also contributed to the complete elimination of
personalised marks in the paintings. As the technique of creating precisely detailed shapes,
colours and tonal values are very important to this style. The artist must have the technical
ability to create a photographical finish.
Media: Most of the artists used traditional media such as oil or acrylic on canvas, but there are
artists who used airbrushing. The artists used projectors or the grid method to transfer the
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