EVENT PRESENTATION: HOUSTON MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS

BY: NADIA KHAN

HOUSTON MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS

• The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, located in the Houston Museum District, Houston, is one of the largest museums in the United States.

• The permanent collection of the museum spans more than 6,000 years of history with approximately 64,000 works from six continents

• The Museum Of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH) is the oldest art museum in Texas. In 1917, the museum site was dedicated by the Houston Public School Art League (later the Houston Art League) with the intention of becoming a public art museum.

• There are a lot of different exhibitions that take place in the Museum of Fine Arts, when I went to visit the Museum. These are some of the interesting stuff I got to see.

Arts of KoreaThe new gallery for the Arts of Korea opening November 16, 2012, showcases the collection’s strengths in decorative arts, in 11th to 13th century celadon from the Hoyt collection, as well

as spectacular pieces of lacquer and metalwork.

Korean art, the painting, calligraphy, pottery, sculpture, lacquer ware, and other fine or decorative visual arts produced by the peoples of Korea over the centuries.

DESCRIPTION

Describe the work/event without using value words such as “beautiful” or “ugly”:- Simplistic- Breathtaking- Amazing calligraphy - Astonishing

What is the written description on the label or in the program about the event?

-The first gallery completed in the suite of Arts of Asia galleries at the MFAH, the Arts of Korea Gallery is the only museum gallery in the Southwest dedicated solely to Korean art. Showcasing some 5,000 years of visual culture, the gallery features exclusive loans of ancient Korean artworks from the National Museum of Korea and AMOREPACIFIC Museum of Art alongside works of contemporary Korean art from the MFAH collection.

ANALYSISDESCRIBE HOW THE WORK/EVENT IS ORGANIZED AS A COMPLETE COMPOSITION:

The art produced by peoples living in the peninsula of Korea has traditionally shared aesthetic concepts, motifs, techniques, and forms with the art of China and Japan. Yet it has developed a distinctive style of its own. The beauty of Korean art and the strength of its artists lay in simplicity, spontaneity, and a feeling of harmony with nature.

If the work has subjects or characters, what are the relationships between or among them?The basic trend of Korean art through the ages has been naturalistic, a characteristic already evident as early as the Three

Kingdoms period (c. 57 bce–668 ce) but fully established by the Unified, or Great, Silla (Korean: Shinla) period (668–935). The traditional attitude of accepting nature as it is resulted in a highly developed appreciation for the simple and unadorned.

Korean artists, favored the unadorned beauty of raw materials, such as the natural patterns of wood grains. The Korean potter was characteristically unconcerned about mechanical perfection of his surfaces, curves, or shapes. His concern was to bring out the inherent or natural characteristics of his materials and the medium. Potters, therefore, were able to work unselfconsciously andnaturally, producing wares of engaging simplicity and artistic distinctiveness.

Simplicity was applied not only to economy of shape but also to the use of decorative motifs and devices. The intervention of the human hand is restricted to a minimum in Korean art. A single stem of a flower, for instance, may be drawn in a subtle shade of blue on the side of a white porcelain vase or bottle, but never merely from a desire to fill an empty space. The effect is rather to enlarge the white background.

INTERPRETATION

• Describe how the work/event makes you think or feel:

• Describe the expressive qualities you find in the work. What expressive language would you use to describe the qualities (i.e., tragic, ugly, funny)?

- The basic trend of Korean art through the ages has been naturalistic.- Korean art had qualities of simplify, natural like designs and the use of fine lines.- Korean art, the painting, calligraphy, pottery, sculpture, lacquer ware, and other fine or decorative visual arts produced

by the peoples of Korea over the centuries.

• Does the work remind you of other things you have experienced (i.e., analogy or metaphor)?- The art work of Korean reminds me of the art work of Islam. They tend to use fine lines, simplistic and

calligraphy.

• How does the work relate to other ideas or events in the world and/or in your other studies?- This work relates to my other studies in which we look at the history and compare and contrast different cultures and religions and how they work.

The Bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara, or Chenrezig as he is known in Tibet, is associated with the quality of karuna or compassion. His name literally "Lord who looks down", and is said to relate to his looking upon the earth and it's suffering beings with compassion. Avalokiteśvara comes in many forms.

This was an interesting piece of art at the Museum.

Judgment or Evaluation

Present your opinion of the event/work’s success or failure:• What qualities of the work make you feel it is a success or failure?-This has been a successful art work because of the unique style that was used in Korea. • Compare it with similar works that you think are good or bad.-Some of the different art work that I saw at the museum included, The Gupta Empire and African American art. All of them were very good.

• What criteria can you list to help others judge this work?- The time it took to create the sculpture- The use of fine line ink compared to thick lines.- The use of art on the vases.

• How original is the work? Why do you feel this work is original or not original?-The work is definitely original! It’s original because this work was done many years ago.