Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Illusionist

Even though visual art was not as popular as it was in the 1800s, a few painters still survived into the mid 1900s. A popular technique at the time was Trompe L’oeil, which can date back to 464BC. The technique of this was to create a three dimensional illusion in a piece. This could include something as small as an object painted onto the frame of a picture, or to where a piece cretes the illusion of an extension onto a room. Trompe L’oeil is style of painting is commonly found on walls, ceilings, and floors as murals.


Adapting Trompe L’oeil into the 1980s hundreds of years later was very similar to its original applications. It was often used on murals on the ceiling, walls, and floors but it was also very common to find this on tables and other furniture pieces found within a room.
In order for this style to survive in such a modern era, the artists of these pieces would often add a taste of surrealism into each piece. The idea behind this was to create something that seemed unimaginable to pop out at the user. The illusion would create more of a challenge to the artist when it was applied to furniture, but they found solutions to create an extraordinary piece of artwork.
Since the technique was so dated, the adaptation into the newer time was not as easy as it appeared. Artists in the eighteenth century have more difficulties finding someone for commission than artists in the seventeenth century; visual artists were in more of a demand at the time. They had to show exquisite technique and create better work than the other artists in their area. Trompe L'oeil is a technique that requires a lot of skill so it is hard to find painters who can still recreate this. The passion that they have for this technique  is carried through and is the main reason that this artwork type still remains today. 
For a style that was created thousands of years ago, it was amazing how easy it could adapt into the modern times. With minor changes to the concept of this idea, it can easily be applied to any culture or into anytime. As modern times have been proven to show, flexibility is key and Trompe L’oeil has proven to be just that. 

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