Comparing and Contrasting
Compare and Contrast Raphael’s High Renaissance fresco Galatea [9’8″ x 7’5″] with Botticelli’s Early Renaissance painting Birth of Venus [5’8″ x 9’1″]. Be sure and discuss the formal differences such as the artists’ use of light, line, color and composition.
Compare and Contrast questions are intended to stimulate you to explore the similarities and differences between the period styles of the two works of art compared, and /or the individual styles of the two artists who created them. You may also explore not only the stylistic differences between the two works but discuss the effect that these stylistic differences had on the subject matter, theme or symbolism of the works. Comparing involves looking for similarities while contrasting is about differences.
In any compare and contrast analysis you ought to begin with the basics such as identifying the work of art (artist, title, period/style) and giving a description of the work and its special features.
The following is a list of issues to consider in your analysis:
culture/artist (who produced it?)
period/style (when and where was it produced?)
function (what was its purpose?)
physical context (how was it used?)
how does it relate to its environment? where was it located?)
medium/material (what is it made of?)
scale (what size is it?)
subject matter (who or what is the subject? Doesn’t apply to architecture)
sacred or secular (is it religious or non-religious in function and/or subject?)
artistic conventions (what reoccurring techniques, devices or motifs are used?)
abstraction/realism (how are the figures and forms rendered?)
cultural context (what was going on historically, socially, politically, religiously during the period in which it was produced?)
symbolism/theme (why was it produced? What symbolic meaning or message does it convey to the viewer?)
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