TWO-DIMENSIONAL ART: HISTORY, CHARACTERISTICS, AUTHORS AND WORKS - ART - 2025

The two - dimensional art is one that has only two (length and width) dimensions and is represented through paintings, drawings, photographs or television and film. Her images lack physical depth; that is why they are also called flat images. In addition, they are represented or projected onto a medium or flat surface.

The plastic arts are divided into two large groups: the two-dimensional plastic arts and the three-dimensional arts. One of the most representative characteristics of two-dimensional art is the flat nature of its images; but that does not mean that the artist does not represent the depth in the work through perspective.

The Guernica by Pablo Picasso (1937)

The analysis of this type of art is carried out through the study of five basic aspects: the work space, drawing and line, balance and movement, texture, execution, color, light and contrast.

As for the different techniques, in plastic, two-dimensional paintings and drawings are created with various pigments, such as oils, acrylics, watercolors, tempera, ink, charcoal and pencils. For this reason, two-dimensional works of art vary in their characteristics according to the physical medium used.

Origin and history

Two-dimensional art is as old as man himself, since its first manifestations - about 64 thousand years ago - were through cave painting. Through drawings painted on rocks in caves and in engravings, the caveman represented his way of life and daily life.

However, modern two-dimensional painting is relatively recent. It was not until the Middle Ages that substantial changes were made in composition and perspective. Before the 14th century there were very few or perhaps no successful attempts to represent the three-dimensional world realistically.

The preceding art - Egyptian, Phoenician, Greek - at least in the plastic field did not work on perspective in their works. In the first place, because it was a later discovery; secondly, because in the art of these periods three-dimensionality was represented only through sculpture.

In general, artists from the Byzantine, Medieval and Gothic periods began to explore other ways of representing life and reality.

It was a very rich and beautiful art style in terms of expressiveness and colors. However, the images they represented were totally flat: they lacked the illusion of space and depth.

Origin of perspective in two-dimensional works

Art had to solve the problem of the two-dimensional nature of the media used until then in painting. From this, the artists began to worry about representing the world the way it really is; that is, three-dimensional.

This is how they discovered the system of illusion to represent reality as it is. In this way the sensation of space, movement and depth was created. The first masters to try it were the Italians Giotto (around 1267-1337) and Duccio (1255-1260 and 1318-1319).

Both began to explore the idea of ​​volume and depth in their works and were the pioneers in the early technique of perspective. They used shading to create an illusion of depth, but they were still far from achieving the effect of perspective that we know in art.

The first artist to make use of linear perspective in a well-known work was the Florentine architect Fillipo Brunelleshi (1377-1446). The work was painted in 1415 and in this the Baptistery of Florence is represented, from the angle of the main door of the unfinished cathedral.

The technique of linear perspective projected in this work the illusion of depth on a two-dimensional plane through the use of "vanishing points", in which all lines tended to converge, at eye level, on the horizon.

From this painting, the linear perspective system was immediately copied and improved upon by other Italian artists.

characteristics

- As its name indicates, it only has two dimensions: height and width. It has no depth.

- The techniques of two-dimensional art are only applied in medium or flat spaces. For example, a photograph, a canvas or wood painting, a wall, a sheet of paper, or a picture on television.

- Two-dimensional plastic works can only be appreciated from a frontal perspective. This means that the relationship of this type of work with the viewer has a unique character. Otherwise the work cannot be seen or appreciated; therefore, it is a must see.

- In this type of work the volume is not real but simulated or represented through perspective, light and shadow of objects. This gives the feeling that the objects have a real volume.

- It is the most common form of graphic representation that exists.

Authors and their representative works

These are some artists who, during different times, introduced changes in the way of representing two-dimensional art.

Masaccio (1401-1428)

Triptych of Saint Juvenal, Masaccio

His name was Tommaso di ser Giovanni di Mone Cassai. He was a medieval Florentine painter and his work was decisive in the history of painting.

He is considered the first artist to apply the laws of scientific perspective, which were previously developed by Brunelleschi, to his paintings. His command over the rules of perspective was total.

His first most important work was the Triptych of Saint Juvenal, in which his mastery of perspective is appreciated to create the effect of depth.

Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528)

Melancholy, Albrecht Dürer (1514)

He is considered the most famous German artist of the Renaissance. His extensive work includes paintings, drawings, engravings, and various writings on art.

One of the representative works of Dürer's two-dimensional art is Melancholy, an engraving on a copper plate made by the artist in 1514.

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519)

Mona Lisa, Leonardo Da Vinci (1503)

One of the most famous works of this Florentine artist, painter, scientist, writer and sculptor of the Renaissance period is La Gioconda or Mona Lisa.

This painting is a portrait of a woman with an enigmatic smile that has been the subject of all kinds of analysis and literature.

Paul Cézanne (1839-1906)

The Sainte-Victoire mountain (1905). Paul cezanne

Towards the end of the 19th century, this French painter began to question the rules and structures of painting, causing his works to become almost abstract.

The techniques and the means used changed, covering the canvases with thick layers of paint applied many times with a spatula and not with the brush.

At the same time, he simplified the natural forms using essential geometric elements. Here began the end of academic composition according to the rules of perspective that had been established until then.

One of his representative paintings from this period of total revision of his work is The Sainte-Victoire Mountain (1905).

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)

The young ladies of Avignon (1907), Pablo Picasso

Spanish painter and sculptor, considered the father of cubism and one of the icons of 20th century art. In his work The Young Ladies of Avignon (1907) Picasso portrays a group of naked women; it also breaks the mold and does not take depths or gaps into account.

Ansel Adams

The Tetons and the Snake River (1942)

American photographer well known for photographing Yosemite and Yellowstone parks and being a great advocate for wildlife conservation.

His two-dimensional and revolutionary work in the photographic field can be seen in the work Tetons and Snake River (1942).

References

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