MAJOR PAINTING STYLES.
Style Description
Gothic Christian art form which flourished between the 12 th and 16 th centuries. The stylised figures were usually shown clad in flowing drapery.
Renaissance Style adopted in Europe in the 15 th and 16 th centuries, and modelled on classical Greek and Roman styles.
Baroque Extravagant and highly decorative style. It was popular mainly in Catholic European countries from 1600 to 1720.
Rococo Florid 18 th century style of decoration using light colours, scrollwork and irregular curves.
Pre-Raphaelite Highly symbolic style adopted by group of mid-19 th -century London artists - including Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828 - 1882) - who were inspired by the brightly coloured pictures produced in Italy before the time of the artist Raphael (1483 - 1520) .
Romanticism Sensational or sentimental style, often using a mythological theme. Romanticism reached its peak in France in about 1830.
Impressionism Late 19 th -century style largely by French painters - including Claude Monet (1840 - 1926), Camille Pissarro (1830 - 1903), Auguste Renoir (1841 - 1919) and Edgar Degas (1834 - 1917) - who concentrated on the effects of light and pure colour.
Post-Impressionism Turn-of-the-century style which aimed to show the spiritual significance of objects. Its main exponent was the Frenchman Paul Cezanne (1839 - 1906) .
Expressionism 20 th -century style of artists - including the Norwegian Edvard Munch (1863 - 1944) - who expressed their emotional themes through distorted shapes and violent colours.
Fauvism Style of painting featuring distorted shapes, violent colours and disregard for perspective. The French painter Henri Matisse (1869 - 1954) was the leader of the school - whose members were known as ' Les Fauves ', meaning 'The wild beasts'.
Cubism Geometrical style of drawing invented by the French painter Georges Braque (1882 - 1963) and the Spaniard Pablo Picasso (1881 - 1973) . It emphasised the mind's perception of an object, rather than attempting to reproduce actual appearance.
Abstract art Non-representational styles of the 20 th century. There are two major categories: 'pure' abstract art as in the geometrical works of the Dutch painter Piet Mondrian (1872 - 1944) ; and highly subjective treatments of recogniseable objects, such as the Cubist canvases of Georges Braque and the sculpture of Henry Moore (1896 - 1988) .
Realism Works that show scenes as they really are - and which often have a social or political message.
Surrealism French movement dating from the 1920s, which uses dream-like effects to explore the subconscious mind. Major exponents include Salvador Dali (1904 - 1989) and Rene Magritte (1898 - 1967) .
Action Painting Modern technique of splashing, throwing and pouring paint on a canvas - and allowing it to form its own shapes. It was invented by the US painter Jackson Pollock (1912 - 1956) .
Pop art Style which emerged in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It made use of comic strip cartoons, advertisements and images of film stars (for instance, Marilyn Monroe), often enormously enlarged and garishly painted. Its main exponents included David Hockney (1937 - ), Eduardo Paolozzi (1924 - ), Andy Warhol (1930 - 1987) , and Roy Lichtenstein (1923 - ) .

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