48 L5-Our World in Art

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Oxford Read and Discover level 5 Our World In Art by Richard Northcott

Introduction Artists help us to look at our world. They look at places and people, and then they show them in pictures. Artists also show smaller things flowers, fruit, or birds. Artists don't only make pictures. Sometimes they make sculptures with stone, metal, or wood. What things from our world do artists show in art? What types of art do you know? What is your favorite type of art? Discover! Now read and discover more about our world in art!

Chapter 1 Cities Cities are interesting places. There are lots of different buildings. Cities are also full of people, and all the people are different. Artists have always been interested in cities and in the people who live in them. A City from Outside In about 1600, an artist called El Greco painted a picture of Toledo, a city in Spain. Toledo was an important city at that time. There were great buildings there. El Greco's painting shows Toledo from the countryside. The city looks quiet. The sky is dark and there's going to be a storm, but the city looks strong. Inside a City Now let's go inside a city. There are streets and buildings, and there are lots of people. It's fun to watch people in cities, and artists like painting them. In 1876, Gustave Caillebotte painted some people on a bridge in Paris. A man and a woman are crossing the bridge and talking. Another man is leaning on the bridge and watching something. A dog is walking across the bridge, too. When we look at this painting, we think that we are on the bridge. We think this because the artist has used perspective.

Perspective You can't go inside a painting. It's just a picture on a flat piece of paper or canvas. Sometimes we think that we're inside a painting, because the artist has used perspective. When there's perspective, the lines in a picture go to a place on the horizon, called the vanishing point. This painting of New York is by Hippolyte Sebron. The tops of the buildings, the windows, and the lines in the snow go to the vanishing point. The vanishing point looks far away, but the horses look near. Now look again at the painting on page 5. Where is the vanishing point? Artists don't always use perspective. When there's no perspective, everything looks near. There's no vanishing point, and there are no buildings far away. A Russian artist called Natalia Goncharova painted this big picture of a Russian city. It was scenery for a ballet. There are hundreds of towers and domes in her painting, but there's no perspective. Discover! Artists can play with perspective and make amazing shapes. Look carefully at this shape. Which is the front of the shape? Which is the back?

Chapter 2 Indoors A painting of the inside of a building is called an interior. When artists paint interiors, they often use perspective so that we can see through one room into another room. Mr Kong's House In this interior from China, we can see a big room with tables, chairs, and five big lamps. At the back of the room there are two doors. We can look through the doors and see another, smaller room. The room is in the house of a rich man called Mr Kong. Maybe he's the man in the blue coat who's playing a type of guitar, but we don't really know. We also don't know the name of the artist. Usually, artists write their signature in small letters on their paintings, but not always. The Boy with the Bread One day, a boy went to the baker's for some bread. Then he went to a big house, walked through the courtyard, and knocked on the door. A woman opened the door and took the bread. We see this little story in this painting by a Dutch painter called Pieter de Hooch. The artist used perspective to show us the house, the courtyard, and the street outside. Look at the lines on the floor. They go to a vanishing point that's behind the building and far away.