Art Terms Glossary

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A la poupée
A single plate is selectively inked in different colors, using stumps of rag known as a poupée.

Abstract
Art that departs from literal representation. The subject is transformed in some fashion, for example, simplified or geometricized.

Academy
Commonly used to denote the national school of art in 18th- and 19th-century France. After 1862, the school's name became the ècole des Beaux-Arts, and the Académie Francaise became the name of an official group of noted authors and artists.

Acanthus
Plant from the Mediterranean region with fleshy, curling, large-lobed, and more or less stylized leaves; often used as ornament in manuscript painting, especially for border decoration.

Additive color process color plate
A colored transparent image on glass, commonly referred to as an autochrome. Since the 1890s, additive color processes have been used to create color photographs. The process relies on screen plates recording red, green, and blue (the primary colors of light) to produce a color image. The three plates are carefully superimposed to register as one unit in making a seamless full-color image. Some additive color processes juxtapose layers of color with transparent reflectors, separation negatives, or transparencies. While several early patented processes produced color plates, the Lumière autochrome was the first color transparency to gain popularity and was widely used into the 1940s. Images were produced as glass plate color transparencies. Starch grains dyed red-orange, blue-violet, and green were spread in equal amounts on a varnished glass surface, which was varnished again and coated with an emulsion sensitive to all colors of light. After exposure in the camera, where light passed through the starch filters before reacting with the light-sensitive emulsion, the coated plates were developed, washed, and then bleached out to a negative image. Exposure to white light and a second development process produced a positive image, which was fixed, washed, and then varnished. Patented by the Louis Lumière (1862-1954) in 1904, these autochromes were noted for their soft, pointillist quality and ranged in size from less than two inches square (5.1 cm) to 15 x 18 inches (38.1 x 45.7 cm).

After
When a printmaker uses the design (often a painting or drawing) of another artist as a basis for a print.

Albumen print
The primary photographic print up until about 1890. Invented by Louis-Désiré Blanquart-évrard (1802-1872) in 1850, the method fell out of favor only when gelatin coated papers were introduced. Because albumen prints allowed greater detail while maintaining reproducibility, they were an improvement on the salted paper print. To make a print, a sheet of thin, high-quality writing paper was coated in a bath of albumen emulsion (a liquid binder of egg white containing salt). The emulsion filled the pores of the paper to create a smooth surface, ranging from a slight sheen to a thick, glossy finish depending upon the desired effect. When dry, the paper was made light sensitive with a silver nitrate solution and placed in dark storage. In a darkroom, the prepared paper was put in a hinged, wooden frame in contact with the usual glass or occasional waxed paper negative and exposed to sunlight to print the image. The exposure could take from as little as a few minutes to an hour or more. This is a printing-out technique no chemical development process was necessary to make the image visible. After exposure, the print was immersed in a fixing bath to prevent further chemical reactions, washed, and finally dried. The lustrous surface of the albumen print was often used with a wet collodion negative, which demanded a printing paper that could provide more detail and contrast than plain salted papers. Albumen prints, which were a reddish-brown, were later toned with gold chloride, which produced a purplish-brown color and made them more permanent. The thin paper was ideal for mounting on larger sheets bound into albums. The surface is delicate, can become cracked, and the highlights yellow in photographs where the coating has deteriorated.

Albumenized salted paper print
A photograph printed from a negative on to a piece of salted paper coated with a layer of albumen (a solution of egg white and salt). The albumenized surface of a salted paper print renders a clearer image than one not albumenized but has less detail than an albumen print and warmer tones and yellowish highlights. Albumenized salted paper prints could be made from wet collodion on glass, dry collodion on glass, or paper or waxed paper negatives.

Albums
A popular means of storing loose photographs in book form. Since the 1850s, albums have been a convenient way to display prints of friends and family and travel vistas. Published picture book albums and single sheets of pictures could be purchased. Photographs were adhered to the pages or inserted into slits or pockets.

Alkali
A general term referring to any basic material (pH greater than 7). Historically, 'alkali' referred to hydroxides and carbonates of sodium and potassium. Alkalis act as fluxes in ceramics and glass production-enabling silica to melt at lower temperatures.

Anne
The mother of the Virgin Mary.

Anneal
To heat a metal until it is soft for working, followed by gradual cooling to strengthen or temper the metal.

Antiphonary
A choral book containing the music used in the Divine Office, the cycle of daily devotions of the year. The musical counterpart to the breviary.

Antique Laid Paper
The type of paper produced in Western Europe until roughly the middle of the 18th century is referred to as antique laid, or laid and chain or simply, laid. Paper type relates directly to the paper mould that was in use at this time. Early Western European paper was handmade on a rigid mould consisting of a rectangular wooden frame with a fixed wire cover. The cover was made from drawn copper wire. Closely spaced laid wires that ran parallel to the long, horizontal side of the mould were woven/tied to vertically oriented, shorter chain wires. Chain wires were more widely spaced at fairly regular intervals and provided rigidity and stability to the laid wires. On the underside of the mould cover, oriented parallel to the chain wires and short side of the mould, were wooden ribs. The wooden ribs also lent rigidity and support to the mould cover and their placement and spacing generally matched that of the chain wires. Wires shaped into various designs/symbols could be sewn or tied to the wire cover to impart a watermark in the final sheet. The final basic component of the rigid mould was a removable wooden collar called a deckle. This was carefully constructed to fit snugly around the top of the mould, covering approximately 2cm on all four sides. The purpose of the deckle was to prevent the wet paper pulp from running off the edges of the mould cover. Apparently, in order to do the intended job, the deckle had to be manufactured with more skill and precision than the mould itself! The raw material for making paper was rags - old discarded clothing and miscellaneous textiles made from linen and hemp primarily. Rags were first sorted, then retted (a fermenting and soaking process) and finally beaten into a homogenous pulp. The pulp was dispersed in vats of water to form a loose slurry of well-hydrated fibers (called stuff). The wooden mould with the deckle firmly in place was grasped along the short sides of the mold and drawn through the stuff so that the rib

Aperture
A device controlling the amount of light that enters a camera through its lens. The aperture, a measured opening, usually has the form of overlapping thin metal leaves arranged in a circle. A mechanical device, it can be made to open and close.

Applied color
Color applied by hand in the form of paint or dyes to black-and-white photographs to alter details and achieve various effects. Artists can add color using brushes, cotton swabs, or airbrushes. A photographer can brighten and lighten highlights of the print and increase tonal range by applying color. As early as 1842, hand coloring started with Daguerreotypes.

Aquatint
Fine particles of acid-resistant resin are deposited on the plate and heated so they adhere to the surface. The plate is immersed in acid which bites into the plate in tiny pools around each particle. The tiny depressions retain the ink and when printed give the effect of a soft grain similar to watercolor.

Armet
A helmet completely encasing the head, with hinged, movable cheekpieces overlapping on the chin, and a visor; replaced by the close helmet in the sixteenth century.

Arquebus
A light form of handgun used by European infantries throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Artist's proof
A specified number of prints from the first run of a negative that are reserved for the artist's personal use.

Assembly process color print
Commonly known as carbro prints (from carbon and bromide) and most frequently used to create bright, vivid color images for advertising from 1919 until the early 1940s. The carbro process is based on the addition of dyes to the carbon printing process, a highly complicated procedure involving as many as eighty steps. A further evolution of this process, the three-color carbro print was introduced by D. A. Spencer in 1935. In this process three individual negatives are made by shooting one each through a red, a green, or a blue filter. From these negatives three bromide prints are made, each still retaining the color from its original filter, which are then transferred onto separate, thin gelatin tissues. The tissues (color separations) are stacked in careful alignment on a base paper to produce one full-color, permanent image.

Attribution
The assignment of a work of art to a particular artist, based upon the close study of traits, characteristics, and stylistic evidence. An attribution can be made by comparing a work to others that have been unequivocally assigned to the artist, based on solid evidence such as a signature.

Augustine
Christian Saint and perhaps the Church's most celebrated and influential theologian. Born at Tagaste in Numidia in 354 A.D.

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