Looking at Art, Step 5: Analyzing

Let’s review what we’ve learned about looking at art.

When we stand in front of a piece of art, remember the following steps:

• Step 1, Basic Information: What can I learn or guess about this art based on the title, artist, and year?
• Step 2, Describing: What exactly am I looking at? What do I see in the background? 
• Step 3, Symbolism: Are any of the things I see symbols that mean something deeper? How does that affect the meaning of the artwork? 
• Step 4, Mood: What is the overall mood of the painting? When I look at the colors, the symbols, and other parts of the artwork, how do they make me feel, and why? What could the mood mean for the meaning of the artwork?

It’s important to remember that these steps are not set in stone. Not every work of art will have symbols. Sometimes you may not know much about the artist or what’s shown in the composition. Sometimes works of art don’t even have a title! It’s alright to not have all of the information, though. Looking at and understanding art is a lifelong practice, and a skill that you can hone as you learn more about history, literature, science, music, and art. This is simply the beginning!

Let’s practice putting all of these steps together with the following print:

• Step 1: The title is The Bassist. We know that a bassist is someone who plays a musical instrument called the bass, which is usually a large stringed instrument often played in classical and jazz music. The artist is David C. Driskell, and we know he frequently painted African Americans and topics related to African American life and culture. Jazz music originated with African American musicians. The print was created in 2006. 

• Step 2: This print is busy and very colorful, but we can make out an African American man playing an upright bass. His fingers are on the neck of the bass, where the strings are. The background is difficult to make out, but there are leaves in the bottom left corner and the top left corner. 

• Step 3: There aren’t any easily identifiable symbols in this print. It’s possible Driskell incorporated symbolism into this artwork, but viewers don’t always pick up on the symbols. 

• Step 4: This print is very colorful. There are lots of yellows, oranges, reds, greens, and blues. Individually, the yellows, oranges, and reds convey a vibrant, happy, and energetic mood. This contrasts with the normal moods associated with blues and greens, but since the predominant colors are the yellows, oranges, and reds, we’ll stick with the vibrant, happy, and energetic mood. Also, the lines in this print are all over the place - it’s a very busy print. Near the bassist’s hands and arms, there are curves that make it look like the musician is moving - like he’s playing the music as we’re looking at the print. This aligns with the energetic mood we observed earlier. 

By putting all of these pieces of information together, here’s what we can say about Driskell’s The Bassist: This print depicts an African American man joyfully and energetically playing an upright bass. The vibrant colors and lines showing movement lead us to believe the bassist is playing jazz music, meaning that this work can be read as a happy celebration of African American music and culture.

Test Yourself 

Now try the process for yourself. Follow the four steps, and then put all the information together.

• Step 1, Basic Information: What can I learn or guess about this art based on the title, artist, and year?
• Step 2, Describing: What exactly am I looking at? What do I see in the background? 
• Step 3, Symbolism: Are any of the things I see symbols that mean something deeper? How does that affect the meaning of the artwork? 
• Step 4, Mood: What is the overall mood of the drawing? When I look at the colors, the symbols, and other parts of the artwork, how do they make me feel, and why? What could the mood mean for the meaning of the artwork?

What can you make of Railroad Bridge, Talladega?