Bleron Samarxhiu
Comparing and Contrasting two works of art from the Museum of Modern Art.
Rue de la Santé by Yves Tanguy and The Wedding by Louis Vivin are two paintings created on the same year: 1925. Despite this remarkable similarity, they are significantly different in the amount of detail, the colors used, and the overall subject shown. Rude de la Santé combines color and the use of light to portray a modern and secular view of a city. The Weddings uses cliché colors and simplicity to depict an average wedding that took place a few centuries ago.
Rue de la Santé by Yves Tanguy can more be recognized as modern. Clearly, there is no mention of religion in it whatsoever. The oil on canvas features a conspicuous avenue that leads up to another street and that is very wide and centered in the painting. This modern road or street obviously is in a city and it makes use of different shades of gray along the road. Because of this, one can also make note of Tanguy’s strokes on the street. The use of light in the painting is odd but interesting. On the left side, lighter shades of gray are used, and most likely the sun is shining on each building on this side of the street, clearly allowing to distinguish the buildings. Each building in this case clearly has its own color and height and few have shadows. On the right side, the avenue uses darker shades of gray and the large building that encompasses the entire block is blacked out. It is unknown if a large cloud is causing this blackout or if the artist is proposing that this side of the street is under nighttime. Yet the entire sky is cloudy and appears to be still under daytime. The perspective is somewhat distorted in the painting, not making it clear if the viewer is looking at a hill or if the buildings have been crookedly built. Tanguy in his artwork pays less attention to detail and focuses more on use of color and light.
In The Wedding by Louis Vivin, the viewer can immediately notice the amount of time it took to paint every visible brick of the structures. The roads on which pedestrians walk are a simple, dull color. Yet this painting uses a perspective that is more realistic and more appealing to the human eye. There are much more people on the street, probably because there is a wedding, and because the painting shows a scene from more than three hundred years ago, the scene portrays the center of a small town that is heavily involved in religion. The colors used for the buildings and used in general are less varying. In other words, colors were reused for other buildings, making the work of art less appealing to the other one. In fact, the reusing of the color yellow throughout the buildings and the windows hurts the eyes. Almost every building is identical; that includes windows, chimneys, and height. Furthermore, there is no notice that the painter put significant effort to the amount of light in the painting. It seems that this is an average wedding taking place in the town square with the sun shining at the entire scene and revealing no shadow. Vivin maintains simplicity throughout his artwork by reusing standard colors and plain structures.
Possible reasons why the two paintings are significantly contrasting is because Tanguy was born about four decades later than Vivin was. Other reasons include that fact that the works of art were possibly painted at different locations, one in the United States and the other in France. In addition, the fact that this is modern art gives the artist practically less restraints on what to create.
In comparison, both paintings are oil on canvas finished in 1925. In fact, Yves Tanguy and Louis Vivin are of French descent, Vivin being French and born in France and Tanguy being American and born in France. The two works of art show these significantly large buildings or structures that tower over pedestrians. Visually, both are nearly the same general dimensions. Within the actual painting, neither of the artists concentrated on creating a impressive sky. Both artists use a simple color for the sky and cover it with clouds. Each artwork’s features are more contrasting than similar.
