Snow Effect Analysis

The application of color and paint in a piece creates a noticeable surface texture within the work. This surface texture can be used to enhance the general chaos or conversely the straightforwardness of a work. The use of color within the image also has an effect on the overall mood of the painting and the viewer’s perception of the subjects. In Claude Monet’s Grainstacks (Snow Effect) the heavily textured surface of the painting and visibility of the separate brush strokes creates a sense of complexity, which along with the practice of keeping colors separate, adds to the visual depth of an otherwise very plain subject but still enforces the general mood of the painting. On the other hand in Kingstein’s Christ in a Pawn Shop the surface texture …show more content…
In all of the paintings there are one or two grainstacks in a variety of different weather and light conditions . Grainstacks (Snow Effect) is, as the title suggests, a representation of two grainstacks, one larger and closer to the viewer and one smaller farther away grainstack slightly behind the first, painted after a snowstorm has partially covered them in snow. The majority of the canvas is covered in varying shades of white with other hues added lightly to denote the sky, background trees and vegetation, and the ground below the grainstacks. The only objects of notable color are the grainstacks, which are painted darkly with brown and yellow then covered with small areas of white on top to represent the snow. The grainstack’s shadows are represented by a light blue color against the white snowy ground. Johan Kingstein’s Christ in a Pawn Shop is an image of a collection of seemingly random items around a central figure of a crucifix statue. Around the figure of Christ there are a variety of colors and shapes that are especially abundant and brighter in the top corners of the painting as though illuminated by overhead lighting in the shop. In the shadow of the large Christ figure close to the absolute center of the canvas is the face of a man wearing a monocle. Despite the central placement of this figure, the darker unadorned area under the crucifix obscures it. The overall sense of the painting, as a result of the shear number of things in it and the dark shades interspersed with high saturation colors, is very chaotic and unsettling for the viewer who isn’t sure where to look or how to divide their attention to the different subjects in the