Breaking the Artists’ Mould What happens when artists break the Order of Things? Every historical period is characterised by a
shifts of landscape art from the past 200 years:
fundamental paradigm, or episteme, and every
Firstly, by focusing on the works of Romanticist
historical movement either begins with or
artist J.M.W. Turner, and secondly by linking
brings about one or several paradigm shifts. In
this to the works and ethos of Fauvist artist
art especially, these paradigm shifts are visible
André Derain. In my analysis I will be referring
in how representation of a subject or a context
to several of their respective artworks, as well as
can change over time, often with just one
referring to artworks from their contemporaries
person or a select group of people kindling
and their forerunners The methods used by
these shifts in perception and representation.
these artists in their paintings demonstrates the ways in which they broke the Order of Things
Many critics and historians attempt to contextualise these paradigm shifts by searching along a timeline for their
that had come before them, shaping art and representation and the way we as viewers perceive it, for ever.
fundamental cause or starting point. However, linearity is far from the only way of exploring
My starting point when considering this was
this, and in fact only started being the more
Foucault’s own analysis of Las Meninas
common method in the late 19th century/after
(published as a preface to The Order of Things),
the 19th century.
a 1656 painting by Diego Velázquez of the Royal family of Philip IV of Spain, and one of the most analysed paintings of Western art history. Foucault’s study illustrates how
By following on from the theories of French Post-Structuralist philosopher Michel Foucault, specifically those explored in his 1966 book Les
Mots Et Les Choses: Une Archéologie des Sciences Humaines (translated into English as “The Order of Things”, 1970) , this essay aims to examine two of the most powerful paradigm
Velázquez’s painting came to be at a time when visual representation was drastically altering in the Western art world from depicting resemblances to curating representation. As stated by Foucault (1966, pp. 3-18) Velázquez manages to capture this moment of change in his painting, where he re-creates the order of