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English art
Overview of the art of England / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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English art is the body of visual arts made in England. England has Europe's earliest and northernmost ice-age cave art.[1] Prehistoric art in England largely corresponds with art made elsewhere in contemporary Britain, but early medieval Anglo-Saxon art saw the development of a distinctly English style,[2] and English art continued thereafter to have a distinct character. English art made after the formation in 1707 of the Kingdom of Great Britain may be regarded in most respects simultaneously as art of the United Kingdom.
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Medieval English painting, mainly religious, had a strong national tradition and was influential in Europe.[3] The English Reformation, which was antipathetic to art, not only brought this tradition to an abrupt stop but resulted in the destruction of almost all wall-paintings.[4][5] Only illuminated manuscripts now survive in good numbers.[6]
There is in the art of the English Renaissance a strong interest in portraiture, and the portrait miniature was more popular in England than anywhere else.[7] English Renaissance sculpture was mainly architectural and for monumental tombs.[8] Interest in English landscape painting had begun to develop by the time of the 1707 Act of Union.[9]
Substantive definitions of English art have been attempted by, among others, art scholar Nikolaus Pevsner (in his 1956 book The Englishness of English Art),[10] art historian Roy Strong (in his 2000 book The Spirit of Britain: A narrative history of the arts)[11] and critic Peter Ackroyd (in his 2002 book Albion).[12]