Apse -  a large, semicircular or polygonal and usually vaulted niche, protruding from the end wall of a building in a Christian Church; it contains the alter.

Arch - in architecture, a curved structural element that spans an open space.  Built from wedge-shaped stone blocks.

Art Nouveau - a French term meaning 'new art,' refers to a style of architecture, decorative art and some painting and sculpture popular around 1900.  Even though the style was then thought of as new art, it was adjusted from older styles of art forms, especially from the Gothic and Rococo styles as well as from arts of Java and Japan.  The movement was inspired by Celtic manuscripts and the drawings of William Blake.

Basilica - a large, rectangular building often built with a clerestory and side aisles seperated from the center nave by colonnades.

Bourgeois Realism - Bourgeois is a French term used to define the middle class.  Bourgeois Realism is a term used to define the realistic style used to portray the people/values/behaviors of the middle class.

Byzantine Art - was the art of the Eastern Roman Empire.  The capital was in Constantinople (now called Istanbul) from 330 AD to 1450 AD.  Paintings and mosaics are characterized by the rich use of color and the figures seem flat and stiff, sometimes appearing to be floating in air and have large eyes.  The background is usually solid gold or toned.

Carolingian Period - The dynasty named for Charlemagne (Charles the great, 768-814).  The Carolingians were Franks, a Germanic people, who had settled in northern Gaul at the end of the 5th Century.

Chevet - the eastermost end of an oriented church, including the crossing.

Classical Baroque - a form of art derived from the study of Baroque.  Baroque succeeded mannerism, lasting well into the 18th century.

Clerestory - the topmost zone of a wall with windows, when it extends above any abutting aisles or secondary roofs.  Provides direct light into central interior.

Crossing - the space in a cruiciform church formed by the intersection of the nave and the transept.

Colonnades - a sequence or row of columns, supporting a straight lintel or a series of arches.

Cross-ribbed vaults - a cross or groin vault is created by the intersection of two barrell vaults (a continuous semicircular vault) of equal size.  A ribbed vault is found when the joining of curved sides of a groin vault is demarcated by a raised rib.

Cruciform Church - a term describing anything that is cross-shaped.  Typical plan of Gothic churches.

Cubism - an abstract art movement of the early 20th Century, initiated by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque; in painting, a means of representing volume in a two-dimensional plane without resorting to the illusion of depth as usually developed within the picture space; in sculpture, in Africa, Oceania, and Alaska, cubistic form was used at much earlier dates.  Examples.

Empiricism - is the name of a broad tradition in Western philosophy.  The term comes from the Greek empeiria, meaning "experience."  The basic thesis of empiricism is that legitimate human knowledge arises from what is provided to the mind by the senses or by introspective awareness through experience.  It is distinguished from the philosophical tradition of rationalism, which holds that human reason apart from experience is a basis for some kinds of knowledge.  Aristotle is sometimes said to be the founder of the empiricist tradition.  So, art forms express experience, whether it be in painting or sculpture.

Expressionism - a 20th Century art movement that turned away from the representation of nature and to the expression of emotional intensity, characterized by bold distortions of form and violent color; forerunners were Vincent Van Gogh and the Fauves.  Other such artists were Georges Ronault, James Ensor, Marc Chagall, and Emil Nolde.  Examples.

Facade - the face or front wall of a building.

Fauvism - a style popular from 1905-1908, characterized by brilliant color, expressive brushwork, and flat composition - as in Matisse's "The Green Stripe, Portrait of Mme. Matisse."  Paintings moved from the spontaneous and exuberant use of color that characterized Fauvism to a more decorative formalism.  Although Fauvism was a short-lived movement, it was very influential, for they represented the first break with the artistic traditions of the past.  The movement's emphasis on formal values and expressive use of color, line, and brushwork helped liberate painting from the representational expectations that had dominated Western art since the Renaissance.  Examples.

Flying buttresses -  A buttress is a mass of masonry or brickwork used as a support or brace counteracting the outward thrust of an arch or vault; used in Gothic Cathedrals.  A flying buttress is a buttrress that reaches over a side aisle to support the heavy stone roof of a Cathedral.

Fresco - a painting technique in which water-based pigments are applied to a surface of wet plaster.  Murals made by this technique are called frescoes.

Futurism - an artistic movement founded in Italy in 1909, as a glorification of machinery, speed, and violence; followed the color approach of neo-impressionists; important artists were Boccioni, Balla, Carra, and Severini.  Examples.

Gothic - pertaining to European art and architecture, between the 12th-15th Centuries.  The building style emphasizes pointed arches, cross-ribbed vaults, and flying buttresses.   The scope was monumental in scale, with much ornamentation.  Gothic painting emphasizes human qualities striving for classical ideals.

Gothic Revival - a style of architecture that dominated the building activity of the mid-19th Century Europe and United States, originating in the mid-18th Century.  Vogue for 'gothick' architecture fantasies.  Considered a Christian style, Gothic was considered superior to the classical revival style popular in the early 19th Century.  Forerunners of this style: John Ruskin, Augustus Pugin and Richard Upjohn.

High Renaissance - the climax of the Renaissance art, about 1500-1525.  Painting reached its peak of technical mastery.  Italian art attained the High Renaissance ideal of harmony and balance within the framework of classical realism.  Forefunners: DaVinci and Raphael.

Impressionism - an art movement beginning in France in the 1870's, founded by an individualistic group of artists including, among others, Claude Monet, Auguste Renoir, Alfred Sisley and Camille Pissarro; all concerned themselves mainly with the components of light and the immediate visual impression of a scene using unconnected colors that were to be mixed by the eye; bright colors and bold brushwork were often used to achieve these impressions.  Examples.

International Style - a form of architecture consisting of an emphasis on volume over form, asymmetrical compositions, and avoidance of ornamentation.  These elements produced this style in response to a century-long search for an architectural style suited to modern materials (steel, glass & concrete), and engineering techniques, freed from borrowed forms.  Founders of this style include: C. Philip Johnson and Bertram Goodhue.

Lintel - a horizonal element of any material carried by 2 or more vertical supports to form an opening.

Lunette - a semi-circular wall area, framed by an arch over a door or window.

Mannerism - a style of painting in Italy and France about 1520-1600, marked by emotional distortion, harsh coloring, and individualism, said to be a reaction to the art of the High Renaissance; major artists were El Greco and Tintoretto.  Examples.

Miniature Painting - very small pictures, usually about 4x4 inches or 5x7 inches.  At first, portrait miniatures were painted on vellum, then usually pasted on cards to give them strength and to prevent them from wrinkling.  Such miniatures held incredable detail from artists such as: Holbein the Younger, Isaac Oliver and Samuel Cooper.  By the end of the 17th Century, ivory replaced vellum and greater inovations were created by the Venetian miniaturist Rosalba Carriera.

Mosaic - images formed by small, colored stones or glass pieces called tesserae, affixed to a hard, stable surface - usually plaster.

Narthex - the rectangular vestibule at the main (usually western) entrance to a church.

Nave - the rectangular central aisle of a basilica, 2 or 3 stories high and flanked by aisles.

Neoclassicism - a movement which originated in Rome in the 18th Century.  It rose partly in reaction against the excesses of Baroque and Rococo.  Neoclassicism differs from all the earlier classic revivals in that for the first time, artists consciously imitated antique art and knew what they were initiating, both in style and in subject matter.  Artists of this were James Barry, Antonio Canova, John Flaxman, and Anton Raffael Mengs.  Examples.

Neoimpressionism - a French art movement in the 1880-1890's under  the leadership of Georges Seurat and Paul Signac.  Based on scientific study of color and the systematic division of tone.  Examples.

Niche - a hollow or recess in a wall or other solid architectural element.

Norman Architecture - the Gothic period was marked by a reassertion of English cultural identity following the imposition of Norman French culture in 1066.  Norman architecture was characterized by imposing height, solid Romanesque walls, French Cathedral facades and tall nave arcade surmounted by short galleries.

Ottonian Art - after the Carolingian Period broke up when it was divided among heirs of Louis the Pious.  They controled the eastern portion of the empire (modern Germany & Austria) during the 10th Century; named for Otto I (936-973), Otto II (973-983), and Otto III (983-1002).

Perpendicular Gothic - is the last of England's medieval architectural styles, originating in London about 1300, through about 1485.  Primarily used in church architecture, it provides an extraordinary unity of design throughout the interior, through the repetition of a single standard module - consisting of an upright traceried rectangle - that served for both wall paneling and window tracery, allowing for windows of immense size.

Portraiture - is the art of depicting specific human individuals as themselves.  The goal was to capture the personality of the individual as well as to get a realistic physical likeness.

Postimpressionism - a term generally relating to the paintings of four artists: Cezanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Seurat, from about 1875 to 1900;  they accepted the impressionists' use of light with bright colors and conspicuous paint handling, but rejected the casual compositional structure of the impressionists.  Examples.

Postwar Abstraction - 1950-1960's Italian artwork done by Lucio Fontana, Renato Birolli, Alberto Burri and Emilio Vedova.

Realism - a way of painting nature without distortion; the philosophy of painting, led by Coubet, centered on unidealized, everyday subject matter.  Examples.

Rococo - a delicate, light-hearted and elegant style based on asymmetrical natural forms.  An 18th Century style of art and decoration with a concern for the trivial rather than the significant; colorful and capricious, closely linked historically with the fashionable reign of Louis XV of France; the style was in reaction against the oppressive formality of French classical baroque.  Artists include: Watteau, Boucher, Fragonard, and Tiepolo.

Romanesque - meaning "in the Roman manner;" medieval European style of architecture, consisting of solid masonry walls, rounded arches, and masonry vaults, characteristic of Roman Imperial buildings.

Surrealism (aka: Magic realism) - a type of painting of the 20th Century where almost photographic realism is achieved.  Sometimes the realism is combined with the fantastic through strangely related subject materials and mysterious light-source treatment; creating metaphysical effects reminiscent of de Chirico and others.  Examples.

Tesserae - the small pieces of stone, glass, or other object that is pieced together with many others to create a mosaic.

Tracery - the thin stone or wooden bars in a Gothic window, screen, or pannel, which create an elaborate decorative matrix or pattern.

Transept - the arm of a cruciform church, perpendicular to the nave.  The point where the nave and transept cross is called the crossing.  Beyond the crossing lies the sanctuary, whether apse, choir, or chevet.

Vault - an arched, masonry structure covering, that spans an interior space.

Vellum - a fine animal skin prepared for writing and painting.