Skip navigation

Main menu

  • What's on
  • Art & Artists
    • The Collection
      Artists
      Artworks
      Art by theme
      Media
      Videos
      Podcasts
      Short articles
      Learning
      Art Terms
      Tate Research
      Student resources
      Art Making
      Create like an artist
      Kids art activities
      Tate Draw game
  • Visit
  • Shop
Become a Member
  • DISCOVER ART
  • ARTISTS A-Z
  • ARTWORK SEARCH
  • ART BY THEME
  • VIDEOS
  • ART TERMS
  • STUDENT RESOURCES
  • TATE KIDS
  • RESEARCH
  • Tate Britain
    Tate Britain Free admission
  • Tate Modern
    Tate Modern Free admission
  • Tate Liverpool + RIBA North
    Tate Liverpool + RIBA North Free admission
  • Tate St Ives
    Tate St Ives Ticket or membership card required
  • FAMILIES
  • ACCESSIBILITY
  • SCHOOLS
  • PRIVATE TOURS
Tate Logo
Become a Member

Art Terms

  • A
  • B
  • C
  • D
  • E
  • F
  • G
  • H
  • I
  • J
  • K
  • L
  • M
  • N
  • O
  • P
  • Q
  • R
  • S
  • T
  • U
  • V
  • W
  • X
  • Y
  • Z
  • 0-9

Showing 1–30 of 41 art terms

Art Term

Salon

Originally the name of the official art exhibitions organised by the French Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture (Académie Royale …

Learn more
Art Term

Sampling

In its most basic form sampling simply re-processes existing culture, usually technologically, in much the same way a collage does

Learn more
Art Term

School of Altamira

Avant-garde art school (Academia Altamira) in Buenos Aires, Argentina, founded in 1946 with the aim of promoting the idea that …

Learn more
Art Term

School of London

School of London was a term invented by artist R.B. Kitaj to describe a group of London-based artists who were …

Learn more
Art Term

School of Paris

In the early years of the twentieth century, Paris became a magnet for artists from all over the world and …

Learn more
Art Term

Scottish Colourists

Group of four Scottish artists, who were among the first to introduce the intense colour of the French fauve movement …

Learn more
Art Term

Screenprint

A variety of stencil printing, using a screen made from fabric (silk or synthetic) stretched tightly over a frame

Learn more
Art Term

Sculpture

Three-dimensional art made by one of four basic processes: carving, modelling, casting, constructing

Learn more
Art Term

Scuola romana

Scuola romana (School of Rome) is an umbrella term for the artists based in Rome, or having close links with …

Learn more
Art Term

Secession

The breaking away of younger and more radical artists from an existing academy or art group to form a new …

Learn more
Art Term

Serial art

Serial art is art that adheres to a strict set of rules to determine its composition or to determine a …

Learn more
Art Term

Significant form

Term coined by art critic Clive Bell in 1914 to describe the idea that the form of an artwork or …

Learn more
Art Term

Simulacrum

A term from Greek Platonic philosophy that meant a copy of a copy of an ideal form

Learn more
Art Term

Simultanism

Term invented by artist Robert Delaunay to describe the abstract painting developed by him and his wife Sonia Delaunay from …

Learn more
Art Term

Site-specific

The term site-specific refers to a work of art designed specifically for a particular location and that has an interrelationship …

Learn more
Art Term

Situationist International

Revolutionary alliance of European avant-garde artists, writers and poets formed at a conference in Italy in 1957 (as Internationale Situationiste …

Learn more
Art Term

Socialist realism

A form of modern realism imposed in Russia by Stalin following his rise to power after the death of Lenin …

Learn more
Art Term

Socially engaged practice

Socially engaged practice describes art that is collaborative, often participatory and involves people as the medium or material of the …

Learn more
Art Term

Social realism

Refers to any realist painting that also carries a clearly discernible social or political comment

Learn more
Art Term

Social sculpture

Social sculpture is a theory developed by the artist Joseph Beuys in the 1970s based on the concept that everything …

Learn more
Art Term

Social turn

Social turn was first used in 2006 to describe the recent return to socially engaged art that is collaborative, often …

Learn more
Art Term

Solarisation

Technique that involves exposing a partially developed photograph to light, before continuing processing, creating halo-like effects

Learn more
Art Term

Sound art

Art which uses sound both as its medium (what it is made out of) and as its subject (what it …

Learn more
Art Term

Spazialismo

Italian movement started by the Argentine-born Italian artist Lucio Fontana in 1947 who, in its manifesto, stated that art should …

Learn more
Art Term

Spiral

Spiral was a New York based African American collective formed in 1963 with the aim of addressing how African American …

Learn more
Art Term

Stars group

Stars group were a short-lived avant-garde group of self-taught artists operating in Beijing between 1979 and 1983, staging outdoor exhibitions, …

Learn more
Art Term

Still life

One of the principal genres (subject types) of Western art – essentially, the subject matter of a still life painting …

Learn more
Art Term

St Ives School

Although they did not see themselves as part of a group or school, the term St Ives School is often …

Learn more
Art Term

St John’s Wood clique

A loose association of painters who lived in the St John’s Wood area of London in the 1870s and 1880s, …

Learn more
Art Term

Street art

Street art is related to graffiti art in that it is created in public locations and is usually unsanctioned, but …

Learn more
Close

Join in

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • YouTube
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
Sign up to emails

Sign up to emails

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Tate’s privacy policy

About

  • About us
  • Our collection
  • Terms and copyright
  • Governance
  • Picture library
  • ARTIST ROOMS
  • Tate Kids

Support

  • Tate Collective
  • Members
  • Patrons
  • Donate
  • Corporate
  • My account
  • Press
  • Jobs
  • Accessibility
  • Privacy
  • Cookies
  • Contact