artist
/ˈɑːtɪst
/noun
1A person who creates paintings or drawings as a profession or hobby.There he met all the other famous artists like Henri Matisse, Joan Miro and George Braques....
- Cubist painting gave to artists complete freedom to deal with reality in art in any way they chose.
- One bathroom featured a Thai Buddha while others were hung with paintings by artists such as Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo.
Synonyms
creator, originator, designer, producer, fine artist;
old master
literary begetter
1.1A person who practises or performs any of the creative arts, such as a sculptor, film-maker, actor, or dancer.Creative artists, screenwriters and filmmakers will need time to figure it out too....
- Also, they all work in creative fields - artists, musicians, writers, architectural photographers, cartoonists.
- The WSF was in some ways like a circus - a huge performing act with many artists, acrobats, entertainers.
1.2A person skilled at a particular task or occupation: a surgeon who is an artist with the scalpel...
- This was of course without the skilled crew of artists and technicians special effects departments deploy today.
- Yes, his squad of highly skilled artists can weave beautiful patterns and cut a poor defence to ribbons, but we knew that anyway.
- We have two positions for artists skilled in modelling and texturing.
Synonyms
expert, master, maestro, past master, adept, virtuoso, genius, old hand, skilled person
informal pro, ace, whizz, wizard, hotshot, ninja
British informal dab hand
North American informal maven, crackerjack
rare proficient
2 [with modifier] informal A person who habitually practises a specified reprehensible activity: rip-off artists...
- All too regularly we carry stories detailing how con artists and thieves swindled and stole from householders.
- The ex-husband, on the other hand, is one of those cardboard cutout con artist crooks whose rather simple death is more decent than he deserves.
- The scheme, supported by the Evening Advertiser, was set up in Wroughton, a burglary hotspot, in August 2002 to combat the activities of con artists.
Origin
Early 16th century (denoting a master of the liberal arts): from French artiste, from Italian artista, from arte 'art', from Latin ars, art-.