The History Of Art Essay Example For Students

The History Of Art Essay The multifaceted and complex intricacies that are woven throughout the centuries in art are unrealistic to attempt in this format. Therefore, because the focus for the majority of the focus throughout history has been on the humanistic form the concentration will be on that. Art was the first written language and to study the history of art is to study the history of civilizations and humankind. The Paleolithic cave paintings in France, when viewed in the modern western perspective can only be speculated at as to the intent and/or purpose of the original artisans. Perhaps the paintings of animals were the focal point of a religious ceremony or ritual, surveyed before the hunt, to bring success or perhaps part of a celebration or documentation after the successful hunt. It appears that art from the earliest history into the Renaissance focuses around religious ceremonies of some type. Plato believed art to be a form of communication on a metaphysical level. The modern western view of art appears to support his supposition in this regard. However, his student Aristotle felt that art was a reflection and invocation derived from the scientific forms of nature. Clearly, his ideology does not fit into the Ancient World’s artistic representations. As art evolves throughout history it intersects with Aristotle’s philosophy although not for many centuries will we begin to see his naturalistic/scientific theory evolve. Human beings are born, live, and held prisoners of their bodies. Since the beginning of time, the human form has been represented in pictorial depictions. Representation of animals and nature appear to only be depicted in ways to enhance the human race; either through religious, mystical, hunting charms, or whatever the themes all center around humans. The form does take on specific significance when viewed in the context of history and culture. The Venus of Willendorf is the earliest officially dated sculpture know to the modern western world yet she is far different from the Aegeans’ Cycladic figures known as the Minoan age. Yet both figurines the full-figured Willendorf and the slender Cycladic figure are interpreted by modern scholars to represent their cultures mythological belief in aiding the deities if their time period in reproduction. Without the scientific knowledge of later generations, it is assumed that these figures were representations to invoke fertility. Mesopotamia art was centered in what are now Iran and Iraq. The developing cultures (Assyrians, Sumerians, Babylonians, etc) in the area, between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, which is sometimes called the Cradle of Civilization or the Fertile Crescent, are credited with the invention of cuneiform writing which is shown to us in the Stele (law code) of Hamarabi. Within these cultures, rulers often conferred with the religious leaders and religion was an important part of their society. The unique character of Sumerian art is exemplified by a group of votive statues from the Abu Temple, at Tell Asmar. The identities of these statues are unclear. However, it is an educated theory that they served Abu, God of vegetation, and they represent priests, and worshipers. There is no indication that these figures were intended to represent a naturalistic scheme. It is important to note that the symbolization is that of the human form and representative of some form of authoritarian hierarchy. Tracking the human form and its relationship to art, history, and culture as the human figure evolves through the centuries as artists perfect their talents is an effective way to establish how art has evolved throughout all culture and eras. The architecture form the ancient world throughout history also reflects the cultures religious beliefs and in most civilizations was designed with humankind in mind. The erection of the citadels during the Mesopotamia historical era is built to provide protection of the temples and palaces. They are decorated in relief and personify power, religious themes, and the cultural beliefs about the human form and its relationship to the universe. The Human-Headed winged lion from Nimrud is the perfect example. The tremendous stone slabs are carved into enormous human-headed winged beasts, a bull, and a lion. The lion wears a horned cap indicating divine status, while the animal’s body is endowed with a device unique to the Mesopotamia art style. It has five legs, so that from the front it appears motionless. However, from the side view it implies the figure is walking. The impression of intimidation and formability radiates from the citadel. Egyptian art radiates the directive of continuity, a seamless stretch of time that reaches back to infinity, yet forward into history all at once. The Sphinx serves much the same purpose for the Egyptians as the citadel depictions did for the Mesopotamian era. It symbolizes stability, intimidation, protection, order, and endurance. It was built about 2530 B. C. E. The Sphinx faces the sun and is massive in height. It has the body of a reclining lion and the head of a man, most likely the Pharaoh Chefren. In the Egyptian culture, the Pharaoh was God and the body and soul were one so it was essential to preserve the body. A Pharaoh might spend all of his lifetime constructing a temple, or pyramid, so that his remains, along with those of his family, would remain intact for throughout time. Hieroglyphics were the written language. Although an exaggeration Plato stated that Egyptian art had remained the same for ten thousand years. There are many consistencies throughout Egyptian art that have remained stable and virtually unchanged. Aristotle’s scientific and math theories are represented in much of the Egyptian art and architecture. The pyramids and sculptures used scientific knowledge and mathematical skill, portraying logical balance and symmetry. The Seated Scribe is a typical representation of the Egyptian sculpture. The sculpture is indicative of reverence to the perfection of the human form showing intelligence and reverence at once. Egyptian painting reveals the same clear visual motifs and illustrative skills that the architecture and sculptures do. Their love of exact detail, meticulous depiction, and biological precision are constants throughout their history. The use of the hierarchical scale to enhance important figures and representing men in a dark red complexion and women in a lighter yellowish coloration attests to their dedication to true representation. The artistic culture of the Aegean parallels in time those of Egypt and the Mesopotamia eras about 3000 B. C. E. The Cycladic, Minoan, and the Mycenaean cultures are the three most prominent in the Grecian area. Historians know little about the Cycladic civilization except the nude female figure mentioned earlier believed to have been a fertility symbol of some type and the Harp Player. The Harp Player is carved in marble and so life like that the viewer is left with the impression that he is actually playing his instrument. The artist lengthened the harpist arms so that they curve into the harp itself. The arms are subtly muscular. The piece is as highly stylized and the essence of shape is clear as with the Cycladic female figurines. The Minoan culture living in Crete were skilled painters. Numerous frescos have survived. The cheerful, happy go lucky, and humorousness of society is represented in them. The Toreador Fresco features a bull thought to be a special animal to them. The human figures in the fresco are animated and performing various feats and activities that lend the impression of game and fun. The composition is well-balanced and beautifully graceful curves. The Snake Goddess is thought to be a priestess or queen of the Minoans. The little terra cotta sculpture has wiggling snakes in her hands leading some historians to speculate on the possibility of some form of religious statue, because of the belief that the Minoans’ worshiped a female deity. Like the Mycenaeans’ they built temples and palaces. However the Mycenaeans flourished in about 1600 to 1100 B. C. E. and are noted for their elaborate tombs. The Mycenaeans’ were master goldsmiths and used gold for jewelry, masks, utensils, weapons, and decoration for architectural structures. The Rhton drinking cup is beautifully constructed in the shape of a lions head contrasting smooth planar sections and extremely detailed nose and mane. The Indian subcontinent called the Indus Valley burgeoned around 2700 –1500 B. C. E. Relatively few artworks have been unearthed from this civilization so little is known of them. The torso from Harappa is made of stone and is only about four inches high but it gives an insight into the civilization that so little is known about. The well formed muscular composition and naturalistic form brings the piece alive. A Raisin In The Sun Essay ConclusionArtists draw from the myths of the Greek and Roman eras, landscapes, and portrait painting is done along with religious art. However, the form and aliveness of the subject matter into tangible expression is a noted difference. Continuous narrative themes surfaced and depth and light were utilized in new and exciting ways. Donatello’s St. Mark sculpture is so life like it looks like it could walk right off the cathedral wall and Giotto’s The Lamenation in fresco show psychological and emotional reactions that have the same effect. His use of dimension and depth was a precursor for future arts to follow. Giotto’s themes mirrored Plato’s theories of art while Leonardo de Vinci began Using Aristotle’s in the form of geometric and mathematical calculations in his art works. Baroque art differs from that of the Renaissance in various significant aspects. Renaissance art exemplified calm and reason and Baroque was violent and full of emotion and energy. Greater color contrast, more vivid bright colors, light and dark brings about a complexity not seen in the simplistic Renaissance artwork. The leading interpreter in this era was Bernini. His theatrical styles of grand gestures bring an innovative look at the evolution of the human form from the ancient world’s crude compositions to believability. In fact, his subject is in ecstasy in his marble, gilt, and bronze statue of St. Teresa in ecstasy. Rococo an eighteen-century style, originating in reaction to the grandeur and massiveness of the Baroque era employed refined, elegant, and highly decorative forms. Although an extenuation of its preceding period Rococo is smaller in scale and color schemes are softer. Because the concepts of linear perspective and other technical skills had been discovered during the Renaissance artist could paint and sculpt very realistically, some of them started to paint very idealistic themes. Typically, these romantic pieces of art exemplify park like settings in a most wonderful and fictional manner. As we enter the modern world we see art fragment or branch out into various schools of thought such as Neo-Classicism a continuation from the technically precise technology of the Renaissance, Impressionism, Abstract, Modern, Post modern. tc. New inventions or technology have a great affect on the way that artists think and emotions became important to the person creating art. Neo-Classicism is a European style of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The perfectionism of the Greek and Romans in representing the perfect body is evident in La Grande Odalisque; an oil on canvas painting by Jean Augusta Dominique Ingres. This era’s intent was to reproduce earlier classical ideologies as authentically as possible using the evolved techniques to perfect the works of art. In reaction to the Neo-classical movement, Romanticism arose. The focus was on the emotional over the perfection of reason and spontaneous expression was highly prized. The stress on drama, turbulent emotions, and imagery in motion was a direct outcome of the revolution in France forty years earlier. Liberty Leading the People is filled with all of them. The sense of blurred motion is created flickering lights and confusion replicated the societal emotions of the time. Realism was the artists’ reaction to the two previous styles again mimicking the shift in the societal culture. Realism stood for what the eye could actually see. Works of myths, imagination, beauty, and idolized subject matter were rejected as false. Their concerns were rooted in the present. Impressionism was a term first used by a journalist ridiculing a landscape by Monet. Basically he had it correct in that this group of artists had a common desire to capture the moment and the immediacy of visual impressions or spontaneity. Prime examples of this desire are depicted by Claude Monet and the way he wanted to capture Rouen Cathedral in different light and weather Two discoveries that affected the thinking of the Impressionists were the invention of photography and the opening of trade with the orient. Photography, which was invented in 1825 and became a constant by the 1850s, had the ability to capture the moment and freeze time rendered portrait painting almost unnecessary as a way to capture the subject for eternity. Vanity and narcissism had a hay-day with photography. Oriental prints used genre themes and incorporated composition techniques that attracted the attention of the impressionistic artists. With the quality and quantity of photographic images and printing the common person could own and display images at a reasonable cost. During the 20th century artists began to look for way to be more expressive, sometimes to the point of reaction. For the artist emotion is everything and the interpretation is left to the viewer, many times with different reactions from different people. Art became a colorless topic with numerous questions and the leading inquiry was Is it Art? The Piazza San Marco, an oil on linen painting by Renoir is a series of blurred images and the human form is lost in the smudges. Even clearer images such, as La Lecture by Morisot where the human form of a young girl can be distinguished is still blurred and unclear. It is as if the movement wanted to wipe out humanity or blend it into the universal surroundings. Expressionism, the artistic style that the artist seeks to display not reality, but emotions and responses. Typically, the art uses distortion, exaggeration, primitivism, and fantasy to evoke a response from the viewer. In 1911, a new group of German Expressionists opens the way towards abstraction with it experimentation and originality. It is Wassily Kandinsky, who is most often credited with painting the first Abstract picture, in 1910. Abstraction distorts the human form and makes it almost unascertainable. Cubism as can be seen in the George Braque painting of Picasso, to the left, the cubistic style demands that the pictorial elements be influenced by the intersecting of transparent cubes and cones emphasizing the two-dimensional surface of the picture plane. Cubism rejects the traditional techniques of perspective learned in the Renaissance Era and many times depicts numerous sides in the same view simultaneously. Artists, such as Pablo Picasso, often began painting in the realistic or impressionistic style, but would spend part of their life exploring the techniques of cubism or abstraction. Because the rules of perspective had been historically learned and studied, artists such as the Dutch graphic artist, M. C. Escher, became most recognized for his spatial illusions of impossible situations and repeating geometric patterns where the illusion of depth was adjusted. Escher was a man studied and greatly appreciated by mathematicians and scientists because of his mathematically complex structures that require a second look. In simplicifation, close up, or minimizing art, the artist is getting rid of the entrapment of enumeration to give the observer a new and many times neglected view of common objects. The close up technique used in the works of Georgia O’Keef many times is taken almost to the point of abstraction, but makes us aware of the loveliness in the parts of the whole flower, which was one of her favorite themes. Artists, such as, Andy Warhol gave us a new look at every day objects through repetition and Piet Mondrian or Paul Klee make us look again at basic colors and shapes. Non-Representational artist Jackson Pollock was painting abstractly with the drip and splash method in 1947. Instead of using the traditional easel he affixed his canvas to the floor or the wall and poured and dripped his paint from a can, manipulating it with sticks, trowels or knives and adding mixture of foreign matter. This method painting was supposed to result in a direct expression of the unconscious moods of the artist. Surrealism was a means of reuniting conscious and unconscious experience so completely that the world of dream and fantasy would be joined to the everyday rational world. Historically, while the method of depicting the human form has changed, the image has remained virtually constant as Plato said about Egyptian art for thousands of years. The healthy, trim, muscular form that represents the ideal period of the era. There have been a few moments in history, such as the artistic works of Renoir and Rubens when a bloated figure was desirable. The evolution of the human form has been to perfect techniques to bring it to life not alter conceptions about the type of body artists have traditionally used to immortalize humanity.