Art Appreciation Midterm

• Theories of Art


  • Imitationism
  • Representationism
  • Formalism
  • Expressionism
  • Aesthetic Hedonism
  • Aesthetic Functionalism
  • Action Theory
  • Institutional Theory
• Imitationism


  Idealist Theory of Art
• Imitationism by Plato


  • Suggests three types of world: World of Being, World of Becoming, and World of Art
  • World of Being is the reality, unchanging and eternal
  • World of Becoming is the appearance, changing, and temporal world
  • World of Art is the imitation or illusion of what is seen from the physical thing

  
• Representationism


  Art is an image, an appearance, a copy, or a reproduction of things, people, objects, or events

  
• William Shakespeare: '"Art is putting mirror up to nature."'
• Chieh Tzu Yuan: '"When painting has reached divinity (shen), there is an end of the matter."'
• Romantic Realism in the Philippine Art shows only the aspect of beauty, idyllic and exotic rural sceneries, and forms of light and shadow for tourism purposes
• Formalism


  Art is the combination of perceptual elements, art is non-figurative because it does not contain any representation
• Clive Bell: '"To appreciate art, we bring with us nothing from life.", What is essential in art is only the "significant form."'
• Paul Cezanne: '"Artists need to look at nature and things only as forms made up of sphere, cylinders, cones."'

  
• Wassily Kandinsky: '"Every work of art is the child of its age…. It follows that each period of culture produces an art of its own which can never be repeated."'
• Wassily Kandinsky: '"Art is born from the inner necessity of the artist in an enigmatic, mystical way through which it acquires an autonomous life; it becomes an independent subject, animated by a spiritual breath."'
• Categories of Kandinsky's Paintings

  • Impressions
  • Improvisations
  • Compositions
• Kandinsky associated colors with musical notes and chords
• Expressionism


  The transfer of the artist's expression of emotions and ideas into an art
• Susanne Langer: '"Art is the creation of symbolic forms expressive of human feelings."'
• Leo Tolstoy: '"Art is the objectification of emotion."'
• Aristotle: '"Art is the expression of the artist's overflowing emotion." (catharsis)'
• Benedetto Croce: '"Like language, art is the expression of idea by the artist." (intuitionism)'
• Periods of Classical Music


  • Baroque
  • Classical
  • Romantic
• Aesthetic Hedonism


  Beauty is pleasure, ugly is pain
• Aristippus and Epicurus: '"Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow you die."'
• Aesthetic Functionalism


  The person's feeling of need of an object which satisfies his/her needs
• Functionalism in the Renaissance period is about teaching catechism to people
• Architectural Principle: form follows function
• Action Theory of Art


  Style of abstract expressionism by Jackson Pollock, the process of putting, dripping, pouring, and splashing paints on the canvas
• Jackson Pollock: '"On the floor I am more at ease, I feel nearer, more part of the painting, since this way I can walk around it, work from the four sides and literally be 'in' the painting."'
• Harold Rosenberg: '"The canvass began to appear as an arena in which an act--rather than a space in which to reproduce, re-design, analyze or express an object, actual or imagined. What was to go on the canvas was not a picture but an event."'
• Institutional Theory of Art

  Art is an institution in the society, the Artworld (artists, art critics, art historians/educators, art patrons/curators, art museums/galleries, schools/clubs, art awards, recognition/popularity, art journals, and TV/newspapers) determines what is considered art
• Requirements to be recognized as an artist by the Artworld-Institution


  • Have skills and talent
  • Be studying in an art school
  • Have a degree in Fine Arts
  • Be a member of art organizations
  • Win recognition, prizes, and awards
  • Have artworks exhibited in museums and/or galleries
  • Be mentioned in books, media, and art history
  • Be well-known
  • Have a revolutionized art
• A thing becomes art if it is acknowledged as an art by the Artworld