Chapter:  INT  |  1  |  2  |  3  |  4  |  5  |  6  |  7  |  8  |  9  |  10  |  11  |  12  |  13

---

Elements of Art  |  Principles of Art  |  Definitions  |  Guide

 

I N T R O  D U C T I O N

T O  H U M A N I T I E S

I N T R O  D U C T I O N    A R T  &  K N O W L E D G E

 

BRANCHES OF EDUCATION

HUMANITIES Performing Arts Visual Arts Architecture Literature History Philosophy Religion Languages and Linguistics Jurisprudence (theory and philosophy of law) SOCIAL SCIENCE Sociology Anthropology Archaeology Cultural and Ethnic Studies Economics Gender and Sexuality Geography Political Science Psychology   NATURAL SCIENCE Physics Chemistry Space Sciences Earth Sciences Life Sciences   FORMAL SCIENCES Computer Sciences Logic (also a branch of philosophy) Mathematics Statistics PROFESSIONS & APPLIED SCIENCES Design Engineering Education Business Forestry and Environmental Studies Family and Consumer Science Health Sciences Journalism, Media, and Communications Law (jurisprudence is a humanities) Library and Museum Studies Military Sciences Public Administration Social Work Transportation Agriculture

 

 

Although we separate the humanities from the sciences and math, it wasn't always that way. Medieval scholars classified the humanities as studies that were relevant to humans. The humanities included:  philosophy (the sciences were called natural philosophy), math, and the arts. Theology and religion were rendered onto God. As you can see above, we now consider Theology to be a philosophy while religion is not, but both are included in the humanities.

did you know that PhD stands for Doctor of Philosophy, and lawyers have PhD degrees. In other countries they have the title of Doctor, but in this country they don't.

The branches of philosophy include:

- Metaphysics is the study of the basic nature of reality. Traditional branches are cosmology and ontology. Cosmology is the study of the universe. Ontology is the general study of reality, types of being, what can be said to exist, and how they should be categorized.

- Epistemology is the study of the nature and scope of knowledge. Skepticism is the belief that knowledge is impossible.

- Ethics is moral theory. The main branches are applied ethics, meta-ethics, and normative ethics. Meta-ethics asks whether absolute moral truths exist, and how we can know them. Normative ethics asks what act, or personality traits, are good or bad.

- Political philosophy is the study of government. It includes justice, law, and property.

- Aesthetics is concerned with art and beauty.

- Logic is the study of proper reasoning.

- Philosophy of mind deals with theory of mind. One of it's main concerns is the mind body problem.

- Philosophy of language

- Theology is theory of God.

 

---

 

What is beauty? (Aesthetics)

Is beauty an average? read  more
 

Conventions:
 

This is the Chrysler Crossfire concept car. It has a great sense of repetition. The production car was built for Chrysler by Karmann of Germany - with parts from Mercedes Benz . The production car's design was slightly changed in the production car because of conventions. What change do you think they made. Click the picture for more images.

 

---

Painting Method

We start by stretching raw canvas on a wooden frame. The canvas is painted with gesso - a primer. Lines are painted with a brush because pencils crack the gesso, and years later those cracks appear through the surface. The first layer of paint is thin, sketchy, and spontaneous. We call this the underpainting. We build thicker layers on top of thinner layers. We do not put thinner layers on top of thicker layers because that also promotes cracking. Oil paint can take over 7 days to dry, and the paint needs to dry before a new layer can be applied. this is why it can take months before an oil painting is finished. 

Why do you suppose we use canvass as a surface to paint? Is it just a custom? [Answer]

 

 

Important Concepts

Underpainting:  

An underpainting is the first layer of paint that is applied in a sketchy manner. Underpaintings are often monochromatic; the technique of painting with shades of only one color is called Grisaille.

Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery by Pieter Bruegel the Elder

 

Impasto:  

Impasto is a painting technique where paint is laid on thickly. This technique makes the painting less realistic, but gives it texture.

 

Painterly:

A painting is considered painterly when the brushstrokes are visible, and it was painted in a free, and spontaneous manner. Examples: Marla Olmstead | Aelita Andre Video

 

Linear:  

A painting is considered linear when the brushstrokes are not visible, and it was painted in a precise, and controlled manner. Linear also refers to sculpture that uses line, rope, wire etc, and it refers to a kind of perspective that we will get to later.
Photorealism by Glennray Tutor |  John Baeder

 

 

Match the terms to the painting:
 

Underpainting:
Impasto:
Painterly:
Linear:
Click here for the answer.

 

 

---

 

 

PURPOSES OF ART

 

3. To Reveal Metaphysical Truths:
 

Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy where we ask questions like: what is real; what is the basic nature of reality; what is the cause of all things? These are all metaphysical questions. Philosophers in the West have been attempting to answer the first question since the ancient Greek philosopher Thales of Miletus (624-545 BCE) asked it.

In epistemology we ask questions that pertain to knowledge. These questions can change our view of reality. Does reason alter belief, or does belief alter reason? In Man's Emerging Mind, H. J. Berrill said:
 

I think the statement you often hear that 'seeing is believing' is one of the most misleading ones a man has ever made, for you are more likely to see what you believe than believe what you see. To see anything as it really exists is about as hard an exercise of mind and eye as it is possible to perform... . Read More

Metaphysical, and epistemological, questions have lead philosophers to different visions of reality - like paintings of Being hanging on some cosmic wall. The most successful vision of reality belongs to Democritus (460-360 BCE) and Leucippus. We know it as the atomic theory of reality; reality consists of atoms moving in a void. Atoms have properties in themselves like: position, impenetrability, shape, weight, etc.; we call these primary qualities. They also have the ability to cause properties in us that are not in the atoms; atoms lack color, smell, taste, odor, and temperature. In art this vision is best portrayed by pointillism.

 

POINTILLISM

Georges Seurat

 A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of la Grande Jatte

 

 

Detail of La Parade

 

 

SURREALISM (presentation)

René Descartes (1596 – 1650) was a French philosopher, and  mathematician. He is considered the father of modern philosophy. His Meditations on First Philosophy used a method of doubt where he attempted to doubt all his beliefs, so he could find one belief that was impossible to doubt (certain), and could serve as the foundation to his philosophy - his starting point. If he seems unreasonable to you, remember that he wants his starting point to be certain - free of even the most unreasonable doubt.

 

How do you know you're not dreaming? How do you know you're not insane? How do you know that an evil demon is not attempting to deceive you on all your beliefs? These questions, although unreasonable to some extent, lay waste the claim that we know anything for certain,  or do they?

In the second meditation Descartes said:

"Doubtless, then, I exist, since I am deceived; and, let him deceive me [an evil demon] as he may, he can never bring it about that I am nothing, so long as I shall be conscious that I am something. ... this proposition ... I am, I exist, is necessarily true each time it is expressed by me, or conceived in my mind."

Cogito ergo sum. I think; Therefore I exist. Is impossible to doubt, and is the starting point of modern philosophy, but this starting point traps us in consciousness. This is one of the great problems in philosophy. How do we get outside ourselves to know that our perceptions are accurate representations of the real word. It is this problem that surrealism addresses. It turns to the dream state as it's source of inspiration.

 

 

Surrealist Manifesto

From Le Manifeste du Surréalisme, 1924

ANDRÉ BRETON

Surrealist Animation
Raymond Georges Yves Tanguy, 1900–1955, French painter.
Dali and Max Ernst: Salvador Dali, 1904-1989, Spanish
Max Ernst, 1891–1976, German painter, sculptor, and poet. He is a pioneer of the Dada and Surrealist movements.
Rene Magritte, 1898-1967, Belgian Painter

 

John Locke – p20 
P21 Out of chaos we create form – TED A Stroke of Insight
 

4: Different Perspective

DADA Art and Existentialism Philosophy:

(Art is not a mirror; it's a hammer.)

The dada movement began in Zürich Switzerland in 1916 as a reaction to World War I. They believed that “Destruction is also creation." Dada can best be defined as art without rules. It focuses on the absurdity of existence, irrationality, is countercultural, controversial, and shocking.

Dadaism looks to existentialist philosophy for inspiration. Starting with Søren Kierkegaard, the existentialist reacted against a world at war, and accepted Descartes foundation of philosophy as consciousness.

 

From left to right, top to bottom: Kierkegaard, Dostoyevsky, Nietzsche, Sartre.

- Science and systematic philosophies are removed from experience. 
- No moral rule can serve as a complete guide for our actions.
- Life is meaningless unless we define ourselves. 
- We are defined by our actions.
- Be true to your nature; be authentic.
 

Fountain (1917) by Marcel Duchamp

Art is whatever is displayed as art.

Marcel Duchamp (1887 –1968) was a French artist whose work is most often associated with the Dadaist and Surrealist movements. He produced relatively few artworks. His output influenced the development of post-World War I Western art. He advised modern art collectors, such as Peggy Guggenheim and other prominent figures, thereby helping to shape the tastes of Western art during this period.

He said, “The creative act is not performed by the artist alone; the spectator brings the work in contact with the external world by deciphering and interpreting its inner qualifications and thus adds his contribution to the creative act.”
 

Write the purpose of art to the left:
 

Provide a Record	Click Images
Express Feelings
Reveal Metaphysical Truths
Different Perspective
Click for answer.

 

 

---

 

 

FUNCTIONS OF ART :

 

SOCIAL CHANGE

 

Dread Scott Tayler's What is the Proper Way to Display a US Flag?

 

Banksy

www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GVs3BSxoOs
Warning - the above link has material that might be considered offensive.
 

Igor Stravinsky - THE RITE OF SPRING, 1912

 

Picasso - G  U E  R  N  I  C  A

 

- In 1937 Nazis bombed the Spanish town of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War. It was the first aerial bombing of civilians in history.

- 11 feet tall by 25 feet long – you feel dwarfed by it, and like you’re within the image.
- The painting is done in black, white, and grays to create contrast.

- The horse dominates the center, and represents the people.

Watch Pan’s Labyrinth: www.panslabyrinth.com
- The bull symbolizes senseless suffering, farm animals (Guernica’s a farming community), & God (the mother pleads, & the bull ignores her. 
- Notice the man holding the flowers.

 

 

CRITICISM:

 

 

Gabriel Cornelius von Max, 1840-1915
Monkeys as Judges of Art, 1889

Sporre points out that the experts disagree, and that their criteria of what constitutes art restricts creativity. When Picasso was asked what is art, he responded by saying, "what isn't art?"

Dr. Neil de Grasse Tyson had the courage to disagree with accepted norms, and push our understanding. Up until recently it was an established fact that Pluto is a planet - not any more.

 

Read more:  Pluto's Not a Planet? Only in New York

 

Is science a humanities?

 
Place these levels of education in their proper order; from where students start to the highest level of education:

- Deliberately bias yourself. When you examine the work of others,
  you give them the strongest interpretation possible. Women tend
  to do this - according to a study at Wellesley College.

- You do exactly what your teachers want.

- You believe that an education consists of memorizing facts
  established by experts.
- You objectively examine ideas, are skeptical, and unbiased. You are
  aware of your own thinking and mistakes, and the thinking and
  errors of others. Everything is up for debate. Men tend to do this.

- Realizing that the experts disagree. Knowledge becomes a matter of
  opinion or gut instinct.

Click here for the answers.

 

 

PLATO (427-348 BCE) was the first art critic. P27 BCE means before the common era. He believed in different levels of reality, and but art at the bottom because it’s a copy (Art is a Mirror). If art is not viewed as a mirror, what is it then?
 

Plato believed in censoring art. We don’t know all ends, so we shouldn’t tamper with convention. We shouldn't glorify violence and vice - Collateral Club Scene with music by Paul Oakenfold. 

Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible." - Frank Zappa

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner

 

ARISTOTLE (384-382 BCE) was Plato’s student. Aristotle's Poetics is the earliest-surviving work of drama and literary theory. It covers poetry, drama, comedy, and tragedy.

 

DECONSTRUCTION

This theory of art criticism was advanced by the philosopher Jacques Derrida. He believed that an analysis of any artwork would yield conflicting meanings. The meaning of a work arises from the artist and viewer, so there is no absolute meaning, facts, or truths in art. There are only interpretations.

 

FORMAL CRITICISM

Formal criticism does not consider any external information. The work must stand on it's own. This ignores symbolisms that point to things happening in the world. READ MORE

 

Criteria:

      Artisanship

      Clarity

      Coherence

      Interest

      Is it unique?
 

CONTEXTUAL CRITICISM

 

This includes external factors.

Criteria:
 

     Does the artist have something to say?

     How well does she say it?

     Is it worth saying?

     Does it make you think or feel?