THE ARTS

What is it?

Art is a diverse range of human activities involving the creation of visual, auditory or
performing artifacts (artworks), which express the creator's imagination, conceptual ideas, or
technical skill, intended to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. Other
activities related to the production of works of art include art criticism and the history of art.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art)

The word “art” usually refers to the so-called “fine arts” such as pictorial, plastic, and
building and to the so-called “minor arts” refers to everyday, useful, applied, and decorative arts.
The word “art” is derived from arti, which denotes craftsmanship, skill, mastery of form,
inventiveness.
Art serves as a technical and creative record of human needs and achievements.

Definitions of art according to some Philosophers:

Art is not, as the metaphysicians say, the manifestation of some mysterious idea of beauty or
God; it is not, as the aesthetical physiologists say, a game in which man lets off his excess of
stored-up energy; it is not the expression of man's emotions by external signs; it is not the
production of pleasing objects; and, above all, it is not pleasure; but it is a means of union among
men, joining them together in the same feelings, and indispensable for the life and progress toward
well-being of individuals and of humanity. - Leo Tolstoy “What is Art”

Art is a discovery and development of elementary principles of nature into beautiful

forms suitable for human use. - Frank Lloyd Wright, (1957) Architecture, Nature, and the Human
Spirit: A Collection of Quotations

Art is not a thing—it is a way. - Elbert Hubbard, (1908)

Little Journeys to the Homes of Great
Teachers
 Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time. - Thomas Merton
No Man Is An Island

An essential element of any art is risk. If you don't take a risk then how are you going to make
something really beautiful, that hasn't been seen before? I always like to say that cinema without
risk is like having no sex and expecting to have a baby. You have
to take a risk.
- Francis
Ford Coppola
American film director, producer, and
Screenwriter

All art is autobiographical; the pearl is the oyster's autobiography.

- Federico Fellini, (1965)
The Atlantic

Three Categories of the Definition of Art

1. Art as Representation or Mimesis

 Attributed to Plato
 Came from the Greek “mimesis,” which means “copying” or “imitation”.
 Art must be a faithful replication of something that is beautiful or meaningful.
 It is art if it is “lifelike”
 Michelangelo, Rubens, Velasquez

2. Art as Expression
 Artwork is use to express the inner life or a definite feeling of the artist.
 The rule of the audience is to respond emotionally.
 an expression of feeling, belief, and character.
 It expresses meanings that are almost always beyond words like grief, fear, love, and joy.

3. Art as Form.
 Also known as formalism
 Art does not require a concept nor should be aesthetically interesting but a combination of forms
 The principles of design (balance, rhythm, harmony, unity) became the basis of defining and
assessing art.
 “Art for art’s sake, not art for life’s sake” is strongly associated with formalism.
 Art is there to be enjoyed, to be savoured, for the perception of the intricate arrangements of lines
and colours, of musical tones, of words, and combinations of these.
 They claim that the tendency to find the meaning of an art work prevents the person from actually
experiencing a fresh or unfamiliar world of aesthetic experience.