ART HISTORY

This unit is an overview of how art started to exist from the Prehistoric period up to
the present time. It focuses on the historical background of art in terms of the various
art periods and movements, their characteristics, leading contributors and influential
works and significant historical events.
Learning Objectives: At the end of this unit, the students are expected to: 1.
Identify the underlying history, philosophy of the different era or art movements. 2.
Classify the various art movements according to their historical background,
factors, influential persons, socio-political issues, prevalent artists, art form and
media.
3. Present the history and movements of arts through a
timeline. 4. Make a creative interpretation of different music
genres.
5. Trace and summarize the development of the arts, art appreciation and aesthetics
in contemporary art practice.
6. Categorize national and GAMABA artists with their art genre and famous works of
art.

Lesson 1 - The Beginnings of Art, Western and Asian Art

“Art is the signature of civilizations” – Beverley Sills.
The Beginnings of Art
Art history is a timeline of vast accumulation of movements, periods and styles that
reflect the time during which each piece of art was made. It begins around 44,000
years ago with the first known cave paintings in Sulawesi, Indonesia that predate
writing in the journey of human race. Art is a significant aspect of history since it is
one of the few things to survive. It can tell us stories, express the condition and
beliefs of an era, and lets us connect to the people who lived ahead of us. Upon
exploration of art from Prehistoric to Contemporary times, people of the present day
can see how art influences the future and convey the past.
WESTERN AND ASIAN ART
Prehistoric and Ancient Art
Prehistoric and ancient art were around 44,000 B.C.E. to 400 BCE. It can be
considered as the art period that includes cave paintings, fertility statues and bone
flutes to approximately the end of the Roman empire. A variety of art styles were
produced over this lasting period. This Art period includes those of prehistory to the
ancient civilizations of Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the nomadic tribes.
Pre-historic Art
Prehistoric cave art in Sulawesi, Indonesia was discovered in the 1950's. This art is
of indigenous mammals; a small water buffalo, a warty pig, and a pig-deer, and hand
stencils. Archeologists discovered their age to be around forty thousand years, at
least same age as the oldest known art in Europe. It would mean that art was
developed much earlier than what humans thought, in Africa, and that men carried
the tradition with them as they move
Seventeen thousand years ago, humans painted on the walls of the caves of
Lascaux, in France the realistic images of bison, bulls, horses, stags, and other
animals. They made stencils of their hands, too. There were also several cave arts
found in Europe. These cave paintings from Indonesia and Europe have similar
characteristics which appear to be prevalent in prehistoric times
Ancient Art
Ancient Art period includes the works found in classical civilizations like the Greeks
and Celts as well as that of the early Chinese dynasties.
The artwork of this time is as varying as the cultures that created it. What relates
them together is their purpose. Most of the time, art was made to narrate stories in a
time when oral tradition predominates. Art was also utilized to decorate utilitarian
objects like bowls, pitchers, and weapons. At times, it was also used to show the
status of its owner, a concept that art has used since time immemorial.

ASIAN ART
Hindu Art
This Art reflects the plurality of beliefs, Hindu Temples, which depicts their
architecture and where sculptures are found, typically are devoted to different
deities. Hindu Art is portrayed by holy symbols like the Om, an invocation of divine
consciousness of God; the swastika, a symbol of auspiciousness; and the lotus
flower, a symbol of purity, beauty, fertility, and transcendence. It is believed that the
Christian "Amen" and Islamic "Amin" are both derived from Om.

Chinese Art
This art evolved through its history. As political and social circumstances changed
and new technologies developed, so did its art. Chinese artistic styles are classified
according to the dynasty under which they were produced. The important qualities
include a love of nature, a credence in the moral and educative capacity of art, an
appreciation of simplicity, an gratitude of accomplished brushwork, an interest in
viewing the subject from various perspectives, and a loyalty to much-used motifs and
designs from lotus leaves to dragons. The art forms most worthy to mention are
calligraphy and painting though Chinese art also encompasses fine arts, folk arts,
and performance arts.

Japanese Art
Japanese art covers a wide range of art styles and media, including ancient pottery,
calligraphy on silk and paper, ink painting, kirigami, origami, and dorodango
sculpture, and, ukiyo-e paintings and woodblock prints, and more recently manga, a
modern method of Japanese cartooning and comics. Japan’s art has frequently been
complicated by the definitions and expectation established in the late 19th and 20th
centuries when Japan was opened to the west.
Byzantine art is about religious expression and more specifically about church
doctrine translated into aesthetic forms. Byzantine forms of architecture and painting
was based on religious concerns which made art uniform, anonymous, and perfected
within this austere tradition. The result was sophistication of style and a spirituality of
expression that rarely compares with the art of Western tradition.

Medieval Art
To some, the millennium from 400 and 1400 A.D. is considered as the Dark Ages,
where the art in this period were depicted as grotesque or brutal scenes while others
were focused on formalized religion. Most of the art created were melancholy.
Medieval European art saw a transition from the Byzantine period to the Early
Christian period. Within that, from about 300 to 900, we also saw Migration Period
Art as Germanic people migrated across the continent. This Barbarian art was
outboard by necessity and more of it was understandably lost.
As the millennium passed, more and more Christian and Catholic art appeared. The
period centered around elaborate churches and artwork to adorn this architecture. It
also saw the rise of Gothic and Romanesque styles of art and architecture.

Early to High Renaissance

This movement covers the period from 1400 through 11500. Renaissance literally
means rebirth and describes the resurgence of curiosity in the artistic achievements
of Greece and Rome. Most known paintings emerged from this period. Many of the
notable art created during the Renaissance was Italian. The famous 15th-century
artists like Brunelleschi and Donatello paved the way to the work of Botticelli and
Alberti. When the High Renaissance took over in the next century, the work of Da
Vinci, Michelangelo, and Raphael emerged.
The increasing edification of society, through political stability, economic growth and
cosmopolitanism brought about the high renaissance. Education at its time took
center stage, with libraries and academies that allowed empirical studies and
research to be conducted into the cultures of the ancient world. The arts benefited
from the patronage of influential families and individuals.

Venetian and Northern Renaissance

In 1430-1550, a period of Northern Renaissance was famous due to advance
technique in oil painting, realistic, vivid altarpiece art, wooden panel paintings,
woodcuts, and printmaking. Stone sculpture was not extremely popular, but the
Germans boost up their wood carving techniques. Dutch art was governed by
empirical perspective. Dutch aimed to get to the basics, capturing every single detail.
The painters learned from direct observation and their knowledge of the consistency
of things.

Mannerism
Mannerism (1527-1580) introduced a highly imaginative period in art after the climax
of excellence that naturalistic painting had attained in Renaissance Italy. Artists
started to deviate from classical influences and turn toward a further intellectual and
expressive approach. This ushered in a change from authentic portrayals of figures
and subjects, a rejection of harmony, and the development of a dramatic new style
unconstrained by the graphic plane, reality, or literal correctness. Radical
asymmetry, artifice, and the decorative also apprised this movement. Paintings, and
compositions can have no focus and space can be abstruse. The figures can be
represented by an powerful twisting and bending with distortions, exaggerations,
elongations of the limbs, bizarre posturing on one hand, graceful posturing on the
other hand and the rendering of the head as uniformly small and oval. The
compositions are marked by clashing colors which lacks the balance, naturalism,
and dramatic colors of High Renaissance. Mannerist artwork seeks instability and
restlessness with fondness for allegories that have lascivious undertones. New
discoveries in science had led society away from Humanist ideals and paintings no
longer conceived man as the center of the universe, but rather as isolated, incidental
partakers in the great mysteries of life.

Baroque Art
The word baroque means something that is elaborate and highly detailed. Baroque
style (1600-1750) is characterized by exaggerated motion and clear detail used to
produce drama, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, architecture,
literature, dance, and music. The defining characteristics of the Baroque style were
real or implied movement, an attempt to represent infinity, an emphasis on light and
its effects, and a focus on the theatrical. A number of techniques were introduced, or
further established by Baroque artists to accomplish these effects including quadro
riportato (frescos that incorporated the illusion of being composed of a series of
framed paintings), quadrature (ceiling painting), and trompe l'oeil techniques. This
allowed for a blurring of the boundaries between painting, sculpture, and architecture
that was signature to the movement. Chiaroscuro technique is a trait of Baroque Art
in which the treatment of light and dark in an artwork assisted to create dramatic
tension, was a key component in Baroque artwork. It was further evolved by Baroque
master Caravaggio into tenebrism, which used the intensification of contrast within
dark atmospheric scenes to highlight particular elements. During this era, significant
events like the Reformation and the Counter Reformation occurred with the baroque
style being considered intricately linked to the Catholic Church. The popularity of
style was encouraged by the church which was decided at the Council of Trent that
the arts should communicate religious themes and direct emotional involvement in
response to the Protestant Reformation.

Neoclassical
The Neoclassical Period is considered a period of enlightenment. The movement
started in Europe in the 1700's and spread into the colonies. The focus of this was
on government, ethics, and science which varies from the previous period that
focused on religion, imagination, and emotions. Neoclassical art has a cleaner style,
sculpted forms, a shallow depth of background and a more realistic approach.
Neoclassical painting and sculpture involved emphasis on austere linear design in
the depiction of classical event, characters and themes, using historically correct
settings and costumes.

Romanticism
Romanticism (1750-1850) rapidly spread all over Europe and the United States at
the end of the 18th century to the 19th. The period extolled abstract, complex ideas
like despair, hope, heroism, liberty, peace, survival, and other impressions that
nature evokes in human beings. Romantic art concentrated on emotions, feelings,
and moods to challenge the rational ideal held so tightly during the Enlightenment.
The subject matter varied widely including landscapes, religion, revolution, and
serene beauty. It also stood counter to science in favor of spiritualism, deliberation in
support of instinct, industry in preference to nature, subjugation vetting on
democracy and against aristocracy for rusticity. The artists emphasized that sense
and emotions - not simply reason and order - were equally important means of
understanding and experiencing the world. Romanticism celebrated the individual
imagination and intuition in the enduring search for individual rights and liberty. Its
ideals of the creative, subjective powers of the artist fueled avant-garde movements
well into the 20th century.
Realism
Realism (1848-1900) is also called naturalism. The accurate, detailed,
straightforward depiction of nature or of contemporary life. Realists rejected
romanticism which had dominated French literature and art late 18th century. They
depicted people of all classes in ordinary life situations which reflected the changes
brought on by the industrial and commercial revolutions.

MODERN ART
The modern art refers to late 19th and early-to-mid 20th century art. Works produced
during this time showcase artists’ interest in re-imagining, reinterpreting, and even
rejecting traditional aesthetic values of preceding styles. Starting with light and airy
Impressionism and ending with energetic Abstract Expressionism, the modern art
genre is composed of several major movements.
Impressionism
This is the style of painting that emerged in the mid and late 1800s. The movement
emphasizes on an artist’s immediate impression of a moment or scene,
communicated through the effect of light and its reflection, short brush strokes and
separation of colors. Modern life is often used as the subject matter by impressionist
painters painting freely and quickly featuring short visible strokes-dots, commas,
smears, and blobs.
Post-Impressionism
Post-impressionism (1885-1910) bridged the gap between the restrictive techniques
found in the impressionist period and the emphasis on geometry found in modern
art. Post-Impressionism is an art movement characterized by a subjective approach
to painting, as artists opted to evoke emotion rather than realism in their work. While
their styles passionately varied, paintings completed in the Post-Impressionist
manner share some similar qualities like symbolic motifs, unnatural color, and
painterly brushstrokes

Fauvism and Expressionism (1900-1935)

Fauvism is a term to denote the use of distortion and exaggeration for emotional e
ect, which first surfaced in the art literature of the early twentieth century. The artists
used pure, brilliant color applied straight from the paint tubes to create bright effects
from the canvass.
Expressionism is an artistic style in which the artist attempts to portray not objective
reality but rather the subjective emotions and responses that objects and events
awaken in him. It is accomplished through distortion, exaggeration, primitivism, and
fantasy through vivid, violent, or dynamic application of formal elements.

Cubism, Futurism, Supremativism, Constructivism, De Still (1905-1920)

Cubism is an artistic movement, created by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque. It
employs geometric shapes in depictions of human and other forms. Overtime, the
geometric touches grew so intense that they sometimes overtook the represented
forms, creating a pure level of visual abstraction.
Futurism is an Italian art movement that took speed, technology, and modernity as
its inspiration. It portrayed the dynamic character of 20th century life, elevated war,
and machine age, and favored the growth of Fascism.
Dadaism and Surrealism (1917-1950)
Dadaism is the first conceptual art movement where the focus of the artists was not
to craft aesthetically pleasing objects but create works that upended bourgeois
sensibilities. It aimed to generate difficult questions about the society, the role of the
artist and the purpose of art. Dada artist are identified to use ready-made objects
with little manipulation.
Surrealism intends to channel the unconscious means to unlock the power of
imagination. Strongly influenced by psychoanalysis, the Surrealist’s considers the
rational mind repressed the power of imagination, weighing it down with taboos. It
was also influenced by Karl Marx in the sense that surrealists hoped that the human
psyche had the power to reveal contradictions in the everyday world and spur on
revolution
Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art Abstract Expressionism (1940-1950)
is an art movement of mostly non representative painting. It was neither wholly
abstract nor expressionist and comprised several fairly various styles. What
integrated them in one art movement was an aim to redefine the nature of painting.
The emergence and fast propagation of Abstract Expressionism turn out to be
possible owing to the following factors. First, was the coming to US of many modern
artist refugees from European autocratic regimes of 1930s and war disasters of
1940s (Arshile Gorky, Hans Hofmann, George Grosz, Fernand Leger, Josef Albers,
Piet Mondrian, Marcel Duchamp, Yves Tanguy, Max Ernst). Second, was the advent
of a new network of New York museums and galleries that staged (for the first time
in US) major exhibitions of European modern art (Museum of Modern Art, MOMA
was instituted in 1929 and increased its popularity by exposing collections of
Cubism, Abstract Art, and Dadaism. Dadaism, known also as Dada is characteristic
of messiness and extremely lively applications of paints. Its brush strokes exposed
the artist’s process, this process is the subject of the art itself. Pop Art (1960s) is a
movement marked by a fascination with popular culture reflecting the auence in post
war society. It was most prominent in American art but soon spread to Britain. In
celebrating everyday objects, the movement turn the commonplace into icons. It is a
direct descendant of Dadaism in the way it mocks the established art world by
appropriating images from the street, the supermarket, the mass media, and
presents it as art.