Visual Arts - It is an art forms that create works that are primarily visual in nature.

- It is also a variety of form that are enjoyed using our eyes.

Difference between 2D and 3D Art
•Painting and Drawing (Two-dimensional medium)
‒ Art that has only the dimension of height and width.
Examples:
▪ Oil and acrylic
▪ Pencil drawing
▪ Cartoons and Comics
• Carving and Weaving (Three-dimensional medium)
‒ An object that has height width and depth like any object in a real world.
Examples:
▪ Engraving
▪ Woodcut
▪ Mosaic
Types of Visual Arts
1. Sculpture ‒ Three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials.
2. Painting ‒ Practice of applying pigments suspended in a medium and a binding agent to a surface.
3. Photography ‒ is the process of making pictures by means of the action of light.
4. Film ‒ called as motion picture through shooting.
5. Fashion Design ‒ is the art of applying design, aesthetics and natural beauty to clothing and its
accessories.
6. Graphic Design ‒ The art or skill of combining text and pictures in advertisements, magazines or
books.
Film
What is a film?
➢ Film also called “movie or a motion picture”. It is a medium used to stimulate experiences to
communicate ideas, stories, perceptions and feelings by means of recorded our programmed moving
images, along with other sensory stimulations.
Digital Art
➢ It is an artistic work or practice that uses digital technology as part of the creative and presentation
process.
Performance Art
➢ A performance presented to an audience within a fine art context. Performance may be scripted,
unscripted, random or orchestrated, spontaneous, or otherwise carefully planned with or without an
audience participation.
➢ An art form that combines visual art and dramatic performance.
➢ Examples: acting, dancing, singing, spoken word poetry, and etc.

Poetry-Performance
➢ Poetry that is specifically composed of or during a performance before an audience.
➢ Typically written with the goal of being performed instead of being published.

Architecture
➢ It is an art and science of designing buildings and other physical structures, such houses, bridges
and etc. As distinguish from the skills associated with construction.
Dance
➢ A body movement in a rhythmic way especially to music and within a given space for the purpose of
expressing an idea.
➢ It is also a performing art form consisting of purposefully selected sequence of human movements.
The movement has an aesthetic and symbolic value.
Types of Dances
➢ Contemporary
➢ Hip-hop
➢ Ballet
➢ Jazz
➢ Ballroom
➢ Others

Literary Art
➢ Is the integrative discipline of ideation literally appreciation and multi creative writing.
➢ Written words which include editing, critiquing, reviewing and other activities related in writing.
➢ Examples: fiction, non-fiction, poetry, scriptwriting and novels.

Theater
➢ It is a collaborative form of fine art concerned almost live performance, in which the action is
precisely planned to create a coherent and significant sense of drama, done by live performers
typically actors or actresses to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live
audience in a specific place often in a stage.
Different Types of Theater Production
➢ Musical theater
➢ Fringe theater
➢ Melodrama
➢ Comedy
➢ Tragedy
➢ Historic Place
➢ Historic plays

Applied Art
➢ All arts that apply design and decoration to everyday and essentially practical objects in order to
make them aesthetically pleasing in the eyes.
➢ The term is applied in distinction of Fine Arts, which aims to produce objects, which are beautiful
and provide intellectual stimulation.

➢ Examples of Applied Art:

▪ Furniture’s
▪ Carpets
▪ Architecture
▪ Jewelry
▪ Metalworks
▪ Pottery
Philosophical Importance of Art
Integrity
➢ Integrity is “present when the thing has all that makes up its substance.”
➢ In Aquinas’ usage, the concept of integrity describes an integrated whole with nothing missing. A
whole person consists of body, mind, and spirit.
Proportion
➢ Proportion is largely about the relationship of the size of one element when compared to another.
➢ When drawing or painting realistically, proportion is important. If the proportions are incorrect, then
the resulting image will look less realistic or abstracted.
➢ Harmony
➢ Alternatively, artists can use proportion for effect.

Clarity
➢ It should clearly radiate intelligibility, the logic of its inner being and impress this knowledge of itself
on the mind of the perceiver.
Philosophical Perspective on Art
Art as an Imitation
➢ In Plato’s The Republic, paints a picture of artists as imitator and art as mere imitation.
➢ In his description of the ideal republic, Plato advises against the inclusion of art as a subject in the
curriculum and the banning of artists in The Republic.
➢ In Plato’s metaphysics or view of reality, the things in this world are only copies of the original, the
eternal and the true entities that can only be found in the World of Forms.
➢ For example, the chair that sits on is not a real chair. It is an imperfect copy of the perfect “chair” in
the World of Forms.
➢ Plato was convinced that artists merely reinforce the belief in copies and discourage men to reach
for the real entities in the World of Forms.
Plato was deeply suspicious of arts and artists for two reasons:
1. They appeal to the emotion rather to the rational faculty of men.
2. They imitate rather than lead one to reality

➢ Poetry rouses emotions and feelings and thus, clouds rationality of people.
➢ Art is just an imitation of imitation. A painting is just an imitation of nature, which is also just an
imitation of reality in the World of Forms.
➢ Art then is to be banished, alongside the practitioners, so that the attitudes and actions of the
members of the Republic will not be corrupted by the influence of the arts.
For Plato, art is dangerous because it provides a pretty replacement for the real entities that can only
be attained through reason.
Art as a Representation
➢ Aristotle, agreed with Plato that art is a Form of Imitation.
➢ However, Aristotle considered art as an aid to Philosophy in revealing the truth.
➢ The kind of imitation that art does is not antithetical to the reaching of fundamental truths in the
world.
➢ Unlike Plato, who thought that art is an imitation of another imitation, Aristotle conceived art as
representing possible version of reality.
➢ For Aristotle, all kinds of art do not aim to represent reality as it is, it endeavors to provide a version
of what might be or the myriad possibilities of reality.
In Aristotelian worldview, art serves two particular purposes:
➢ Art allows for the experience of pleasure (horrible experience can be made an object of humor).
➢ Art also has an ability to be instructive and teach.

Art as a Disinterest Judgment

➢ Immanuel Kant, in his Critique of Judgment, considered the judgment of beauty, the cornerstone of
art, as something that can be universal despite its subjectivity.
➢ Kant recognized that judgment of beauty is subjective.
➢ However even subjective judgments are based on some universal for the said judgment.

“How and in what sense can a judgment of beauty, which ordinarily is considered to be a subjective
feeling, be considered objective or universal?”
Art as a Communication of Emotion
➢ According to Leo Tolstoy, art plays a huge role in communication to its audience’s emotions that
the artists previously experienced.
➢ In same language that communicates information to other people, art communicates emotions.
➢ As a purveyor of man’s innermost feelings and thoughts, art is given a unique opportunity to serve
as a mechanism for social unity.
➢ Art is central to man’s existence because it makes accessible feelings and emotions of people from
the past and present.
Subject of Art
➢ The term subject in art refers to the main idea that is represented in the artwork. It is the essence of
the piece.
➢ It is the matter to be described or to be portrayed by the artist.
➢ This may refer to any person, object, scene or event.

To determine subject matter in a particular piece of art, ask yourself:

• What is actually depicted in this artwork?
• What is the artist trying to express to the world?
• What is his or her message?
• And how are they conveying that message?
Two Kinds of Arts as to Subject
Representational or Objective Art
➢ Depicts objects that are commonly recognized by most people.
➢ Attempt to copy what is real or portray the subject as it is.
➢ Uses “form” and are concerned with “what” is to be depicted.

Non-representational or Non-objective Art

➢ Without any reference or recognizable objects.
➢ Abstract; does not represent real objects.
➢ Uses “content” and is concerned with “how” the artwork is depicted.

The artist and his choice

1. Everything under the sun is raw material for the artist to draw his subject.
2. The artist’s choice of subject is usually affected by his medium.
3. The piece of art depends largely upon the time in which he lived.
Source of Subject of Art
1. Nature - Most common inspiration and subject.
2. History - Historical people, events, periods.
3. Greek and Roman Mythology - Myths or Definite parts of inheritance.
4. Religion - Anything that represents spiritual beliefs and doctrines.
5. Sacred Oriental Text - Sacred texts of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, Zoroastrianism,
Jainism, and Islam.
Kinds of Subject
➢ Landscape, seascapes, cityscapes
➢ Still Life-inanimate objects arranged in indoor setting.
➢ Portraits-The realistic likeness of a person. Attire, accessories are very much expressive because
they reveal so much of the person and his time.
➢ Figures (nude/clothed)- Greeks-physical beauty was the symbol of moral and spiritual perfection.
➢ Everyday Life- life around the artist, or the actual setting. E.g. children playing, life at the park.
➢ History and Legends
▪ History-consist of verifiable facts.
▪ Legends-unverifiable but they have been accepted as true.
➢ Religion and Mythology
▪ Art- handmaid of religion.
➢ Dreams and Fantasy-mostly used by surrealist painters.

Content of Art
➢ It is the meaning, message and/or feeling imparted by a work of art.

It is the mass of ideas associated with each artwork and communicated through the following:
• The Art’s imagery
• The symbolic meaning
• Its surroundings where it is used or displayed
• The customs, beliefs and values of the culture that uses it
• Writings that help explain the work.
Three Levels of Meaning (According to Cleaver, 1966)
➢ Factual Meaning
▪ Literal statement or the narrative content in the work which can be directly understood because the
objects presented are easily recognized.
➢ Conventional Meaning
▪ Special meaning that a certain object or color has for a particular culture or a group of people.

➢ Subjective Meaning
▪ Any personal meaning consciously or unconsciously conveyed by the artist using private symbolism
which stems from his own associations of certain objects, actions, or colors from past experiences.
 Medium refers to the material or means by which the artist uses to portray his feeling or thought
such
as a pigment in painting, a wood or stone in a sculpture, metal steels in architecture, sound in music,
words in literature and body movements in dance (Ortiz, et. Al., 1976).
Artist: Generally defined as an art practitioner, such as painter, sculptor, choreographer, dancer,
writer, poet, musicians, and the like, who produces or creates indirectly functional arts with aesthetic
value using imagination.
Artisans: Craftsmen, such as carpenters, carvers, plumbers, blacksmiths, weavers, embroiders, and
the like, who produce directly functional and/or decorative arts.
KEY COMPONENTS ON THE ART MARKET
An Art Curator, who is a manager or overseer, or keeper of a cultural heritage institution (e.g, gallery,
museum, library, or archive), is a content specialist charged with an institution’s collections, selecting
art to be displayed in a museum, organizing art exhibitions in galleries or public places, researching
artists, and writing catalogs and involved with the interpretation of heritage.
An art buyer is a professional who is knowledgeable in art, or who may look for an art and buy it on
behalf of a collector or company.
An art dealer is a person or a company that buys and sells works of art. Art dealers often study the
history of art before starting their careers. They have to understand the business side of the art world.
They keep up with the trends in the market and are knowledgeable about the style of art that people
want to buy.
ELEMENTS OF ART
LINE - An element of art defined by a point moving in space. Line may be two-or three-dimensional,
descriptive, implied, or abstract.
SHAPE - An element of art that is two-dimensional, flat, or limited to height and width.
FORM - An element of art that is three-dimensional, flat, and encloses volume; includes height, width
and depth (as in a cube, a sphere, a pyramid, or a cylinder). Form may also be free flowing.
VALUE - The lightness or darkness of tones or colors. White is the lightest value; black is the darkest.
The value halfway between these extremes is called middle gray.
SPACE - An element of art by which positive and negative areas are defined or a sense of depth
achieved in a work of art.
COLOR - An element of art made up of three properties: hue, value and intensity.
• Hue : name of color
• Value : hue’s lightness and darkness (a color’s value changes when white or black is added)
• Intensity : quality or brightness and purity (high intensity= color is strong and bright; low intensity=
color is faint and dull).
TEXTURE - An element of art that refers to the way things feel, or look as if they might feel if touched.
ART/PERFOMANCE ARTS
PERFORMANCE ARTS - comes in a variety of forms, based on language, music, and live arts.
Regardless of the media, purpose, theme, style, location, or size of the audience, performance art can
contribute to culture, create community, and provide outlets for expression.
PERFORMING ARTS - are arts such as music, dance, and drama which are performed for an audience.
They are different from the visual arts, which are the use of paint, canvas or various materials to create
physical or static art objects. Performing arts include a range of disciplines which are performed in
front of a live audience, including theatre, music, and dance.

THEATRE - is the branch of performing arts concerned with acting out stories in front of an audience,
using a combination of speech, gesture, music, dance, sound, and spectacle. Any one or more of these
elements is considered performing arts. In addition to the standard narrative dialogue style of plays,
theater takes such forms as plays, musicals, opera, ballet, illusion, mime, classical Indian dance,
kabuki, mummers' plays, improvisational theatre, comedy, pantomime, and non-conventional or
contemporary forms like postmodern theatre, post dramatic theatre, or performance art.
EXAMPLES OF THEATRE
Opera
Ballet
Classical Indian dance
Kabuki
Comedy
Pantomime
DANCE - In the context of performing arts, dance generally refers to human movement, typically
rhythmic and to music, used as a form of audience entertainment in a performance setting.
EXAMPLES OF DANCE
Hip hop
Folk dance
Tap dance
Tango
Acrobatic dance
Break dance
MUSIC - is an art form which combines pitch, rhythm, and dynamic to create sound. It can be
performed using a variety of instruments and styles and is divided into genres such as folk, jazz, hip
hop, pop, and rock, etc. As an art form, music can occur in live or recorded formats, and can be
planned or improvised.
EXAMPLES OF MUSIC
Rock music
Country music
Jazz
R&B
Pop music
Blues

• Principles of Design - The principles of design describe the ways that artists use the elements of art
in a work of art.
▪ Balance - It is the distribution of the visual weight of objects, colors, texture, and space. If the design
was a scale, these elements should be balanced to make a design feel stable.
1. Symmetrical - the elements used on one side of the design are similar to those on the other side
2. Asymmetrical - the sides are different but still look balanced.
3. Radial - in radial balance, the elements are arranged around a central point and may be similar
▪ Emphasis- It is the part of the design that catches the viewer’s attention.
Usually, the artist will make one area stand out by contrasting it with other areas. The area could be
different in size, color, texture, shape, etc.
▪ Rhythm - It is created when one or more elements of design are used repeatedly to create a feeling of
organized movement. Rhythm creates a mood like music or dancing. To keep rhythm exciting and
active, variety is essential.
▪ Movement - It is the path the viewer’s eye takes through the work of art, often to focal areas. Such
movement can be directed along lines, edges, shape, and color within the work of art.
▪ Pattern - It is the repeating of an object or symbol all over the work of art.
▪ Proportion - It is the feeling of unity created when all parts (sizes, amounts, or number) relate well
with each other. When drawing the human figure, proportion can refer to the size of the head compared
to the rest of the body.
▪ Variety - It is the use of several elements of design to hold the viewer’s attention and to guide the
viewer’s eye through and around the work of art.
▪ Unity - It is the feeling of harmony between all parts of the work of art, which creates a sense of
completeness.
• The Rule of Thirds
o The Rule of Thirds is a guideline for both artists and photographers. It will help produce a more
pleasing arrangement and layout for your compositions.
o We can say “The Rule of Thirds” is more like a "technique", rather than a "rule".
o If you divide your canvas into 3 by 3, which will look like this:
▪ The intersections are where the focal area be placed or located
▪ What is “focal area/focal point”, it’s simply where the attention of the audience is drawn
o The Rule of Thirds can be related to “Golden Ratio.”
▪ “Golden Ratio”, also known as “divine-proportion” has been round for some time and has influenced
many areas of life including architecture, math, design, and course of art
• Reading the Image
o By Alice Guillermo
▪ Who is Alice Guillermo?
• She was born in Manila on January 6, 1938.
• She received a BA in Education degree (magna cum laude) in 1957 from the College of Holy Spirit,
formerly the College of Holy Ghost.
• She is a recipient of Palanca Awards.
• She is a renowned writer, researcher, art critic and professor.
• She is best known for her extensive body of art criticism and academic texts on the subject of
Philippine art, which academics credit for having significantly informed the writing of both art history
and art theory in Southeast Asia.
o Guillermo’s essay is very important because it provides guidelines in analyzing or interpreting
images may they be from ads, paintings or any text. She said that art should be placed in the context
of society and history because these two always have the connection.
According to Guillermo, the basic documentary information of an artworks are:
1. Title of the Work
2. Artist
3. Medium and Technique
4. Dimensions / Measurement
5. Date of the Work
6. Provenance
- Example of basic documentary information of an artwork
Spoliarium (can be seen on the National Museum of the Philippines)
1. Title of the Work – Spoliarium
2. Artist – Juan N. Luna
3. Medium and Technique – Oil Painting in Poplar
4. Dimensions / Measurement – 4.26m x 7.72m
5. Date of the Work – 1883-1884
6. Provenance – Madrid, Spain (currently in National Museum of the Philippines)
o Four Planes of Analysis
1. Basic Semiotic Plane - It is the study of "signs". It consists of "signifier" or its material/physical
aspect and its "signified" or non-material aspect as concept and value.
- Semiotic is concerned with everything that can be taken as a sign. The elements of the visual arts
derive their meaning-conveying potential from two large sources: human psychophysical experiences
and the socio-cultural conventions of a particular society and period.
- Common examples of semiotics include traffic signs, emojis, and emoticons used in electronic
communication, and logos and brands used by international corporations to sell us things—"brand
loyalty," they call it.
• Example:
The movie shows situations inside the Renaissance period. Originally the movie was based from the
Shakespeare’s recreation of the novel Romeo and Juliet back from the late 1500’s. It represents a love
story of two teenagers that came from two feuding families. The movie; even the stage play version
before, played several times in the Elizabethan Period usually gives the audience a work of art by
the settings and costumes of the characters. So, at the end, the story marked the audience with a
weary and disappointing feeling.
2. Iconic Plane - It can be called the image itself, it is still part of the semiotic approach since it is still
based on the signifier-signified relationship. The only difference is that that material elements of the
work has to do with the particular features, aspects, and qualities of the image.
- The iconic plane includes the choice of the subject which may bear social and political
implications. Also, it is the positioning of the figure (frontal, in profile, three-fourths, etc.) that implies
its bearing to the meaning of the work.
- In the basic semiotic plane which deals with the material aspect of the work and in the iconic plane
which deals with the features of the image itself, one can see that as the signifier cannot be separated
from the signified, concrete fact or material data cannot be divorced from value.
• Example:
The movie gives the audience a choice of what can they feel because of the scenarios, the two
teenagers go through between their feuding families, because this isn’t just a love story, this story
includes political changes in the society because of the two main families where Romeo and Juliet
came from are battling for years to gain Political respect and benefits to overcome certain
circumstances. The scenery and fashion of the people in the movie was a glimpse of the past, it is
because it is like traveling through another time that, there are bountiful harvest, unlimited resources
and criminals that can be freed again if they escaped the authorities and if no one saw what they did.
Truly, the government or the authorities in this time of what the movie conveys, does have rules but do
not know how to implement it thoroughly.
3. Contextual Plane - In Contextual Plane, you put the work in context and its relationship to society. It
is an advantage if the artist / viewer has a knowledge of society’s history and its economic, political
and cultural conditions, national and world art and literatures, mythologies, philosophies and different
cultures and world views.
- The audience needs to draw the discussion between art and society. Art derives its creativity and
power from their social environment, being a cultural force and the impetus for transformation.
• Example:
This sculpture truly means a lot to Filipinos, because this monument represents freedom and
democracy over a dictator who led the country into darkness at those times. The creator expresses his
feelings and thoughts about what happening at that time, a very tragic and hopeless period to the
country but through the power of faith, unity and courage, Filipinos defeated the dictator and caused
him to flee the country.
4. Evaluative Plane - It is concerned with an analysis of a work’s values.
- It can often be easy to say that assessment encompasses both facets of form and content.
However, this segment is conservative theoretically as both are philosophically divided. The semiotic
analysis includes the basic semiotic plane, iconic plane, and contexts, which demonstrates how
meaning is generated by the connections between meaning (material traits) and meaning (concepts
and values) of the specific picture symbol that is an art piece. Meaning is rooted in the content
structure at all times.
• Example:
Made by the ancient Filipinos hand by hand and with minimal equipment for a millennia, It represents a
culture of the Ifugao tribe and shows how united and devoted they are to make their harvest at its best.
Because of the beauty of how the ancients created this, this enormous step of rice fields now goes and
voted as the eight wonders of the world. Even now that a younger generation of Ifugao’s tribe holds
the rights of keeping this big pile of lands for maintaining it, the value of their ancestors of how they
managed this before will remain to them as a knowledge and wisdom their ancestors truly want to exist
for the whole eternity and for prosperity and wealth of the tribe.