Art and its types

By: Farzana Mir

M.Sc. 4th (T.I.A.C)
 Art and craft:
Art
• it derived from the Latin word "ars" (meaning "skill" or "craft") - is a
useful starting point. This broad approach leads to art being defined
as: "the product of a body of knowledge, most often using a set of
skills. or
• Art is commonly used to describe something of beauty, or a skill
which produces an aesthetic result. Or
• Art means utilization of available material to create new material or
thing
• Art is occasion for expression, talking, verbalization of beauty, truth
and perfection. However the real height of beauty truth and
perfection is Allah and all His creation.
Craft: An activity involving skill in making things by hand or skill used
in deceiving others.
Principals of Art
• Balance
• Emphasis
• Movement
• Proportion
• Rhythm
• Unity and
• Varity
• The means an artist uses to organize elements within a work of art.

Purpose of art:
Art has had a great number of different functions throughout its
history, making its purpose difficult to abstract or quantify to any
single concept. This does not imply that the purpose of Art is
"vague", but that it has had many unique, different reasons for
being created. Some of these functions of Art are provided in the
following outline. The different purposes of art may be grouped
according to those that are non-motivated, and those that are
motivated (Lévi-Strauss).
 Terms concerning with Art
• Artifice:
A deceptive tactic
• Artificer:
Someone who is the first to
think of or make something.
• Artificial:
Contrived by art rather than
nature
• Artisan:
A skilled worker who practices
some trade or handicraft.
• Articulate:
Put into words or an expression
• Artestry or Artistry:
A superior skill that you can
learn by study and practice and
observation.
• Artist:
A person whose creative work
shows sensitivity and
imagination.
TYPES OF ARTS:
• Fine arts
• Visual arts
• Plastic arts
• Performance arts
• Applied arts and
• Decorative arts are the major classifications of the arts.
1.Fine Arts:
• This category includes those artworks that are
created primarily for aesthetic reasons ('art for
art's sake') rather than for commercial or
functional use. Designed for its uplifting, life-
enhancing qualities, fine art typically denotes the
traditional, Western European 'high arts‘.
• Historically, the five main fine arts
were paintings, sculpture, architecture, music and 
poetry, with performing arts including theatre and
dance. Today, the fine arts commonly include
additional forms, such
as film, photography, conceptual art,
and printmaking. However, in some institutes of
learning or in museums, fine art and frequently the
term fine arts as well, are associated exclusively
with visual art forms. Mona Liza by Leonardo da Vinci
Paintings and drawings
Drawing is a form of visual expression and is one of the major forms within the
visual arts. Common instruments include graphite pencils, pen and
ink, inked brushes, wax color pencils,
 crayons, charcoals, chalk, pastels, markers, stylus, or various metals like
silverpoint
Printmaking
Using simple methods like woodcuts or stencils, the more demanding techniques
of engraving, etching and lithography, or the more modern forms like screen-
printing, foil imaging prints. For a significant application of printmaking.

 Sculpture

In bronze, stone, marble, wood, or clay.

Other Fine Arts

Photography-architecture-Manuscript illumination Calligraphy-Animation
2.Visual Arts:
Visual art includes all the fine arts as well as new media and
contemporary forms of expression such as Assemblage,
Collage, Conceptual, Installation and Performance art, as well
as Photography and film-based forms like Video Art and Animation,
or any combination thereof. Another type, often created on a
monumental scale is the new environmental land art.
3.Plastic Arts:
The art of shaping or modeling, carving and sculpture.
4.Decorative Arts
• This category traditionally denotes functional but ornamental art
forms, such as works in glass, clay, wood, metal, or textile fabric.
This includes all forms of jeweler and mosaic art, as well
as ceramics, (exemplified by beautifully decorated styles
of ancient pottery notably Chinese and Greek Pottery) furniture,
furnishings, stained glass and tapestry art.

5.Performance Arts
• This type refers to public performance events. Traditional
varieties include, theatre, opera, music, and ballet.
Contemporary performance art also includes any activity in which
the artist's physical presence acts as the medium. Thus it
encompasses, mime, face or body painting, and the like. A hyper-
modern type of performance art is known as Happenings.
6.Applied Arts

• This category encompasses all activities involving the

application of aesthetic designs to everyday
functional objects. While fine art provides intellectual
stimulation to the viewer, applied art creates
utilitarian items (a cup, a couch or sofa, a clock, a chair
or table) using aesthetic principles in their design.
Folk art is predominantly involved with this type of
creative activity. Applied art includes
architecture, computer art, photography, industrial
design, graphic design, fashion design, interior design,
as well as all decorative arts
Bibliography:
Dana Arnold and Margaret Iverson (eds.) Art and Thought.
Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 2003

Shiner, Larry. "The Invention of Art: A Cultural History".

Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003. ISBN 978-0-226-
75342-3

Nina, Felshin, ed. But is it Art? 1995

Stephen Davies, Definitions of Art, 1991

Noel Carroll, Theories of Art Today, 2000

http://www.fine-art-bender.com/art.html
http://www.visual-arts-cork.com/art-definition.htm
http://www.ask.com/art-literature/classifications-art-
9f2e6ffed007ea1e
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art