GEC 106 [ Art Appreciation ]

Nature, Function and Appreciation of the Arts

in Contemporary Society

Lecture Note 02: BASIC CONCEPTS OF ART

BASIC CONCEPTS refer to the process of artistic creations. Learning the fundamental notions,
terms, concepts, ideas of an artwork gives us commonality in the understanding and purposes
of the produced artworks done by man.

KINDS OF BASIC CONCEPTS OF ART

SUBJECT denotes whatever is represented or shown in an artwork such as sacred realm, politics
and the social order, stories and histories, invention and fantasy, natural world as well as arts and
arts.

Kinds of Subject

Objective / Representational / Figurative Subject depicts a subject of an

artwork that can easily be identified by the art viewers like people, animals,
things, places, nature and others.

Non-Objective / Non-Representational / Non-Figurative Subject shows a

subject of an artwork that cannot easily be identified by the art viewers. Its intent
gives the viewers a hard time to critically think in knowing the subject. It is
stripped down to visual elements like shapes, lines and colors that are used to
translate a particular feeling, emotion, or even concept.

MEDIUM is the physical means through which we come in contact with the artwork. It is the
material out of which the artists create their artwork. The material, too, is the means through
which the artists express their thoughts and feelings. It is critically important in understanding the
work, because each medium has particular possibilities and limitations that determine the effects
the artists can achieve.

TECHNIQUE refers to the artistic and technical ability or craftsmanship of the artists to express
an idea, feeling, or sensation in the materials they use.

FORM is the particular manner in which the elements exist or appear. It is produced because of
the elements (qualities of the medium) of interacting, relating, and fusing to express an idea, a
feeling, or a sensation. These ideas, feelings, and sensations constitute the expressive content of
Art.

Classifications of Art according to FORM

SPATIAL ART / PLASTIC ART is developed through space and perceived by the sense of
sight such as painting, sculpture, and architecture.

TEMPORAL ART is created in time such as music and literature

HYBRID ART is created in space and time such as theatre / drama, dance, cinema and film
and poetry

NEWER MULTI-MEDIA FORMS are modern technology and new ways the artists have
interpreted the world such as digital art, action art, performance art, new media arts, and
world music.
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Prepared by: ASSOC. PROF. BOYLIE ABENIR SARCINA

Humanities Faculty, CASS, MSU-IIT, Iligan City
GEC 106 [ Art Appreciation ]
Nature, Function and Appreciation of the Arts
in Contemporary Society

REPRESENTATIVE THEORIES OF ART

MIMESIS imitates or depicts an object, whether individual, ideal (Plato) or universal

(Aristotle). This means that ART is an imitation of nature where the artists create artworks
based on what is happening in the community either real or not. For example, artists may
create artworks -life, success, happiness, failure, etc. So, whatever the
persons feel or think is being captured and put these feelings and ideas into the artworks
for us (viewers) to see, feel or think the same as what happens in reality or situation.

HEDONISM is the doctrine that pleasure is the only thing which is good in itself. Beauty is
pleasure objectified - example, our pleasure viewed as a quality of the object, which then
appears to us as beautiful (George Santayana, American philosopher). In short, we like or want things or
experiences are that satisfying and beautiful and not the other way around.

REVELATION enables us to free ourselves from immersion in brute fact, emotion, striving
and to achieve a liberation in the aesthetic experience ( Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Arthur
Schopenhauer, German philosophers). ,
philosophy of pessimism, doctrine that reality, life, and the world are evil rather than good.
This entails that as the artists create artworks, part of themselves if not all are shown or
reflected in their creations, thus, we as viewers can tell the personality and culture of the
artists. Accordingly, You are what you eat; you are what you say.

PLAY enables the human imagination to operate freely, through the order it imposes on
the playful activity of the imagination (German poet, dramatist, philosopher and historian Friedrich von Schiller;
Polish-born English novelist Teodor Józef Konrad Korzeniowski a.k.a Joseph Conrad; Norwegian historian Christian Christoph
Andreas Lange). Allied theories make art an escape or illusion, as in of the Austrian physician,
neurologist and founder of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud (art as the expression of
repressed wishes or desires) or Lange (art as a form of self-depiction by which we escape
into an ideal world). This means that as we create the artworks, we extract all our creative
juices or ideas in the process or stages of creation in order for us to have the best outputs.
Also, this enables us to explore, experiment possible chances to create extraordinary things.

COMMUNICATION views art as an activity in which the artists transmit emotions by means
of consciously constructed external signs, to other persons, who may then experience the
They hand on to others feelings they have lived through and others are
infected by these feelings and also experience them (from What is Art?) by a Russian writer
and moral philosopher Leo Nikolayevich Tolstoy. Contrast this with British art critic Arthur
uage of emotion, where emotion is a special,
aesthetic emotion expressed in apprehending significant form. This suggests that art is an
effective tool to transmit the innermost thoughts and feelings of the artists towards the
audience and viewers for them to relate, understand and enjoy such created artworks.

EXPRESSION views art as the expression of impressions, example, the spiritual

transformation of the raw materials of experience (emotions, feelings, actions, knowing,
etc.) into intuition, lyric visions of the concrete and individual visions. We thus achieve a
knowledge differing from the universalized, conceptualized knowledge of science (Italian
philosopher, historian and political leader Benedetto Croce). This means that art is a venue
for us (artists) in order to let go of our feelings, emotions, ideas, and views as well as share
things we like and do not like. As aptly said, art is a liberator of the soul.

CONTEMPLATION AT A DISTANCE views aesthetic experience as one of contemplation of

an object achieved as a result of interposing a physical distance between it and ourselves.
We distance an object by putting it out of years with our practical needs and ends, and
thereby allow ourselves to enjoy the contemplation of it (Edward Bullough). Anchored on
the idea that we are sometimes clingy to things we own; we then see artworks based on
their functionality without getting too attached or too emotional. So, we really need to
rethink on the value of the artworks.
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Prepared by: ASSOC. PROF. BOYLIE ABENIR SARCINA

Humanities Faculty, CASS, MSU-IIT, Iligan City
GEC 106 [ Art Appreciation ]
Nature, Function and Appreciation of the Arts
in Contemporary Society

EMPATHY was the name that Theodor Lipps gave to a process which he described as

independently formulated much the same account as that of Lipps. When we say, for

(empathy) from ourselves to the looked-at shape of the mountain the idea of rising and the
emotions that accompany it. As stated, we need to make viewers to put themselves in our
shoe for them to become sensitive and put importance on the felt-need as to why
situations happen. For instance, if someone is broken-hearted and we are not, such feeling
is impossible to digest because we are not in the same boat. In sum, we need to think the
what IFs.

EXPERIENCE
experience the world in its fullness. It is an embodiment of idealized experience, a matter
erience.
It is valuable because it both reflects the tensions of the world, thereby its contradictory
possibilities and gives them unity and totality (John Dewey, American philosopher,
psychologist and educator).

According to John Dewey, the source of art is passionate excitement about subject matter,
which activates memories of previous experiences and translates them into emotionalized

The artist went through in producing the work, so that we perfect form to perceive. Art is
communicable experience.
of experience, it does not mean that we have to have a first-hand experience. Such
experience can be done through observation in order to deepen our understanding about
the situation.

FUNCTIONALISM is the theory that beauty results from or is identical with functional
efficiency. In the Memorabilia of Xenophon (4th century, BC), Socrates is made to argue

sses

Although functionalism had its beauty - - it was preached as a new aesthetic creed after
World War I (Le Corbusier) - - and for a decade became the rage, many used the term with

functional efficiency and beauty do often coincide may be admitted. The mistake is to
assume that functional efficiency is the cause of the beauty: because functional, therefore

By the mid-20th century, functionalism was orthodox doctrine as one element in the
aesthetic bases of all practical and utilitarian arts, but it was no longer preached in a
doctrinaire fashion as the ultimate or sole principle of beauty.

Hence, functionalism is a theory that a building or piece of furniture or other subject should
be designed primarily to fulfill its material purpose and use and that its form should be
determined exclusively by its functions.

Aristotle claimed that every particular substance in the world has an end, telos in Greek,
telos is intricately linked with function.

In contemporary life, the connection betwe

a thing have been closer and more interlaced, suggesting sometimes that the end is the
function and vice versa, and that they determine what kind of thing a thing is.
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Prepared by: ASSOC. PROF. BOYLIE ABENIR SARCINA

Humanities Faculty, CASS, MSU-IIT, Iligan City
 GEC 106 [ Art Appreciation ]
Nature, Function and Appreciation of the Arts
in Contemporary Society

FUNCTIONS OF ART

From the very start,

described, defined, and deepened the significant human experience (SHE). Arts likewise
serve myriads of functions which are outcomes to their own purposes.

Aesthetic Function is the consciousness of man regarding the beauty of nature

where the man benefits from his own works and works done by his fellowmen. It is
visual spice for gracefully adorned interiors and can bring out the most elegant
features of different decor elements. It reasonably reproduced visual images which
communicate through fantastic persuasions and meaningful words.
Utilitarian Function
conservation such as utensils, building structures, mega bridges, interior
decorations, industrial and graphic designs, basketry, weaving, etc.
Religious Function tends to the uplift spiritual well-being.
Cultural Function transmits and preserves skills, knowledge, cultural background
that makes man more civilized and makes life more enduring and satisfying. Art is
an articulation and transmission of new information and values.
Social Function refers to the civic and graphic arts that man learns to love and
help each other. International understanding and cooperation are fostered and
nations become more unified, friendly, cooperative, helpful and sympathetic.
People associate with others through their art performance that arouses social
consciousness such as group singing and dancing, public art exhibits, among
others.
Individual Function is where the artists perform arts to express their passion in
various mediums.
Economic Function is where arts emerge as a potent force in the economic life

as crafts, tourism and cultural attractions.

Political Function is when art provides a forum of ideas that lead to employment,
prestige, status, influence, and power for example, during the election campaign
where the candidates make the usage of posters, propaganda, agenda and political
views.

HOW TO LOOK AT ART?

We find everything from paintings on the walls of caves and huge sculptures carved into the
faces of mountains to tiny pieces of jewelry or miniature paintings. All of these are art because
they were made by the human hand in an attempt to express human ideas and/or emotions.
Our response to such objects depends a good deal on our own education and cultural biases.

Our lives are so bound up with art that we often fail to recognize how much we are shaped by
it. We are bombarded with examples of graphic art (television commercials, magazine ads, CD
jackets, displays in stores) every day; we use art to make statements about who we are and
what we value in the way we decorate our rooms and in the style of our clothing.

In all of these ways we manipulate artistic symbols to make statements about what we believe
in, what we stand for, and how we want others to see us. The many sites on the Web bombard
us with visual clues which attempt to make us stop and find out what is being offered or
argued.The history of art is nothing more than the record of how people have used their minds
and imaginations to symbolize who they are and what they value. If a certain age spends
enormous amounts of money to build and decorate churches (as in twelfth-century France)
and another spends the same kind of money on palaces (like eighteenth-century France), we
learn about what each age values the most. The very complexity of human art makes it difficult
to interpret. That difficulty increases when we are looking at art from a much different culture
and/or a far different age. We may admire the massiveness of Egyptian architecture, but find it
hard to appreciate why such energies were used for the cult of the dead. When confronted
with the art of another age (or even our own art, for that matter), a number of questions we
can ask of ourselves and of the art may lead us to greater understanding.
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Prepared by: ASSOC. PROF. BOYLIE ABENIR SARCINA

Humanities Faculty, CASS, MSU-IIT, Iligan City
 GEC 106 [ Art Appreciation ]
Nature, Function and Appreciation of the Arts
in Contemporary Society

This is essentially a question of context. Most of the religious

paintings in our museums were originally meant to be seen in churches in very specific
settings. To imagine them in their original setting helps us to understand that they had a
devotional purpose that is lost when they are seen on a museum wall. To ask about the original
setting, then, helps us to ask further whether the painting is in fact devotional or meant as a
teaching tool or to serve some other purpose. Setting is crucial. A frescoed wall on a public
building is meant to be seen by many people, while a fresco on the wall of an aristocratic home
is meant for a much smaller, more elite class of viewer. The calligraphy decorating an Islamic
mosque tells us much about the importance of the sacred writings of Islam. A sculpture
designed for a wall niche is going to have a shape different from one designed to be seen by
walking around it. Similarly, art made under official sponsorship of an authoritarian government
must be read in a far different manner than art produced by underground artists who have no
standing with the government. Finally, art may be purely decorative or it may have a didactic
purpose, but (and here is a paradox) purely decorative art may teach us while didactic art may
end up being purely decorative.

This question is one of intellectual or emotional context.

Funeral sculpture may reflect the grief of the survivors, or a desire to commemorate the
achievements of the deceased, or to affirm what the survivors believe about life after death, or
a combination of these purposes. If we think of art as a variety of speech we can then inquire
of any artwork: What is it saying? An artist may strive for an ideal, illustrate the power of an

may well produce a work simply to demonstrate inventiveness or to expand the boundaries of
what art means.

How Was This Piece of Art Made? This question inquires into both the materials and the skills
the artist employs to turn materials into art. To learn to appreciate the craft of the artist is a first
step toward enjoying art for its worth as art
looking at the object as a crafted object.

What is the Composition of this Artwork? This question addresses how th

the work. Since all of these techniques are designed to make us see in a particular manner,
only by thinking about composition do we begin to reflect on what the artist has done. If we
do not think about composition, we tend to take an

mixing done on the computer.

What Elements should we Notice about a Work of Art? The answer to this question is a
summary of what we have stated above. Without pretending to exclusivity, we should judge
art on the basis of the following three aspects: Formal elements. What kind of artwork is it?
What materials are employed? What is its composition in terms of structure? In terms of pure
form, how does this particular work look when compared to a similar work of the same or

didactic, propagandistic, to give pleasure, or what? How well do the formal elements
contribute to the symbolic statement being attempted in the work of art? Social elements.
What is the context of this work of art? Who paid and why? Whose purposes does it serve?

At this level, many different philosophies come into play. Conversely, to judge every work
purely in terms of social theory excludes the notion of an artistic work and, as a consequence,
reduces art to politics or philosophy. For a fuller appreciation of art, then, all of the elements
mentioned above need to come into play.

WHAT KIND OF IMPORTANT INFORMATION IS NEEDED IN THE ARTWORK?

Artist (if known) Title

Date Materials
Size Original and present location
Patron
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Prepared by: ASSOC. PROF. BOYLIE ABENIR SARCINA

Humanities Faculty, CASS, MSU-IIT, Iligan City