QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY

DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence

Module 2: AESTHETICS
Aesthetics is the philosophical argument about the nature of beauty. It’s an idea central to any
exploration of art.  Aesthetics deals with notions of taste, cultural conventions – ideas of art being
‘good’ and ‘bad’ based on specific cultural information and beliefs and the judgments we make based
on our perceptions.
As deep as visual art is embedded in the fabric of our lives, it still is the source of controversy and
irony. It thrives on common experience yet contradicts ideas of ourselves. Art is part of the culture it’s
created in, but can reflect many cultures at once. From where you and I stand today art has become
probably more complex than ever in its use of imagery, mediums and meanings. We need a way to
access the visual information of our society, of past cultures, and cultures not known to us to have a
way to understand what we are looking at.
SUBJECTIVE & OBJECTIVE PERSPECTIVES
The first level in approaching art is learning to LOOK at it.  In future discussions we will spend more
time in pure observation than you probably have done before.  Generally, we tend to look at art in
terms of "liking" it FIRST, and "looking" at it later. From this perspective, the subjective (knowledge
residing in the emotions and thoughts of the viewer) almost completely dominates our way of looking
at art. In the arts, it’s especially important to begin to develop an informed or objective opinion rather
than just an instinctual reaction.  An objective view is one that focuses on the object’s physical
characteristics as the main source of information. This does not mean that you will remove or
invalidate your subjective feelings about a work, in fact you will find that the more informed you
become, the more artwork will affect you emotionally and intellectually. It does mean that you will
learn alternative ways to approach art, ways that allow you to find clues to meaning and to
understand how art reflects and affects our lives.
It’s complex, but the satisfaction of looking at art comes from exploring the work to find meaning, not
shying away from it simply because we may not understand it.

M1-Artistic Roles

Visual artists and the works they produce perform specific roles. These roles vary between cultures.
We can examine some general areas to see the diversity they offer – and perhaps come up with
some new ones of our own.
Description
A traditional role of visual art is to describe our self and our surroundings. Some of the earliest
artwork discovered are drawings and paintings of humans and wild animals on walls deep within
prehistoric caves. One particular image is a hand print: a universal symbol of human communication.
Portraits
Portraits, landscapes and still life are common examples of description. Portraits capture the
accuracy of physical characteristics but the very best also transfer a sense of an individual’s unique
personality. For thousands of years this role was reserved for images of those in positions of power,
influence and authority. The portrait not only signifies who they are, but also solidifies class structure
by presenting only the highest-ranking members of a society. The portrait bust of Egyptian Queen
Nefertiti, dated to around 1300 BCE, exemplifies beauty and royalty.
 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence
Egyptian, Bust of Nefertiti, painted sandstone, c. 1370 BCE, Neues Museum, Berlin.
Licensed under Creative Commons and GNU.
The full-length Imperial Portrait of Chinese Emperor Xianfeng below not only shows realism in the
likeness of the emperor, it exalts in the patterns and colors of his robe and the throne behind him.

Imperial Portrait of Emperor Xianfeng, China, c. 1855. Palace Museum, Bejing.

Licensed under Creative Commons.
 Landscapes
Landscapes – by themselves – give us detailed information about our natural and human made
surroundings; things like location, architecture, time of day, year or season plus other physical
information such as geological elements and the plants and animals within a particular region.
In many western cultures, the more realistic the rendering of a scene the closer to our idea of the
‘truth’ it becomes. In the 15th century German artist Albrecht Durer creates vivid works that show a
keen sense of observation. His Young Hare from 1495 is uncanny in its realism and sense of
animation.

 
Albrecht Durer, Young Hare, c. 1505, gouache and watercolor on paper. Albertina Museum, Vienna.
Image in the public domain.
Scientific Illustration
 Out of this striving for accuracy and documentation developed the art of scientific illustration. The
traditional mediums of painting and drawing are still used to record much of the world around us.
Linda Berkley’s Merino Ram uses a layered approach to record in great detail the physical anatomy
of the head of the great sheep.
 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence

Merino Ram, composite drawing, colored pencil, acrylic on Canson paper, 2009. Linda Berkley,
Illustrator.
              
Enhancing our World
Enhancing the world of our everyday lives is another role art plays. This role is more utilitarian than
others. It includes textiles and product design, decorative  embellishments to the items we use
everyday and all the aesthetic considerations that create a more comfortable, expressive environment
 Narratives: How Artists Tell Their Stories
Artists can combine representation with more complex elements and situational compositions to bring
a narrative component into art. Using subject matter – the objects and figures that inhabit a work of
art -- as a vehicle for communicating stories and other cultural expressions is another traditional
function of visual art.
The narrative tradition is strong in many cultures throughout the world. They become a means to
perpetuate knowledge, morals and ethics, and can signify historical contexts within specific cultures.
Narrative takes many forms; the spoken or written word, music, dance and visual art are the mediums
most often used. Many times one is used in conjunction with another. In his Migration Series, Jacob
Lawrence paints stark, direct images that communicate the realities of the African American
experience in their struggle to escape the repression of the South and overcome the difficulties of
adjusting to the big cities in the North.
In contrast, photographers used the camera lens to document examples of segregation in the United
States. Here the image on film tells its poignant story about inequalities based on race.

Man Drinking at a Water Cooler in the Street Car

Terminal, Russell Lee, Oklahoma City, 1939.
Photo from the National Archives and in the public domain
Spirit, Myth and Fantasy
Tied to the idea of narrative, another artistic role is the exploration of other worlds beyond our
physical one. This world is in many ways richer than our own and includes the world of spirit, myth,
fantasy and the imagination; areas particularly suited for the visual artist. We can see how art gives a
rich and varied treatment to these ideas. Artist Michael Spafford has spent his career presenting
classical Greek myths through painting, drawing and printmaking. His spare, abstract style uses high
contrast images to strong dramatic effect. A Smiling Figure from ancient Mexico portrays a god of
dance, music and joy. A third example, Hieronymus Bosch’s painting the Temptation of Saint
Anthony, gives the subject matter both spiritual and bizarre significance in the way they are
presented.  His creative imagination takes the subject of temptation and raises it to the realm of the
fantastic. There is an entire module devoted to the idea of the other world later in this course.
 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence
ARTISTIC CATEGORIES
Visual arts are generally divided into categories that make distinctions based on the context of the
work. For example, Leonardo da Vinci’s ‘Mona Lisa’ would not fall into the same category as, say, a
graphic poster for a rock concert. Some artworks can be placed in more than one category. Here are
the main categories:
Fine Art
 This category includes drawings, paintings, sculptures, photographs and, in the last decade, new
media that are in museum collections and sold through commercial art galleries. Fine art has a
distinction of being some of the finest examples of our human artistic heritage. Here is where you will
find Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa (below), also ancient sculpture, such as the Gandhara figure
from India (also below), and stunning ceramics from different cultures and time periods.

 Mona Lisa, Leonardo Da Vincic. 1503-19. Oil on poplar. 30” x 21”. The Louvre, Paris
Image licensed through Creative Commons

Stucco Ganhara figure, India, 4th–5th century CE. Victoria & Albert Museum, London.
Licensed through GNU
Popular Culture
This category contains the many products and images we are exposed to every day. In the
industrialized world, this includes posters, graffiti, advertising, popular music, television and digital
imagery, magazines, books and movies (as distinguished from film, which we’ll examine in a different
context later in the course). Also included are cars, celebrity status and all the ideas and attitudes that
help define the contemporary period of a particular culture.          
Handbills posted on telephone poles or the sides of buildings are graphic, colorful and informative,
but they also provide a street level texture to the urban environment most of us live in. Public murals
serve this same function. They put an aesthetic stamp on an otherwise bland and industrialized
landscape.
 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence

Street handbills. Image by Christopher Gildow

Licensed through Creative Commons

Public Mural, Seattle. Image by Christopher Gildow

Licensed through Creative Commons
Craft
Craft is a category of art that shows a high degree of skilled workmanship in its production. Craft
works are normally associated with utilitarian purposes, but can be aesthetic works in themselves,
often highly decorated. The Mexican ceramic vessel below is an example. Handmade furniture and
glassware, fine metalworking and leather goods are other examples of craft.

Ceramic bowl, Mexico. Date unknown. Painted clay. Anahuacalli Museum, Mexico City.
Licensed through GNU and Creative Commons.
 ARTISTIC STYLES
Style
The search for truth is not exclusive to representational art. From viewing many of the examples so
far you can see how individual artists use different styles to communicate their ideas. Style refers to a
particular kind of appearance in works of art. It’s a characteristic of an individual artist or a collective
relationship based on an idea, culture or artistic movement. Following is a list and description of the
most common styles in art:
Naturalistic Style
 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence
Naturalistic style uses recognizable images with a high level of accuracy in their depiction.
Naturalism also includes the idealized object: one that is modified to achieve a kind of perfection
within the bounds of aesthetics and form.  William Sydney Mount’s painting The Bone Player gives
accuracy in its representation and a sense of character to the figure, from his ragged-edged hat to the
button missing from his vest. Mount treats the musician’s portrait with a sensitive hand, more
idealized by his handsome features and soft smile. Note: click the image for a larger view.
Abstract Style
Abstract style is based on a recognizable object but which is then manipulated by distortion, scale
issues or other artistic devices. Abstraction can be created by exaggerating form, simplifying shapes
or the use of strong colors. Let’s look at three landscapes below with varying degrees of abstraction
in them to see how this style can be so effective. In the first one, Marsden Hartley uses abstraction to
give the spare “Landscape, New Mexico” a sense of energy. Through the rounded forms and gesture
in treatment we can discern hills, clouds, a road and some trees or bushes.

Landscape, New Mexico, Marsden Hartley, about 1916. Pastel on paper. The Brooklyn Museum,
New York.

Georgia O’Keeffe’s Birch and Pine Trees -- Pink employs abstraction to turn the painting into a tree-
filled landscape dominated by a spray of orange paint suggesting a branch of birch leaves at the top
left. Vasily Kandinsky’s Landscape with Red Spots, No. 2 goes further into abstraction, releasing
color from its descriptive function and vastly simplifying forms. The rendering of a town at the lower
left is reduced to blocky areas of paint and a black triangular shape of hill in the background. In all
three of these, the artists manipulate and distort the ‘real’ landscape as a vehicle for emotion.
It’s important to note the definition of ‘abstract’ is relative to cultural perspective. That is, different
cultures develop traditional forms and styles of art they understand within the context of their own
culture (see ‘Cultural Styles’ below), and which are difficult for other cultures to understand. So what
may be ‘abstract’ to one could be more ‘realistic’ in style to another. For example, the Roman bust of
Sappho below looks very real from a western European aesthetic perspective. Under the same
perspective, the African mask would be called ‘abstract’.

Roman bust of Sappho.  Capitoline Museum, Rome.

Image in the public domain.
 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence

African mask photo by Cezary.

Yet to the African culture that produced the mask it would appear more realistic. In addition, the
African mask shares some formal attributes with the Tlingit ‘Groundhog Mask’ (below under ‘Cultural
styles’) from Canada’s west coast. It’s very possible these two cultures would see the Roman bust as
the ‘abstract’ one. So it’s important that we understand artworks from cultures other than our own in
the context in which they were originally created.
Questions of abstraction can also emerge from something as simple as our distance from an artwork.
View and read about Fanny/Fingerpainting by the artist Chuck Close. At first glance it is a highly
realistic portrait of the artist’s grandmother-in law. You can zoom it in to see how the painting
dissolves into a grid of individual fingerprints, a process that renders the surface very abstract. With
this in mind, we can see how any work of art is essentially made of smaller abstract parts that, when
seen together, make up a coherent whole.

Non-objective imagery has no relation to the ‘real’ world – that is – the work of art is based solely
upon itself. In this way the non-objective style is completely different than abstract, and it’s important
to make the distinction between the two. This style rose from the modern art movement in Europe,
Russia and the United States during the first half of the 20 th century. Pergusa Three by American
artist Frank Stella uses organic and geometric shapes and strong color set against a heavy black
background to create a vivid image.  More than with other styles, issues of content are associated
with a non-objective work’s formal structure. 
Cultural Styles
Cultural styles refer to distinctive characteristics in artworks throughout a particular society or culture.
Some main elements of cultural styles are recurring motifs, created in the same way by many
artists.  Cultural styles are formed over hundreds or even thousands of years and help define cultural
identity. We can find evidence of this by comparing two masks; one from Alaska and the other from
Canada. The  Yup'ik  dance mask from Alaska is quite stylized with oval and rounded forms divided
by wide bands in strong relief. The painted areas outline or follow shapes. Carved objects are
attached to the mask and give an upward movement to the whole artwork while the face itself carries
an animated expression.
By comparison, a ‘Groundhog Mask’ from the Tlingit culture in coastal northwestern Canada exhibits
similar forms and many of the same motifs. The mouths of each mask are particularly similar to each
other. Groundhog’s visage takes on human – like characteristics just as the Yup’ik mask takes the
form of a bird. This cultural style ranges from western Alaska to northern Canada.
 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence
 Ground Hog Mask,Tlingit, c. 19th century. Carved and painted wood, animal hair.
Collection the Burke Museum, University of Washington, Seattle.
Celtic art from Great Britain and Ireland shows a cultural style that’s been identified for thousands of
years. Its highly refined organic motifs include spirals, plant forms and zoomorphism. Intricate and
decorative, the Celtic style adapted to include early book illustration. The Book of Kells is considered
the pinnacle of this cultural style. 

Page from the Book of Kells, around 800 CE. Trinity College, Dublin.

IDEAS OF PERCEPTION & VISUAL AWARENESS

Images from media and the environment around us – dominate our perception. Our eyes literally
navigate us through a visual landscape all our lives, and we all make decisions based
on how and what we see.  Separating the subjective and objective ways we see helps us become
more visually aware of our surroundings.  Scientifically, the process of seeing is the result of light
passing through the lens in our eye, then concentrating it on the retina at the back of the eye. The
retina has nerve cells that act like sponges, soaking up the information and sending it to the visual
cortex of our brain. Here the light is converted to an image that we can perceive – the ‘truth’ – as we
understand it to be. We are exposed to so much visual information every day, especially with the
advent of mass media, that it’s hard to process all of it into specific meaning. Being visually aware is
more complicated than just the physical act of seeing because our perceptions are influenced by
exterior factors, including our own prejudices, desires and ideas about what the ‘truth’ really is.
Moreover, cultural ties to perception are many. For example, let’s look at two images that share one
particular element; that of raised arms, and see how we perceive each one according to what we
know about them.

Standing Bather with Raised Arms, 1930, Aristide Maillol, Marble

Photo by Flickr User: zebrawatcher
 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence

Touchdown Jesus, Monroe, Ohio

Photo by Flickr User: danieljohnsonjr

Art is a resource for questioning our perceptions about how objects and ideas present themselves.
The Belgian artist Rene Magritte  used his easel as a soapbox to confront the viewer with
confounding visual information. Click the hyperlink to watch a short video where Magritte considers
language and perception.
As was mentioned at the beginning of this module, there is a difference between looking and seeing.
To look is to glance back and forth, aware of surface qualities in the things that come into our line of
sight. To see is more about comprehending. After all, when we say “I see” we really mean that we
understand. Seeing goes beyond appearances. So, as we confront the huge amounts of visual
information coming at us we start to make choices about what we keep and what we edit out. We
concentrate on that which has the most meaning for us: a street sign that helps us get home, a view
of the mountains that lets us enjoy a part of nature’s spectacle, or the computer screen that allows us
to gather information, whether it’s reading the content in this course or catching up on the day’s news
or emails. Our gaze becomes more specific, and with that comes specific meaning. At this point what
we see becomes part of what we know. It’s when we stop to contemplate what we see – the view of
the mountain mentioned above, a portrait or simple visual composition that catches our eye – that we
make reference to an aesthetic perception. That is, when something is considered for its visual
properties alone, and their relation to our ideas of what is beautiful, as a vehicle for meaning.
No matter how visually aware we are, visual clues alone hinder our ability to fully comprehend what
we see. Words, either spoken or read as text, help fill in the blanks to understanding. They provide
a context; a historical background, religious function or other cultural significance to the art we are
looking at. We ask others for information about it, or find it ourselves, to help understand the
meaning. In a museum or gallery it may be wall text that provides this link, or a source text, website or
someone knowledgeable about the art.
MODULE 2 ASSESSMENT ACTIVITY
Please follow the format indicated for your personal info like name, course, etc.
Student Name:
Course, Year and Section:
Instructor:
Subject: Arts Appreciation
Module: Module 2: Aesthetics

JOURNAL PROMPTS
Journal Prompt #1: Investigating Art
Using the external links as a resource, find a work of art to answer the following questions. The
artwork can be from any culture or time period.

 Provide the title, date and artist’s name. Make sure your source has all of this information.
 What medium is used (painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, photograph or digital image,
video, installation or performance)?

Give a short description of the work:

 QUIRINO STATE UNIVERSITY
DIFFUN CAMPUS
Diffun, 3401 Quirino

COLLEGE OF TEACHER EDUCATION

….promoting pedagogical excellence
 Is it realistic, abstract or non-objective?
 What does it depict? What colors are used?
 What category does it fall under?
 What artistic role does it play?  Does it take on more than one role? Review the different roles
discussed in Module 2 to help you decide.

Reminder: Submit your word file in the following format:

YourName_ArtModule2_Course&Section (Surname first),
Send it thru: messenger: Qsu Cte
Example: PascuaAmelia_ArtModule2_BSEdEnglish1B

***END OF MODULE 2***