EVOLUTION OF VISUAL ART (THEORY)

                                                              

PAPER IV – EVOLUTION OF VISUAL ARTS  

Duration of Examination: 3 hrs

Maximum Marks: 100

Credits: 4

Objective: To create awareness about expressive functions of art using art elements, including form, texture, value, depth and gain knowledge about organizing the art elements, including unity and emphasis.

Unit 1:

Architecture-Indian Art: Harrapa and Mohenjadaro, Buddhist Art: Stamba, Stupa, Chaityaghara, Vihara

Unit 2:

Structural Temples: North Indian Temples- Nagara style, Vesara style, South Indian Temples- Pallava Peroid, Chola Peroid, Pandya Peroid, Nayaka Peroid.

Unit 3:

Architecture- Western Art: Gothic Art, Roman Art, Greek Art, Egypt Art.

Unit 4:

Paintings- Renaissance Art: Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Raphel, and Titan.

Unit 5:

Islamic Architecture: Delhi or Imperial style, Mughal Architecture.

Reference:

q  Francis Ching, , Vikram Prakash, A Global History of Architecture, Wiley, 2006.

q  Rajan, K.V. Soundara (1998). Rock-Cut Temple Styles. Somaiya Publications: Mumbai

Gascoigne, Bamber (1971). The Great Moguls, Harper & Row

GREEK ART

Greek art began in the Cycladic and Minoan prehistorical civilization, and gave birth to Western classical art in the ancient period (further developing this during the Hellenistic Period). It took in influences of Eastern civilizations and the new religion of Orthodox Christianity in the Byzantine era and absorbed Italian and European ideas during the period of Romanticism (with the invigoration of the Greek Revolution), right up until the Modernist and Postmodernist periods.

Greek art is mainly five forms: architecture, sculpture, painting, pottery and jewellery making.

·         1 Ancient Period

·         2 Byzantine Period

·         3 Modern Period

·         4 Contemporary Period

·         5 See also

·         6 References

·         7 External links

Ancient Period

There are three scholarly distinctions of later ancient Greek art that correspond roughly with historical periods of the same names. These are the Archaic, the Classical and the Hellenistic. The Archaic period is usually dated from ca. 1000 bc. The Persian Wars of 480 BC to 448 BC are usually taken as the dividing line between the Archaic and the Classical periods, and before the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC is regarded as separating the Classical from the Hellenistic period. Of course, different forms of art developed at different speeds in different parts of the Greek world, and varied to a degree from artist to artist. There was no sharp transition from one artistic period to another.

The art of ancient Greece has exercised an enormous influence on the culture of many countries from ancient times until the present, particularly in the areas of sculpture and architecture. In the West, the art of the Roman Empire was largely derived from Greek models. In the East, Alexander the Great's conquests initiated several centuries of exchange between Greek, Central Asian and Indian cultures, resulting in Greco-Buddhist art, with ramifications as far as Japan. Following the Renaissance in Europe, the humanist aesthetic and the high technical standards of Greek art inspired generations of European artists.

Byzantine Period

Byzantine art is the term created by the Eastern Roman Empire from about the 5th century until the fall of Constantinople in 1453. (The Roman Empire during this period is conventionally known as the Byzantine Empire.) The term can also be used for the art of states which were contemporary with the Persian Empire and shared a common culture with it, without actually being part of it, such as Bulgaria, or Russia, and also Venice, which had close ties to the Byzantine Empire despite being in other respects part of western European culture. It can also be used for the art of peoples of the former Byzantine Empire under the rule of Ottoman Empire after 1453. In some respects the Byzantine artistic tradition has continued in Russia and other Eastern Orthodox countries to the present day.

Byzantine art grew from the art of Ancient Greece, and at least before 1453 never lost sight of its classical heritage, but was distinguished from it in a number of ways. The most profound of these was that the humanist ethic of Ancient Greek art was replaced by the Christian ethic. If the purpose of classical art was the glorification of man, the purpose of Byzantine art was the glorification of God.

 place of the nude, the figures of Glhi the Father, Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, and the saints and martyrs of Christian tradition were elevated and became the dominant - indeed almost exclusive - focus of Byzantine art. One of the most important forms of Byzantine art was, and still is, the icon: an image of Christ, the Virgin (particularly the Virgin and Child), or a saint, used as an object of veneration in Orthodox churches and private homes.

Modern Period

Due to the Ottoman rule of Greece, there was very little artistic output during this time, so the de facto birth of modern Greek art was the start of the 19th century (the end of the Greek War of Independence was in 1829). Absorbing a number of Romantic influences, most notably from Italy, the result was the distinctive style of Greek Romanticist art, inspired by revolutionary ideals as well as the particular geography and long history of the country.

Contemporary Period

Theodoros Stamos (1922–1997) was a great abstract expressionism art from Lefkas that lived and worked in New York in the 40s and 50s. His work has been exhibited throughout the world, and can be found in major museum collections such as the Whitney Museum of Art, the Guggenheim Museum, Smithsonian and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

ROMAN ARCHITECTURE

It was in the area of architecture that Roman art produced its greatest innovations. Because the Roman Empire extended over so great an area and included so many urbanized areas, Roman engineers developed methods for city building on a grand scale, including the use of concrete. Massive buildings like the Pantheon and the Colosseum could never have been constructed with previous materials and methods. Though concrete had been invented a thousand years earlier in the Near East, the Romans extended its use from fortifications to their most impressive buildings and monuments, capitalizing on the material’s strength and low cost. The concrete core was covered with a plaster, brick, stone, or marble veneer, and decorative polychrome and gold-gilded sculpture was often added to produce a dazzling effect of power and wealth.

Because of these methods, Roman architecture is legendary for the durability of its construction; with many buildings still standing, and some still in use, mostly buildings converted to churches during the Christian era. Many ruins, however, have been stripped of their marble veneer and are left with their concrete core exposed, thus appearing somewhat reduced in size and grandeur from their original appearance, such as with the Basilica of Constantine.

During the Republican era, Roman architecture combined Greek and Etruscan elements, and produced innovations such as the round temple and the curved arch. As Roman power grew in the early empire, the first emperors inaugurated wholesale leveling of slums to build grand palaces on the Palatine Hill and nearby areas, which required advances in engineering methods and large scale design. Roman buildings were then built in the commercial, political, and social grouping known as a forum, that of Julius Caesar being the first and several added later, with the Forum Romanum being the most famous. The greatest arena in the Roman world, the Colosseum, was completed around 80 AD. at the far end of that forum. It held over 50,000 spectators, had retractable fabric coverings for shade, and could stage massive spectacles including huge gladiatorial contests and mock naval battles. This masterpiece of Roman architecture epitomizes Roman engineering efficiency and incorporates all three architectural orders—Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian. Less celebrated but just as important if not more so for most Roman citizens, was the five-story insula or city block, the Roman equivalent of an apartment building, which housed tens of thousands of Romans.

It was during the reign of Trajan (98-117 AD.) and Hadrian (117-138 AD.) that the Roman Empire reached its greatest extent and that Rome itself was at the peak of its artistic glory— achieved through massive building programs of monuments, meeting houses, gardens, aqueducts, baths, palaces, pavilions, sarcophagi, and temples. The Roman use of the arch, the use of concrete building methods, the use of the dome all permitted construction of vaulted ceilings and enabled the building of these public spaces and complexes, including the palaces, public baths and basilicas of the “Golden Age” of the empire. Outstanding examples of dome construction include the Pantheon, the Baths of Diocletian, and the Baths of Caracalla. The Pantheon (dedicated to all the planetary gods) is the best preserved temple of ancient times with an intact ceiling featuring an open “eye” in the center. The height of the ceiling exactly equals the interior diameter of the building, creating an enclosure that could contain giant sphere.[27] These grand buildings later served as inspirational models for architects of the Italian Renaissance, such as Brunelleschi. By the age of Constantine (306-337 AD), the last great building programs in Rome took place, including the erection of the Arch of Constantine built near the Colosseum, which recycled some stone work from the forum nearby, to produce an eclectic mix of styles.

Roman aqueducts, also based on the arch, were commonplace in the empire and essential transporters of water to large urban areas. Their standing masonry remains are especially impressive, such as the Pont du Gard (featuring three tiers of arches) and the aqueduct of Segovia, serving as mute testimony to their quality of their design and construction.

ART OF ANCIENT EGYPT

Ancient Egyptian art refers to the style of painting, sculpture, crafts and architecture developed by the civilization in the lower Nile Valley from 5000 BC to 300 AD. Ancient Egyptian art was expressed in paintings and sculptures, and was both highly stylized and symbolic. Much of the surviving art comes from tombs and monuments and thus there is an emphasis on life after death and the preservation of knowledge of the past.

In a more narrow sense, Ancient Egyptian art refers to the canonical 2nd and 3rd Dynasty art developed in Egypt from 3000 BC and used until the 3rd century. Most elements of Egyptian art remained remarkably stable over that 3000 year period without strong outside influence. The quality of observation started at a high level and remained near that level throughout the period.

Periods

·         Predynastic (4210 BC–2680 BC)

·         Old Kingdom (2680 BC–2258 BC)

·         Middle Kingdom (2258 BC–1786 BC)

·         New Kingdom (1786 BC–1085 BC)

·         Amarna Period (1085 BC–1055 BC)

·         Third Intermediate Period, First Persian Period, Late Period of ancient Egypt

Symbolism

                     Symbolism also played an important role in establishing a sense of order. Symbolism, ranging from the pharaoh's regalia (symbolizing his power to maintain order) to the individual symbols of Egyptian gods and goddesses, is omnipresent in Egyptian art. Animals were usually also highly symbolic figures in Egyptian art. Colors were more expressive rather than natural: red skin implied vigorous tanned youth, whereas yellow skin was used for women or middle-aged men who worked indoors; blue or gold indicated divinity because of its unnatural appearance and association with precious materials; the use of black for royal figures expressed the fertility of the Nile from which Egypt was born. Stereotypes were employed to indicate the geographical origins of foreigners

Art forms

Ancient Egyptian art forms are characterized by regularity and detailed depiction of human beings and nature, and were intended to provide company to the deceased in the other world. Artists endeavored to preserve everything of the present time as clearly and permanently as possible. Completion took precedence over style. Some art forms present an extraordinarily vivid representation of their time and the life, as the ancient Egyptian life was lived thousand of years before.

Egyptian art in all forms obeyed one law: the mode of representing man, nature and the environment remained almost the same for thousands of years and the most admired artists were those who replicated most admired styles of the past.

Architecture

Ancient Egyptian architects used sun-dried and kiln-baked bricks, fine sandstone, limestone and granite. Architects carefully planned all their work. The stones had to fit precisely together. Ramps were used to allow workmen to move up as the height of the construction grew. When the top of the structure was completed, the artists decorated from the top down, removing ramp sand as they went down. Exterior walls contained only a few small openings. Hieroglyphic and pictorial carvings in brilliant covers were abundantly used to decorate the structures, including many motifs, like the scarab, sacred beetle, the solar disk, and the vulture.

Paper

The word paper is derived from "papyrus", a plant which was cultivated in the Nile delta. Papyrus sheets were derived after processing the papyrus plant. Some rolls of papyrus discovered are lengthy, up to 10 meters. The technique for crafting papyrus was lost over time, but was rediscovered by an Egyptologist in the 1940s. Papyrus was used by ancient Egyptians for writing and painting.

Papyrus texts illustrate all dimensions of ancient Egyptian life and include literary, religious, historical and administrative documents. The pictorial script used in these texts ultimately provided the model for two most common alphabets in the world, the Roman and the Arabic.

Pottery

Ancient Egyptians used steatite (some varieties were called soapstone) and carved small pieces of vases, amulets, images of deities, of animals and several other objects. Ancient Egyptian artists also discovered the art of covering pottery with enamel. Covering by enamel was also applied to some stone works.

Different types of pottery items were deposited in tombs of the dead. Some such pottery items represented interior parts of the body, like the heart and the lungs, the liver and smaller intestines, which were removed before embalming. A large number of smaller objects in enamel pottery were also deposited with the dead. It was customary to craft on the walls of the tombs cones of pottery, about six to ten inches tall, on which were engraved or impressed legends relating to the dead occupants of the tombs. These cones usually contained the names of the deceased, their titles, offices which they held, and some expressions appropriate to funeral purposes.

Sculpture

The ancient art of Egyptian sculpture evolved to represent the ancient Egyptian gods, Pharaohs, and the kings and queens, in physical form. Whether there was real portraiture in Ancient Egypt or not is still debated. Massive statues were built to represent gods and famous kings and queens. These statues were supposed to give eternal life to the kings and queens, and to enable the subjects to see them in physical forms.

Very strict conventions were followed while crafting statues: male statues were darker than the female ones; in seated statues, hands were required to be placed on knees and specific rules governed appearance of every Egyptian god. For example, the sky god (Horus) was essentially to be represented with a falcon’s head, the god of funeral rites (Anubis) was to be always shown with a jackal’s head. Artistic works were ranked according to their compliance with these conventions, and the conventions were followed so strictly that, over three thousand years, the appearance of statues changed very little. These conventions were intended to convey the timeless and non-aging quality of the figure's ka.

Hieroglyphs

Hieroglyphics are the ancient Egyptian writing system in which pictures and symbols stand for sounds and words. Jean-Francois Champollion first decoded hieroglyphics from Rosetta Stone, which was found in 1799. Hieroglyphics have more than 700 symbols.

Literature

Ancient Egyptian literature, most often written on papyrus, also contains elements of ancient Egyptian art, as the texts and connected pictures were recorded on papyrus or on wall paintings and so on. They date from the Old Kingdom to the Greco-Roman period.

The subject matter of such literature-related art forms include hymns to the gods, mythological and magical texts, mortuary texts. Other subject matters were biographical and historical texts, scientific premises, including mathematical and medical texts, wisdom texts dealing with instructive literature, fables and stories.

Paintings

Many ancient Egyptian paintings have survived due to Egypt's extremely dry climate. The paintings were often made with the intent of making a pleasant afterlife for the deceased. The themes included journey through the afterworld or protective deities introducing the deceased to the gods of the underworld (such as Osiris). Some tomb paintings show activities that the deceased were involved in when they were alive and wished to carry on doing for eternity.

In the New Kingdom and later, the Book of the Dead was buried with the entombed person. It was considered important for an introduction to the afterlife.

Egyptian paintings are painted in such a way to show a profile view and a side view of the animal or person. For example, the painting to the right shows the head from a profile view and the body from a frontal view. Their main colors were red, blue, black, gold, and green.

Evolution

The Ancient Egyptian art style known as Amarna art was a style of art that was adopted in the Amarna Period (i.e. during and just after the reign of Akhenaten in the late Eighteenth Dynasty), and is noticeably different from more conventional Egyptian art styles.

It is characterized by a sense of movement and activity in images, with figures having raised heads, many figures overlapping and many scenes busy and crowded. Also, the human body is portrayed differently in Amarna style artwork than Egyptian art on the whole. For instance, many depictions of Akhenaten's body give him distinctly feminine qualities, such as large hips, prominent breasts, and a larger stomach and thighs. This is a divergence from the earlier Egyptian art which shows men with perfectly chiseled bodies. Faces are still shown exclusively in profile. Not many buildings from this period have survived the ravages of later kings, partially as they were constructed out of standard size blocks, known as Talatat, which were very easy to remove and reuse. Temples in Amarna, following the trend, did not follow traditional Egyptian customs and were open, without ceilings, and had no closing doors.

In the generation after Akhenaten's death, artists reverted to their old styles. There were still traces of this period's style in later art.

ISLAMIC ART

Islamic art encompasses the visual arts produced from the 7th century onwards by people who lived within the territory that was inhabited by or ruled by culturally Islamic populations. The huge field of Islamic architecture is the subject of a separate article, leaving fields as varied as calligraphy, painting, glass, ceramics, and textiles, among others.

Islamic art is not at all restricted to religious art, but includes all the art of the rich and varied cultures of Islamic societies as well. It frequently includes secular elements and elements that are frowned upon, if not forbidden, by some Islamic theologians. Apart from the ever-present calligraphic inscriptions, specifically religious art is actually less prominent in Islamic art than in Western medieval art, with the exception of Islamic architecture where mosques and their complexes of surrounding buildings are the most common remains. Figurative painting may cover religious scenes, but normally in essentially secular contexts such as the walls of palaces or illuminated books of poetry. The calligraphy and decoration of manuscript from Qu'ran is an important aspect, but other religious art such as glass mosque lamps and other mosque fittings such as tiles, woodwork and carpets usually have the same style and motifs as contemporary secular art, although with religious inscriptions even more prominent.

"Islamic art developed from many sources: Roman, Early Christian art, and Byzantine styles were taken over in early Islamic art and architecture; the influence of the Sassanian art of Pre Islamic Persia was of paramount significance; Central Asian styles were brought in with various nomadic incursions; and Chinese influences had an formative effect on Islamic painting, pottery, and textiles." Though the whole concept of "Islamic art" has been criticized by some modern art historians, the similarities between art produced at widely different times and places in the Islamic world have been sufficient to keep the term in wide use by scholars.

There are repeating elements in Islamic art, such as the use of geometrical floral or vegetation designs in a repetition known as the arabesque. The arabesque in Islamic art is often used to symbolize the transcendent, indivisible and infinite nature of God. Mistakes in repetitions may be intentionally introduced as a show of humility by artists who believes only God can produce perfection, although this theory is disputed.

Typically, though not entirely, Islamic art has focused on the depiction of patterns and Arabic calligraphy, rather than on figures, because it is feared by many Muslims that the depiction of the human form is idolatry and thereby a sin against God, forbidden in the Qur'an. Human portrayals can be found in all eras of Islamic art, above all in the more private form of miniatures, where their absence is rare. Human representation for the purpose of worship is considered idolatry and is duly forbidden in Islamic law, known as Sharia law. There are also many depictions of Muhammad, Islam's chief prophet, in historical Islamic art. Small decorative figures of animals and humans, especially if they are hunting the animals, are found on secular pieces in many media from many periods, but portraits were slow to develop.