Current usage of the term "visual arts" includesfine art as well asapplied ordecorative arts andcrafts, but this was not always the case. Before theArts and Crafts Movement in Britain and elsewhere at the turn of the 20th century, the term 'artist' had for some centuries often been restricted to a person working in the fine arts (such as painting, sculpture, or printmaking) and not the decorative arts, crafts, or applied visual arts media. The distinction was emphasized by artists of the Arts and Crafts Movement, who valued vernacular art forms as much as high forms.[4]Art schools made a distinction between the fine arts and the crafts, maintaining that a craftsperson could not be considered a practitioner ofthe arts.
The increasing tendency to privilege painting, and to a lesser degree sculpture, above other arts has been a feature ofWestern art as well asEast Asian art. In both regions, painting has been seen as relying to the highest degree on the imagination of the artist and being the furthest removed from manual labour – inChinese painting, the most highly valued styles were those of "scholar-painting", at least in theory practiced by gentleman amateurs. The Westernhierarchy of genres reflected similar attitudes.
Training in the visual arts has generally been through variations of theapprentice and workshop systems. In Europe, theRenaissance movement to increase the prestige of the artist led to theacademy system for training artists, and today most of the people who are pursuing a career in the arts train inart schools attertiary levels. Visual arts have now become an elective subject in most education systems.[5][6]
Leading country in the development of the arts inLatin America, in 1875 created the National Society of the Stimulus of the Arts, founded by paintersEduardo Schiaffino,Eduardo Sívori, and other artists. Their guild was rechartered as the National Academy of Fine Arts in 1905 and, in 1923, on the initiative of painter and academicErnesto de la Cárcova, as a department in theUniversity of Buenos Aires, the Superior Art School of the Nation. Currently, the leading educational organization for the arts in the country is theUNA Universidad Nacional de las Artes.[10]
Christiaan Tonnis - Female Warrior #14 'Extinction', pencil and colored pencil on paper, 1981
Drawing is a means of making animage,illustration or graphic using any of a wide variety of tools and techniques available online and offline. It generally involves making marks on a surface by applying pressure from a tool, or moving a tool across a surface using dry media such asgraphitepencils,pen and ink,inkedbrushes, waxcolor pencils,crayons,charcoals,pastels, andmarkers. Digital tools, including pens,stylus, that simulate the effects of these are also used. The main techniques used in drawing are: line drawing,hatching, crosshatching, random hatching,shading, scribbling,stippling, and blending. An artist who excels at drawing is referred to as adraftsman ordraughtsman.[11]
Inancient Egypt, ink drawings onpapyrus, often depicting people, were used as models for painting or sculpture.[17] Drawings onGreek vases, initially geometric, later developed into the human form withblack-figure pottery during the 6th century BC.[18]
Withpaper becoming more common in Europe by the 14th century,[19] drawing was adopted by masters such asSandro Botticelli,Raphael,Michelangelo, andLeonardo da Vinci, who sometimes treated drawing as an art in its own right, rather than a preparatory stage for painting or sculpture.[20]
Painting taken literally is the practice of applyingpigment suspended in a carrier (ormedium) and a binding agent (aglue) to a surface (support) such aspaper,canvas or a wall. However, when used in an artistic sense it means the use of this activity in combination withdrawing,composition, or other aesthetic considerations in order to manifest the expressive and conceptual intention of the practitioner. Painting is also used to express spiritual motifs and ideas; sites of this kind of painting range from artwork depicting mythological figures on pottery toThe Sistine Chapel, to the human body itself.[21]
Like drawing, painting has its documented origins in caves and on rock faces.[22] The earliest known cave paintings, dating to between 32,000-30,000 years ago, are found in theChauvet cave in southern France;[23] the celebrated polychrome murals ofLascaux date to around 17,000–15,500 years ago.[24] In shades of red, brown, yellow and black, the paintings on the walls and ceilings depict bison, cattle (aurochs), horses and deer.[25]
Paintings of human figures can be found in the tombs of ancient Egypt. In the great temple ofRamesses II,Nefertari, his queen, is depicted being led byIsis.[26] TheGreeks contributed to painting but much of their work has been lost. One of the best remaining representations are theHellenisticFayum mummy portraits. Another example is mosaic of theBattle of Issus atPompeii, which was probably based on a Greek painting. Greek and Roman art contributed toByzantine art in the 4th century BC, which initiated a tradition in icon painting.[27]
Painters in northern Europe too were influenced by the Italian school.Jan van Eyck from Belgium,Pieter Bruegel the Elder from the Netherlands andHans Holbein the Younger from Germany are among the most successful painters of the times. They used theglazing technique with oils to achieve depth and luminosity.
The 17th century witnessed the emergence of the great Dutch masters such as the versatileRembrandt who was especially remembered for his portraits and Bible scenes, andVermeer who specialized in interior scenes of Dutch life.
Impressionism began in France in the 19th century with a loose association of artists includingClaude Monet,Pierre-Auguste Renoir andPaul Cézanne who brought a new freely brushed style to painting, often choosing to paint realistic scenes of modern life outside rather than in the studio. This was achieved through a new expression of aesthetic features demonstrated by brush strokes and the impression of reality. They achieved intense color vibration by using pure, unmixed colors and short brush strokes. The movement influenced art as a dynamic, moving through time and adjusting to newfound techniques and perception of art. Attention to detail became less of a priority in achieving, whilst exploring a biased view of landscapes and nature to the artist's eye.[30][31]
Towards the end of the 19th century, several young painters took impressionism a stage further, using geometric forms and unnatural color to depict emotions while striving for deeper symbolism. Of particular note arePaul Gauguin, who was strongly influenced by Asian, African and Japanese art,Vincent van Gogh, a Dutchman who moved to France where he drew on the strong sunlight of the south, andToulouse-Lautrec, remembered for his vivid paintings of night life in the Paris district ofMontmartre.[32]
Edvard Munch, a Norwegian artist, developed his symbolistic approach at the end of the 19th century, inspired by the French impressionistManet.The Scream (1893), his most famous work, is widely interpreted as representing the universal anxiety of modern man. Partly as a result of Munch's influence, the Germanexpressionist movement originated in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century as artists such asErnst Kirschner andErich Heckel began to distort reality for an emotional effect.
In parallel, the style known ascubism developed in France as artists focused on the volume and space of sharp structures within a composition.Pablo Picasso andGeorges Braque were the leading proponents of the movement. Objects are broken up, analyzed, and re-assembled in an abstracted form. By the 1920s, the style had developed intosurrealism withDali andMagritte.[33]
Ancient Chinese engraving of female instrumentalists
Printmaking is creating, for artistic purposes, an image on amatrix that is then transferred to a two-dimensional (flat) surface by means of ink or other form of pigmentation.[34] Except in the case of amonotype, the same matrix can be used to produce many examples of the print.[35]
Prints in the Western tradition produced before about 1830 are known asold master prints. In Europe, from around 1400 ADwoodcut, was used for master prints on paper by using printing techniques developed in theByzantine and Islamic worlds.Michael Wolgemut improved German woodcut from about 1475, andErhard Reuwich, a Dutchman, was the first to use cross-hatching. At the end of the centuryAlbrecht Dürer brought the Western woodcut to a stage that has never been surpassed, increasing the status of the single-leaf woodcut.[44]
In China, the art of printmaking developed some 1,100 years ago as illustrations alongside text cut in woodblocks for printing on paper. Initially images were mainly religious but in theSong dynasty, artists began to cut landscapes. During theMing (1368–1644) andQing (1616–1911) dynasties, the technique was perfected for both religious and artistic engravings.[45][46]
Woodblock printing in Japan (Japanese: 木版画, moku hanga) is a technique best known for its use in theukiyo-e artistic genre; however, it was also used very widely for printingillustrated books in the same period. Woodblock printing had been used in China for centuries to print books, long before the advent of movable type, but was only widely adopted in Japan during theEdo period (1603–1867).[47][48] Although similar to woodcut in western printmaking in some regards, moku hanga differs greatly in that water-based inks are used (as opposed to western woodcut, which uses oil-based inks), allowing for a wide range of vivid color, glazes and color transparency.
After the decline ofukiyo-e and introduction of modern printing technologies, woodblock printing continued as a method for printing texts as well as for producing art, both within traditional modes such asukiyo-e and in a variety of more radical or Western forms that might be construed asmodern art. In the early 20th century,shin-hanga that fused the tradition ofukiyo-e with the techniques of Western paintings became popular, and the works ofHasui Kawase andHiroshi Yoshida gained international popularity.[49][50] Institutes such as the "Adachi Institute of Woodblock Prints" and "Takezasado" continue to produce ukiyo-e prints with the same materials and methods as used in the past.[51][52]
Photography is the process of making pictures by means of the action of light. The light patterns reflected or emitted from objects are recorded onto a sensitive medium, or storage chip, through a timedexposure.[53] The process is done through mechanicalshutters[54] or electronically timed exposure ofphotons intochemical processing ordigitizing devices known ascameras.[55]
The word comes from the Greek φῶς ‘’phos’’ ("light") and γραφή ‘’graphê’’ ("drawing" or "writing"), literally meaning "drawing with light".[56] Traditionally, the product of photography has been called aphotograph; the term ‘’photo’’ is an abbreviation and though many call them "pictures," the term "image" has increasingly replaced "photograph," reflecting electronic capture and the broader concept of graphical representation in optics and computing.[57]
Architecture is the process and the product ofplanning,designing, andconstructingbuildings or any other structures.[58] Architectural works, in the material form of buildings, are often perceived ascultural symbols and works of art.[59] Historical civilizations are often identified with their surviving architectural achievements.[60]
The earliest surviving written work on architecture isDe architectura, by the Roman architectVitruvius in the early 1st century AD.[61] According to Vitruvius, a good building should satisfy three principles: firmitas, utilitas, venustas, translated asfirmness, commodity, and delight.[62] An equivalent in modern English would be:
Durability – a building should stand up robustly and remain in good condition.
Utility – it should be suitable for the purposes for which it is used.
Building first evolved out of the dynamics between needs (shelter, security, worship, etc.) and means (availablebuilding materials and attendant skills).[64] As cultures developed and knowledge began to be formalized through oral traditions and practices, building became acraft, and "architecture" is the name given to the most highly formalized versions of that craft.[65]
Filmmaking is the process of making amotion picture, from an initial conception and research, through scriptwriting, shooting and recording, animation or other special effects, editing, sound and music work and finally distribution to an audience; it refers broadly to the creation of all types of films, embracing documentary, strains of theatre and literature in film, and poetic or experimental practices, and is often used to refer to video-based processes as well.
Visual artists are no longer limited to traditional visualarts media. Computers have been used in the visual arts since the 1960s.[66] Uses include thecapturing or creating of images and forms,[67] the editing of those images (including exploring multiplecompositions)[68] and the finalrendering orprinting (including3D printing).[69]
Many traditional disciplines now integratedigital technologies, so the lines between traditional works of art andnew media works created using computers have been blurred.[72] For instance, an artist may combine traditional painting withalgorithmic art and other digital techniques.[73] As a result, defining computer art by its end product can be difficult. Nevertheless, this type of art appears in art museum exhibits, but can be seen more as a tool, rather than a form as with painting.[74] On the other hand, there are computer-based artworks which belong to a newconceptual andpostdigital strand, assuming the same technologies, and their social impact, as an object of inquiry.[75]
Plastic arts is a term for art forms that involve physical manipulation of a plastic medium by moulding or modeling such assculpture orceramics. The term has also been applied toall the visual (non-literary, non-musical) arts.[80][81]
Materials that can be carved or shaped, such as stone, wood, concrete, or steel, have also been included in the narrower definition, since, with appropriate tools, such materials are also capable of modulation.[82] This use of the term "plastic" in the arts is different from Piet Mondrian’s use, and with the movement he termed, "Neoplasticism."[83][84]
The earliest undisputed examples of sculpture belong to theAurignacian culture, which was located in Europe and southwest Asia and active at the beginning of theUpper Paleolithic. As well as producing some of the earliest knowncave art, the people of this culture developed finely crafted stone tools, manufacturing pendants, bracelets, ivory beads, and bone-flutes, as well as three-dimensional figurines.[86][87][88]
Because sculpture involves the use of materials that can be moulded or modulated, it is considered one of theplastic arts. The majority ofpublic art is sculpture. Many sculptures together in agarden setting may be referred to as asculpture garden. Sculptors do not always make sculptures by hand. With increasing technology in the 20th century and the popularity ofconceptual art over technical mastery, more sculptors turned toart fabricators to produce their artworks. With fabrication, the artist creates a design and pays a fabricator to produce it. This allows sculptors to create larger and more complex sculptures out of materials like cement, metal and plastic, that they would not be able to create by hand. Sculptures can also be made with3-d printing technology.
In the United States, the law protecting the copyright over a piece of visual art gives a more restrictive definition of "visual art".[89]
A "work of visual art" is — (1) a painting, drawing, print or sculpture, existing in a single copy, in a limited edition of 200 copies or fewer that are signed and consecutively numbered by the author, or, in the case of a sculpture, in multiple cast, carved, or fabricated sculptures of 200 or fewer that are consecutively numbered by the author and bear the signature or other identifying mark of the author; or (2) a still photographic image produced for exhibition purposes only, existing in a single copy that is signed by the author, or in a limited edition of 200 copies or fewer that are signed and consecutively numbered by the author.
A work of visual art does not include — (A)(i) any poster, map, globe, chart,technical drawing, diagram, model, applied art, motion picture or other audiovisual work, book, magazine, newspaper, periodical, data base, electronic information service, electronic publication, or similar publication; (ii) any merchandising item or advertising, promotional, descriptive, covering, or packaging material or container; (iii) any portion or part of any item described in clause (i) or (ii); (B) anywork made for hire; or (C) any work not subject to copyright protection under this title.[89]
^Valladas, Hélène (1 September 2003). "Direct radiocarbon dating of prehistoric cave paintings by accelerator mass spectrometry".Measurement Science and Technology.14 (9):1487–1492.doi:10.1088/0957-0233/14/9/301.
^P. Mellars, Archeology and the Dispersal of Modern Humans in Europe: Deconstructing the Aurignacian,Evolutionary Anthropology, vol. 15 (2006), pp. 167–82.
