CME-NGEC6Arts Appreciation

WEEK 2
FUNCTIONS OF ART
AND PHILOSOPHY
ENGR. CHARLITO S. VILLAS,RME, MAEDInstructor,
College of Maritime Education

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4. Art is something we do. Art is an expression of our thoughts, emotions, intuitions

and desires but it is even more personal than that: it’s about sharing the way we
experience the world. It is the communication of intimate concepts that cannot be
faithfully portrayed by words alone.

What is art? Art is an expression and application of one’s creativity, typically in the
form of something visual. The definition of art is in the eyes of the beholder. Many
dig far too deep into the ambiguity of the definition of art itself that they forget to
appreciate the significance of art in their lives.

I think in order to fully understand the definition of art; one must picture what life
would be like without art. Consider the effect of existence without your favorite
pictures hanging above your bed; your favorite computer game without graphics;
that graffiti on the side of the bridge that you have grown so fond of; the song that
you religiously play on your iPod. Art is even proven to stimulate certain parts of
our brains to make us giggle, cry and all emotions in between.

Art is a way of grasping the world. Not merely the physical world, which is what
science attempts to do; but the whole world and specifically the human world of
society and spiritual experience. For me this concept is very complex. It can be
acknowledged in all the possible spheres of life. If I try to generalize, art for me is a
kind of thing that warms my heart and influences me to think.

The topic of art appreciation is vast. An Internet search of art appreciation produced
about 3,540,000 results. Appreciation is interlocked with beauty and beauty to
aesthetic experience.

Art appreciation is generally assumed and often explicitly claimed to exemplify acts
of appreciation in the visual arts and briefly explore the history of teaching for art
appreciation.
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 "The act of apprehending a work of art with enjoyment”.

The teaching of art usually focuses entirely on composition, artistic technique, and
skill development. There is no evidence that studying art provides students with an
appreciation for art. If art classes teach only the knowledge and skills necessary for
self-expression and do not prepare the student for reflection on and discussion about
art, they do nothing more than teach a trade.

4.1 Art appreciation

Aesthetic education, commonly known as art appreciation, aims to explain viewers

to aesthetic elements (line, shape, color) and such that the viewers may place value
on art and aesthetic
experience. For example, the plight
of the Jews during WWII can be felt through the design elements of Ben Shahn's
Warsaw 1943. Sharp pointed lines,
stinging in feeling, make up the
tortured hands in this print reminding the viewer of
the many acts of barbarism. It is hard
to remain unaffected by this dramatic
representation of human pain and
suffering. The amount of sensitivity to
these elements directly affects the
quality of the viewer's response.

This sensitivity is determined by the viewer's awareness of the design elements. For
me this sensitivity provokes me
to go beyond a superficial summing
of the picture. In essence this makes me want to get something out of a work of art,
probably where the artist has left off
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When you taste food, you detect its goodness with your tongue. When you hear
music, you detect its goodness with your ear. When you look at art, detect its
goodness with your eye. Art objects can have many numbers of virtues. Good taste
doesn't appear as often as you might think in the art world. Talent for looking at art
occurs commonly than talent for making art, but it operates in a relatively small
number of people

Because the category of art has blurry boundaries, people with questionable taste
often think that objects that lie in front of them has stylish properties, even though
no such trait exists. You will find it impossible to prove that something presented as
art doesn't belong in the category of art. Its appearance in an art context proves that
someone is using it for artistic purposes. It can feel strange, to accept objects that
lack visual qualities as art. Some artists strive for that reaction deliberately.

Art Appreciation as pointed out earlier “Art Appreciation, like love

is the awareness and understanding of
the widespread and undying qualities
cannot be done by proxy. It
that identify great art. That is to say is a very personal affair and
that art appreciation is like speaking a is necessary to every
second language. There is an assumption that if this language of art is learnt it
individual”.
would make for a better understanding
of what many great artists were trying -
to express. Art Appreciation could By Robert Henri
simply mean being able to look at works
and form your own opinions

4.2 IMPORTANCE OF ART EDUCATION

Art education is often underestimated by many who believe that school was created
to teach only analytical concepts such as mathematics and literature. However,
research shows that art courses are important even necessary for students in
elementary, middle and high schools. Whatever your age or career knowledge of arts
can have tremendous benefits for you.

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 As Barbara Streisand said

“Art does not exist only to entertain, but also to challenge one to
think, to provoke, even to disturb in a constant search for the truth”.

Obviously it is impossible to separate art or the arts from life they are part of it. For some
people, art is the entire reason they get out of bed in the morning. You could say "Art is
something that makes us more thoughtful and well-rounded humans." Art stimulates
different parts of our brains to make us laugh. Art gives us a way to be creative and express
ourselves.

The idea can also be expressed by saying that when life declines and the standards of living
deteriorate, art also declines. On the other hand, when life marks upward swing, such a
swing inevitably gets reflected in the arts.

To say that art is the only confined to the artist, the painter, the sculptor, the dancer, the
musician, the singer or craftsman is to take a needlessly rigid and restricted view. Real art
is all-round enlightenment and adds importance to life. The object of art, has been said, is
to crystalize human emotions into thought, and then fix it in a concrete form.

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 Life itself is an art. The swing of the pendulum may raise art to the skies or bring it down
crashing to the earth. The progress in art reveals the progress of a country and its innermost
character. In a nutshell we must value the importance of arts education as it develops the
young learners in a fun and engaging manner. It helps to look into the child’s growth in the
different areas such as self-esteem, self-discipline, cooperation, self-motivation and
problem solving.

As in the words of Gil Dellinger:

“Art is important. We tend to think it is a luxury, but it gives people deep pleasure because
beauty is the personification of hope that something grander is at work.”

2.3 FUNCTIONS OF ART

Function refers to the intended effect of the artwork. That is, how it functions in the world.
However all works of art perform a social function, since they are created for an audience.
Likewise art performs a social function when it influences the shared behavior of people;
or it is created to be seen or used primarily in public situations; and it expresses or
describes collective aspects of existence as opposed to individual and personal kinds of
experience.

Artists may try to make us laugh at the same phenomena; to accept economic, religious, or
social ideologies; to identify with a class or ethnic interest; or to see our social situation in
ways which had not previously been apparent.

Throughout history the role of the artist has changed greatly. We have stepped over the
slope of the twentieth century, still bloody from wars and the myriad sacrifices made in the
name of progress. Presently we are falling through the twenty-first century, floating in a
culture that makes it simple for us to feel what that in power wants us to feel. The artists
are only part of our society who have not fallen over the cliff, but are instead climbing
taller mountains. They are pulling themselves up towards cultural truths by their fingertips,
struggling to pull the rest of man behind them.

In my opinion artists tell stories. They help us make sense of our world and they broaden
our experience and understanding. The artists enable us to imagine the unimaginable, and
to connect us to past, the present and the future sometimes simultaneously. They offer a
lens by which we can view the world.

The one that are remembered are usually those who colored our lives with a shade we
hadn’t seen before, or imagined could exist. . I believe artist have a unique ability to

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 prevent us from being fed-up about the material and immaterial worlds we live in by
drawing our attention to their qualities. Historian and social activist, Howard Zinn
accurately describes the artists as ‘transcendent’, someone who thinks “outside of the
framework that society has created”. By acting outside of that framework and in many
cases outside of society itself, artists are free to be the most honest and constructive
members of humanity.

Thus art is a valuable tool for processing social modes of feeling on a large scale. It is “an
important way of arriving at an opinion without the rationalist form of legal argument.”
Because artists are transcendent to the socialization of their time, they are free to explore
their experience within humanity instead of within its institutions. The cultural conclusions
reached by artists are therefore more accurate.

The Swiss artist Olaf Breuning was born 1970 in Schaffhausen. He has gained recognition
through his films, staged photography, and colourful, huge-eyed, infantile sculptures and
drawings, which comment on reality in an ironic manner. On the one hand, he aims to deal
with the large existential questions of life. In his childlike drawings and sculptures, the
artist wants to speak about life in a very simple and direct way. On the other hand,
Breuning’s work deals with popular culture and consumerism. He does not recognize a
difference between mass culture and the art world. For him popular culture is the reality we
all live in. He somehow plays with the hierarchy between so-called high and low culture,
between high and low art forms. He aims to find a language that anybody can understand.

There are certainly many more functions of art to discover and to discuss. Nevertheless one
function of art which seems to be quite important is art as a promoter of life skills. Often
the teaching of life skills is linked to topics like health care and food organization. It could
also be connected to art. Notable artistic expression is not bound to riches; it also matters in
the context of underdevelopment. From this perspective it is widely accepted today that
artists and the cultural community help to bring about social change and economic
development. Creative people are able to trigger interaction between communities or to
stimulate general debate and dialogue in a society. Art can have a vital impact on self-
managed development.

Art has influenced the time, place, and culture from which it evolves. Many artists have
seen their art as a laboratory to develop tools for changing society. Philosopher and
mathematician Alain Badiou comments on the artist’s purpose in relation to truth when
examining the concept of cultural change.

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 2.4 ANALYSIS
Appreciation is a complex act of perception that is dependent on relevant knowledge of
what is appreciated. Full appreciation involves engagement with what is appreciated, and
such engagement involves knowledge of various sorts. Art appreciation has as one of its
foremost objectives to train a student in observing his immediate surroundings and
contrast, and effortlessly relate new forms or visual experiences to already learned ones.
This skill if properly developed by a student makes him competent in analyzing a visual
experience.
Hence appreciation must not to be assumed to be a natural and inevitable outcome of art
education. Likewise teachers are ought to design their curricula so that appreciation is
taught and assessed. Moreover art education opens up the mind of students to appreciate
works of art and nature. They will learn enjoy colour simplicity of line, patterns and forms
of many kinds found in nature. A student who has been able to learn these qualities through
creative experiences carries the knowledge over to the other levels and areas of learning
like architecture or different form of art in respective sphere of life. Nevertheless in the end
this quote by Mikhail Baryshnikov sums it up:

“I think art education, especially in this country, which government pretty much
ignores, is so important for young people.”

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 Name: _____________________________________________ Rating: ________________
Year and Section:_____________ Professor / Instructor: __________________________
Due of Submission: _____________________________

<< Week No. >>

<< LESSON TITLE >>

ANSWER THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS FOR SERIES DISCUSSION.

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INDICATIVE RESOURCES

1.ART, Design, Context and Meaning By: Pamel a J . S a chant , Ph.D.

2. Art Appreciation By: Wilson K Panisan Et.Al

3. Art Appreciation By: Claudio V. Tabotabo

4. Art Appreciation (GEC SERIES) By: Bernardo Nicolas Caslib Jr.

5. PHILOSOPHY OF ART By: Noel Carroll

6. Module Core Text

7. Module Video Presentation

8. Art Journals: History of art. GCE LEVEL

9, Internet Access

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