Functions of Arts

1. Beauty – why do you think some people hang artworks on their wall?
2. Happiness and Hope
• The experience and process of creating art itself;
• The bliss of looking at a piece of imagery evoking a happy memories;
• Direct words from typography and graphic messages that are so relatable as if
the author has read your mind and feelings;
• Identifying oneself with the properties of an artwork: a homage to something;
works addressing diaspora, displacement, and other social issues.
3. Identity and Understanding The Self
• Today’s generation being the “me” generation is also sometimes tagged as the
“anxious generation” a lot of social issues evidently reflect is a struggle for
identity: gender issues, disconnectedness brought on by social media,
regionalism, and even mental health issues.
4. Grief and Healing
• Most of the most poignant and humanistic products of art were made after the
World War II.
• Twentieth-Century art mostly expressed human suffering and darkness in its
theme.
• Artists such as Rachel Whiteread talked about this haunting remembrance of
holocaust victims in her work “Ghost Library”. She used an experiential type of
artistic expression, exploring the themes of place and memory in an architectural
setting.
5. Remembering and Mark-Making - How do you think has art helped us remember?
How have artists shaped our landscape?
6. Raising Awareness - Some art can be categorized as activist art. But not all are as
loud and garish. Some are subtle paintings which might use satire.
7. Culture and Togetherness - Forms of art are often localized so they can bring identity
also to certain regions and this is very evident in the Philippines which is geographically
separated by thousands of islands.

Elements and Principles of Arts

I. Elements of Art
- are the formal or tangible aspects of art. These are termed as elements because they
are the “medium of language” of visual arts.
 ▪ Line
- can be expressive and have a quality of its own
- scribbling, whimsical or naïve lines, implied lines, blurred lines, aggressive
lines, and calligraphic lines.
▪ Shape
- three basic kinds: geometric, biomorph and amorphous.
- can also be implied (shapes produced by the negative spaces)
▪ Form
- three-dimensional shape
- can refer to the quality or likeness of an entire mass
- employs several techniques like shading, perspectives, and lighting
▪ Value
- lightness and darkness of a hue or a color
- often represented in a tonal value scale, it has two parts: tints (lighter tones)
and shades (darker tones)
- A tone is a general term for certain value.
▪ Color
- also known as hue
- light that bounces off a surface
- In art, we use subtractive colors (colors that are pigments)
- Additive colors refer to property of light
▪ Texture
- can be used in paintings like impasto, stamping, and scratching in pottery,
embossing when making prints, and many others.
- Contemporary artists have also used the element of texture to convey a
certain emotion.
▪ Light
- creates the illusion that color, form, and texture exist.
- can be implied, natural, or artificial (as with a digital rendition)
- the lighting of an artwork has a very strong effect on its overall impact
- example of strong and theatrical lighting is called chiaroscuro.
▪ Space
- an area where the other elements can interact
- two types: positive and negative space
- Double negative space – refers to a blank space used as negative space by,
let us say, a field of color or pigment
Quick Fact:
- Representational art simply means it mimics what is real or what can be
seen. Image is recognizable as interpreted by the artist.
- Abstract is modified interpretation of something that exist, but it becomes
hardly recognizable.
 - Nonrepresentational art is purely concerned with forms, shapes, colors, and
the rest of the elements. Does not represent any other subject matter outside
of itself.

Principles of Design
▪ Contrast
- uses the element of value to create depth and dimension. Light also plays an
important role in creating good contrast.
▪ Harmony
- elements are related to each other in terms of form, color, theme, etc.
▪ Balance
- aesthetic quality of a work marked by a sensible balance between two areas:
right and left; top and bottom.
▪ Rhythm and Movement
- Creating a sense of direction through repetition of elements. Movement direct
the viewer’s eye toward something.
▪ Unity and Variety
- Elements should be seen as a whole in unity; variety still gives a sense of
wholeness, but the elements differ in some aspect and provide more interest
to the work.
▪ Emphasis and Subordination
- Area or a specific subject is given focus; hence other parts of the picture are
subordinated.
▪ Scale and Proportion
- Can be either an appropriate use of scale and proportion or it can also be an
effective way of changing the scale to achieve a certain visual goal.
- Also shows relationship between the object and the space.
▪ Depth and Perspective
- Shows three-dimensionality of a space through the use of perspective lines
and vanishing point.

Psychology in Art
▪ Color Psychology
- Colors have imbibed certain meanings. Whether it is a social construct or a
product of association, these hues certainly appeal to our understanding of
the world based on how they are used.
▪ Gestalt Theory
- Allows communicators to predict how viewers will respond to design
elements. Based on theories of perception, the gestalt principles explain how
whole images are often perceived as more than the sum of their parts.
 Knowing and using gestalt theory in technical communication can help ensure
that our visual messages will be understood and that our designs will be
dynamic.
Quick Fact: What is a Medium?
- Is the tool or the material used in realizing the expression.
- In visual arts, this is the term for the materials used in specific types of
technique, let us say, dry media for drawing. (pencil, charcoal, or pastels)
- Watercolor is an example of wet medium.
- Non-conventional types may include mixed media, computer graphics, and
even found objects)

Principles of Design
▪ Movement
- The path the viewer’s eye takes through the artwork, often to areas of focus.
▪ Balance
- The visual weight of each element is distributed in a way that makes the
composition feel stable.
▪ Symmetrical Balance
- The artwork could be divided in half or both sides could be the same.
▪ Asymmetrical Balance
- A type of balance in which the two sides of the artwork may look different but
feel stable.
▪ Unity
- Using similar or repeated element in an artwork to create consistency (marks,
mood, colors, theme etc.)
▪ Variety
- Using many different elements to create interest or contrast to the artwork.
▪ Rhythm
- Repeating elements in order to create a feeling of organized movement.
▪ Pattern
- A repeated design
▪ Scale
- The comparison of one object to another in terms of size.
▪ Proportion
- Ratio; comparing parts to a whole in terms of size.
▪ Emphasis
- What we focus on in an artwork. Usually the largest and the most detailed
areas.
▪ Contrast
- The amount of difference between elements.
 ▪ Value Contrast
- The amount of difference between values.
- High contrast – there is a large difference between the lightest and darkest
areas. Edges look harder
- Low contrast – there is not much difference between the lightest and darkest
areas. Edges look softer
▪ Juxtaposition
- Two or more unlike things to show contrast.

Quick History of Arts

19th Century
- Emergence of “isms”
- Neoclassicism: Greek and Roman Classics revived
- Romanticism, Realism, Art Nouveau, Impressionism
- Photography comes into the scene
- Post-impressionism, early expressionism, and symbolism
20th Century Modern Art
- Art became more non-representational
- Garish colors explored in Fauvism
- Abstracted sculptures emerged
- Simplified forms in paintings by Picasso and Matisse
- Art movements: Cubism, Futurism, Constructivism, Expressionism
- Mondrian’s purely geometric art
Art During the Wars
- Dadaism: the art movement that defies logic
- Surrealism: stepping into the dreamworld
- American art blossoms: Jackson Pollock became famous as “Jack the
Dripper” and paved the way for American Abstract Expressionism
- Mobile Sculptures (Alexander Calder) and Color Field (Rothko) paintings also
became prominent
20th Century to Contemporary
- Highly experimental and radical
- Pop art defines consumer culture; dominated mostly by works of Andy Warhol
- Minimalism: glorifying the simplest art elements
- Birth of conceptual art
- Photography is further developed which paved way to art movement,
Photorealism
 - Neo-expressionism or new expressionism is characterized by strong subject
matters
- Contemporary Art: a very diverse art scene, the rise of appropriation,
photography-derived works, graphic style of art, experimental works,
multimedia and multi-modial art
Quick Facts:
- An art period is a specific length of time in history with a prominent
movement, trend, or creed in artistic practice.
- Art movements are sets of distinguishable styles and artistic tendencies often
characterized by a major trend in techniques or approach. Usually, they are
named with the suffix “-ism” at the end. It suggests a certain attitude toward
painting or any art-making.

Art History Quick Map

Prehistoric:
- Cave paintings, Venus figurines which are considered portable sculptures
- Greek standard of beauty: the birth of the “Classical” Age
- Romans: the competitor of Greece; created realistic sculptures of human
figure
Middle Ages
- The “death” of artistic freedom due to canonical standards of visual
interpretation
- The rise of Gothic art especially in Gothic churches
- Popular art: Stained glass windows and illuminated manuscripts
Renaissance
- Revival of artistic genius
- Where the term “Renaissance Man” was derived because of man’s
intellectual achievements in the arts and science
- The time of “Masters” e.g., Donatello, Da Vinci, Michaelangelo, Raphael, and
Van Eyck
Baroque
- Grandiose and ornate art
- Artistic innovation: “spotlight effect” called chiaroscuro or in extreme usage, it
is called tenebrism
- Artists to note: Caravaggio (Italy), Velazquez (Spain), Poussin (France), and
Antonio Gaudi (designer of “Sagrada Familia” chapel in Barcelona)