UNIT 1: INTRODUCTION

TO ART APPRECIATION
 WHAT IS ART?
• the expression or application of human
creative skill and imagination.
• comes from the Latin word "ars" which
means a "craft or specialized form or
skill skill like carpentry or smithying or
surgery. (Collingwood, 1938)
• “ars” in Medieval Latin meant "any
special form of book-learning such as
grammar or logic, magic and astrology.
 ART
• The humanities constitute one of the
oldest and most important means of
expression developed by man” (Dudley et al.
1960).

The Galloping Wild Boar,

cave of Altamira Spain
 ASSUMPTIONS OF ART
Art is universal
• Art has been crafted by all people regardless of
origin, time, place and that it stayed on because
it is liked and enjoyed by people continuously
• The two Greek epics, the Illiad and the Odyssey
and the Sanksrit pieces Mahabharata and
Ramayana purportedly written before the
beginning of recorded history.
• An “art is not good because it is old, but old
because it is good” (Dudley et al, 1960).
• Florante at Laura
• Ibong Adarna
ASSUMPTIONS OF ART
Art is not nature
Art is man’s expression of his reception of nature. Art is
man’s way of interpreting nature.
Art is not nature. Art is made by man, whereas nature is a
given around us. It is in this juncture that they can be
considered opposites.
Paul Cézanne
French painter, painted a scene from
reality entitled Well and Grinding Wheel
in the Forest of the Château Noir. The said
scene is inspired by a real scene in a forest around the
Château Noir area near Aix in Cézanne’s native Provence
“WELL AND GRINDING WHEEL IN
THE FOREST OF THE CHATEAU
NOIR” BY PAUL CEZANNE
ASSUMPTIONS OF ART
Art is not nature
Art is not nature. Art is made by man, whereas nature is
a given around us. It is in this juncture that they can be
considered opposites.

The Elephant and

the Blind Men
 ASSUMPTIONS OF ART
Art involves experience
Art does not require a full definition, art is just
experience.
“Actual doing of something”.
Dudley et al. (1960) affirmed that “all art depends on
experience, and if one is to know art, he must know
it not as fact or information but as experience.”
A work of art then cannot be abstracted from
actual doing. In order to know what an artwork
is, we have to sense it, see or hear it, and see
AND hear it.
• In matters of art, the subject’s perception is of primacy.
• An important aspect of experiencing is its being highly
personal individual, and subjective. In philosophical
terms, perception of art is always a value judgment.
• Degustibus non disputandum est (Matters of taste are
not matters of dispute).
• Finally, one should also underscore that every
experience with art is accompanied by some emotion.
One either likes or dislikes, agrees or disagrees
that a work of art is beautiful.

PABLO PICASSO
 LESSON 2:

Art Appreciation: Creativity,

Imagination, and Expression
 ART APPRECIATION AS A WAY
OF LIFE
• Jean-Paul Sartre

- A famous French philosopher of the 20th century

- Described the role of art as a creative work that
depicts the world in a completely different light and
perspective, and the source is due to human
freedom. (Geene, 1995)
• Each artwork beholds beauty of its own kind, the
kind that the artist sees and wants the viewers to
perceive.
• In cultivating an appreciation of art, one should also
exercise and develop his taste for things that are
fine and beautiful. This allows individuals to make
intelligent choices and decisions in acquiring
necessities and luxuries, knowing what gives better
value for time or money while taking into
 THE ROLE OF CREATIVITY IN
ART MAKING
• Creativity requires “thinking outside the box”.
• In art, creativity is what sets apart one artwork from
another.
• A creative artist does not simply copy or imitate another
artist’s work.
• What you thought was your own unique and creative idea
may not what it seems to be after extensive research and
that someone else has coincidentally devised before the
idea in another part of the world.
Where do you think famous
writers, painters, and musicians
get their ideas? Where do ideas
in making creative solutions
begin?
 ART AS A PRODUCT OF
IMAGINATION, IMAGINATION AS A
PRODUCT OF ART
• Albert Einstein – demonstrated that knowledge is
actually derived from imagination.

“Imagination is more important than knowledge. For

knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand,
while imagination embraces the entire world, and all
there ever will be to know and understand.”
 ART AS A PRODUCT OF
IMAGINATION, IMAGINATION AS A
PRODUCT OF ART
• Imagination is not constrained by the walls of the norm,
but goes beyond that.

People + (curiousity + imagination) =

ADVANCEMENT
• Through imagination, one is able to craft something bold,
something new and something better in the hopes of
creating something that will stimulate change.

Imagination allows endless possibilities.

 ART AS A PRODUCT OF
IMAGINATION, IMAGINATION AS A
PRODUCT OF ART
• An artwork does not need to be real to be a real thing,
but can be something that is imaginary (Collingwood,
1938)
• Artists use their imagination that gives birth to reality
through creation.
 IMAGINATION AS A PRODUCT
OF ART
• Art also inspires imagination.
• Adding beauty to the surrounding.
• These creative pieces were made not only because they
were functional to men, but also because beauty gave
them joy.
 ART AS AN EXPRESSION

• Robin George Collingwood – an English philosopher

who is best known for his work in aesthetics explicated in
his publication The Principles of Art (1938)

• Through expression, he is able to explore his own

emotions and at the same time, create something
beautiful out of them. He further illustrated that
expressing emotions is something different from
describing emotions.
 ART AS AN EXPRESSION

• Description actually destroys the idea of expression, as it

classifies the emotion, making it ordinary and predictable.

• Expression, on the other hand, individualizes. An artist

has the freedom to express himself the way he wants to.

• This makes people’s art not a reflection of what is outside

or external to them, but a reflection of their inner selves.
 THERE ARE COUNTLESS WAYS OF
EXPRESSING ONESELF THROUGH
ART.
VISUAL ARTS
 Creations that fall under this category are those that appeal to
the sense of sight and are mainly visual in nature.
 Artists produce visual arts driven by their desire to reproduce
things that they have seen in the way that they perceived
them.
 It is the kind of art form that the population is most likely
more exposed to.
 Some mediums of visual arts include paintings, drawings,
letterings, printing, sculptures, digital imaging, and more.
“CAMELLIA IN OLD CHINESE VASE
ON BLACK LACQUER TABLE” BY
JOHN LA FARGE
 F I L M
• Refers to the art of putting together successions of still
images in order to create an illusion or movement.

• Filmmaking focuses on its aesthetic, cultural, and social

value and is considered as both an art and an industry.
• Films can be created by using one or a combination of
some or all of these techniques:
 motion-picture camera (also known as movie camera)
 animation techniques
 Computer-Generated Imagery (CGI), and more

• Filmmaking stimulates experiences or creates one that

is beyond the scope of our imagination as it aims to
deliver ideas, feelings, or beauty to its viewers.
• The art of filmmaking is so complex it has to take into
account many important elements such as lighting,
musical score, visual effects, direction, and more.

• That is why in famous film festivals and awards such as

the Metro Manila Film Festival and Oscars, a long list of
categories is considered to recognize excellence in the
art of filmmaking.
 PERFORMANCE ARTS

• Is a live art and the artist’s medium is mainly the human

body which he / she uses to perform, but also employs
other kind of art such as virtual art, props, or sound.
 PERFORMANCE ARTS
• It usually consists of four important elements:
 time, where the performance took place,
 the performers’ or performer’s body,
 and a relationship between the audience and the
performer(s).
 PERFORMANCE ARTS

• The fact that performance art is live makes it intangible,

which means it cannot be bought or traded as a
commodity, unlike the previously discussed art
expressions.
 POETRY PERFORMANCE

• Poetry is an art form where the artists expresses his

emotions not by using paint, charcoal, or camera, but
expresses them through words.
• There words are carefully selected to exhibit clarity and
beauty and to stimulate strong emotions of joy, anger,
love, sorrow, and the list goes on.
• It uses a word’s emotional, musical, and spatial values
that go beyond its literal meaning to narrate, emphasize,
argue, or convince.
 POETRY PERFORMANCE

• These words, combined with movements, tone, volume,

and intensity of the delivery, add to the artistic value of
the poem.
• Some poets even make poems out of their emotions
picked up from other works of art, which in turn produce
another work of art through poetry.
 ARCHITECTURE
• Art is the pursuit and creation of beautiful things while
architecture is the making of beautiful buildings.
However, not all buildings are beautiful.
• Some buildings only embody the functionality they need,
but the structure, lines, forms, and colors are not
beautifully expressed.
 DANCE

• Is a series of movements that follows the rhythm of the

music accompaniment. It has been an age-old debate
whether dance can really be considered an art form.
• A creative form that allows people to freely express
themselves. It has no rules.
• Dancers are not confined to set steps and rules but are
free to create and invent their own movements as long
as they deem them graceful and beautiful.
 LITERARY ART

• Artists who practices literary arts use words – not paint,

musical instruments, or chisels – to express themselves
and communicate emotions to the readers. However,
simply becoming a writer does not make one a literary
artist.
• Simply constructing a succession of sentences in a
meaningful manner is not literary art. Literary art goes
beyond the usual professional, academic, journalistic,
and other technical forms of writing.
 LITERARY ART

• It focuses on writing using a unique style, not following a

specific format or norm. It may include both fiction and
non-fiction such as novels, biographies, and poems.

Examples of famous literary artists and their works include

The Little Prince by Antione de Saint-Exupery and Romeo
and Juliet by William Shakespeare.
 THEATER

• Uses live performers to present accounts or imaginary

events before a live audience. Theater art performances
usually follow a script, though they should not be confused
with literary arts.
• Much like in filmmaking, theater also considers several
elements such as acting, gesture, lighting, sound effects,
musical score scenery, and props.
• The combination of these elements is what gives the
strongest impression on the audience and the script thus
becomes a minor element.
 THEATER

• The combination of these elements is what gives the

strongest impression on the audience and the script thus
becomes a minor element. Like performance art, since
theater is also a live performance, the participation of
the viewer is an important element in theater arts.
• Some genres of theater include drama, musical,
tragedy, comedy and improvisation.
 APPLIED ARTS

• Applied arts is incorporating elements of style and

design to everyday items with the aim of increasing their
aesthetical value. Artists in this field bring beauty,
charm, and comfort into many things that are useful in
everyday life.
 APPLIED ARTS
• Industrial design, interior design, fashion design, and
graphic design are considered applied arts. Applied is
often compared to fine arts, where the latter is chiefly
concerned on aesthetic value. Through exploration and
expression of ideas, consideration of the needs, and
careful choice of materials and techniques, artists can
combine functionality and style.