Introduction to Art Appreciation

• Understanding art appreciation and its significance is a primary goal
• Through art, individuals can expand their perceptions and mindsets by listening to different interpretations
• Assumptions and the nature of art will be explored
• Discover how people develop multiple perspectives on art
• Philosophical significance of art will be looked into from the perspective of classic thinkers
• Art communicates by containing cognitive, social and moral substance
• Communication can be done through the Gestalt Principles

Course Learning Outcomes

• Demonstrate an understanding and appreciation of arts
• Know their function, value and historical significance
• Analyze art based on aesthetic value, historical context, tradition, and social relevance
• Create art and curate productions or exhibits
• Utilize art for self-expression and promoting advocacies
• Discover and deepen identity through art, respecting nationality, culture, and religion

What is Art Appreciation

• Art is a necessary component of existence
• Art appreciation is the understanding of the universal and timeless elements that distinguish great art
• It describes the study of visual art forms
• Functions as the introduction of basic visual literacy principles
• Art appreciation requires the analysis of an artwork's form for public audiences
• Improving appreciation is the aim
• Can be studied independently from its subject matter, symbolism, or historical background
• Art appreciation is personal and influenced by inclinations for aesthetics and form
• Can be objective and based on design features, principles, cultural, and social acceptance

Intended Learning Outcomes

• Appreciate the role of art in realizing man’s end

• Clarify misconceptions of art

• Paintings, sculptures, architecture, design, and digital art are forms of art

• Art can be enjoyed by everyone

• It is subjective, and different art forms appeal to different people

• Art appreciation refers to the study and appreciation of various art forms

• Can be subjective, based on preferences and tastes

• Objective qualities include the piece's design and mastery

• Investigating context, historical implication, background, and roots are key

• Art is derived from the Latin word ars, meaning "trade or specialized type of skill"

• An artist’s goal is to produce art that connects with its audience on an intimate level

• Art should be interpreted in various ways

• Artists need to connect to their target audience because of influx of styles and trends

• Artwork aims to tap the subconscious

• Art appreciation allows the study of the time period and history

• Artists reflect their own struggles and social challenges

• Relate to the concerns of the artists by understanding societal happenings from their point of view

• Art elicits understanding and communication with the audience

• You tap into emotions and memories through art

• Art appreciation enables a conversation and understanding

• There are several approaches in the interpretation of art by listening to ideas and opinions

• Art is a means to convey and express the impossible

• Find the capacity to feel joy, sadness, rage, and grief through visual medium

• Interpretation is crucial as a final piece in art appreciation

• Art shifts with every person who encounters it

• Art appreciation and analysis are significant, connect people to art and have value

• Highlights background and history, as well as the artist’s biography

• Looks into the design, technique, and expertise

• Art appreciation promotes analysis and critical understanding

Assumptions of Art

• Assumptions and nature of art will be taken into account
• Perspectives on what art means have varied
• Art is constantly present in society
• Acknowledge the arts include the artistic

Intended Learning Outcomes

• Characterize the assumptions of art
• Engage better with personal experiences of and in art
• Characterize artistic expression based on personal experiences
• Discuss the nature of art

Art is Universal

• People and their social backgrounds mirror art
• Art brings awareness and unity
• Art fosters mutual understanding and cultural exchange
• Creations connect with anybody, regardless of form
• Art reflects political, social, and cultural processes
• Art is the most important form of communication
• Art represents people, tradition, culture, unity, freedom, harmony, and understanding
• Art exists in every country and generation
• Creative works shouldn't be deemed artistic if they were created long ago
• The works of Jose Rizal and Francisco Balagtas are relevant
• Florante at Laura inspires high school learners

Art is Not Nature

• Art requires thinking and comprehension
• Nature requires the lack of thinking to be nature
• The sight from the summit of a mountain isn't art until seen or captured in pictures
• Nature and Art borrow elements but are not equivalent
• Painter Paul Cezanne, painted Well and Grinding Wheel in the Forest of the Chateau Noir (1904) from the real forest near Cezanne’s native province
• Cezanne changed patterns and details, and did not act in accordance with nature

Art Involves Experience

• Art is a personal experience
• Experience means the “actual doing of something” and is contingent to art
• To understand art, one must experience it
• Work of art cannot be separated from the act of making it
• Art must be sensed, seen, and heard for understanding
• Art is personal, individual, and subjective
• Judgment is a fundamental component of perceiving art
• Understanding art is a value judgment based on the perceiver, his preferences, biases, and what he possesses

Nature of Art

• Art is a non-symbolic mode of communication
• Art is a key counterbalance to language
• Language needs extensive training, while art can be communicated with little indoctrination
• Art communicates without words
• Experiement with visual-emotional correlations
• Colors elicit specific feelings
• Making art requires the presence of an artist
• Art is the result of man's creativity, imagination, and emotion
• Everyone can appreciate art
• It is a way to determine quality
• Each art piece depicts beauty uniquely
• Artists shows their vision to the audience

The Role of Creativity in Art Making

• Creativity necessitates a willingness to think outside the box
• Creativity is what distinguishes art
• Creativity must be out of the ordinary and original
• Creativity should feature originality that has not been seen and is not a copy
• Being creative can be challenging

Art Forms

• Art expresses emotions
• It represents inner selves rather than outer observations

Visual Arts

• Visual arts are primarily visual and appeal to sight
• Artists want to recreate what they've seen
• Performance arts, applied arts, and theater include a visual component
• Examples of mediums are paintings, drawings, lettering, printing, sculpting, and digital imaging

Film

• Filmmaking is the skill of piecing together sequences of static images
• There is filmmaking as an art and a business
• Movie-making techniques include motion picture cameras, animation, and CGI
• Filmmaking stimulates or creates experiences beyond imagination

Performance Art

• Performance art is live art using the human body
• Visual art, sounds, and props, can be incorporated
• There is setting, time, performer’s body, audience and performer relationship
• Performance art is intangible and cannot be traded like a commodity

Music

• Music is a collection of coordinated sounds
• Making music puts sounds and tones in an order
• Making music combines sounds to create a piece
• Music organizes sounds for a purpose

Architecture

• Architecture creates buildings
• Is the creation of beautiful things
• Buildings provide functionality requirements
• Framework, lines, shapes, and colors need to be well-designed
• The three elements of architecture are plan, construction, and design

Dance

• Dance is gestures choreographed to music
• Is a method of expression
• Dancers aren't restricted to routines and can create their own, as long as they are graceful

Literary Art

• Literary artists use language to express themselves
• Being a writer is not the same as being a literary artist
• Literary art has its own style
• Literary art does not adhere to any particular format or standard
• Novels, poems, and biographies are examples of fiction and nonfiction

Theater

• Live performers offer tales or visuals
• Theater is distinguished from literary art by performing according to a script
• Acting, gestures, scenery, lighting, props, sound effects, and musical score are considered
• Performance and theater arts are live
• Genres include musicals, comedies, tragedies, and improvisation

Applied Arts

• Applied arts provide aesthetic value to ordinary objects
• Style and design are blended
• Artists infuse beauty, charm, and comfort
• Examples of applied arts: industrial design, fashion design, interior design, and graphic design

Philosophical Importance of Art

• Art is alleged to have a cognitive function
• Cognitive function is a medium in acquiring truth
• Art has been called the form of highest knowledge

Art, Science, and Philosophy

• Science, art, and philosophy differ on the subject matter and medium

• Philosophy, like art, depicts man

• Philosophy reflects a reality in relation to man

• Philosophy includes the interactions of people in their day to day lives

• Art can communicate political, spiritual, philosophical concepts

• Art depicts beauty and express emotions

• Is a source of pleasure

• Art explores perception

• Explores perception all through analysis and critics

• Analysis and critics are done by those with philosophical pillars in art

Art as an Imitation

• Artists are viewed as imitators in Plato's "The Republic"
• Plato feels artistic subjects shouldn't be included in schools, and artists should be banned
• Things in this world are copies of the original in the World of Forms, according to Plato
• There are two realms: physical and spiritual
• The Physical World is the material things interacted with daily
• The spiritual, the World of Forms, is beyond the physical realm
• The physical realm is an image of the true Realm of Forms
• Artists only strengthen beliefs in replicating rather than seeking real beings in the World of Forms
• Plato was skeptical because art appeals to emotions, and imitates rather than makes reality
• Art can be removed to ensure no one compromises the Republic
• Plato argues art represents a trivial alternative to reality

Art as a Representation

• Aristotle agreed that art was imitation
• Art helped show the truth to philosophy
• Art represents a possible version of reality and is not opposed to the basic truth
• Art seeks to portray potential realities
• Art serves two purposes: pleasure and education

Art as a Disinterested Judgement

• Immanuel Kant viewed the judgment of beauty
• Judgment is a cornerstone of art
• Judgment can be universal despite subjectivity
• Judgments about beauty are subjective
• Judgments follow a common measure
• Assessments can be objective or universal
• Aesthetics require indifference, as should aim to go beyond personal tastes and preferences

Art as a Communication of Emotion

• Leo Tolstoy stated art plays a role in communicating emotions
• Art conveys emotions like language conveys information
• Art acts as a form of cohesion
• Can act as a conductor of emotions and thoughts
• Art is existence, and provides access to emotions

Gestalt Principles of Visual Perception

• The brain successfully fills in blanks to create a greater whole
• There are faces in bathrooms tiles, clouds and in nature
• Brains see patterns and are wired to see logic
• Psychologists developed Gestalt Principles to show how we perceive the world
• Discover the Gestalt Principles effects how people see art

Intended Learning Outcomes

• Explain and discuss the seven Gestalt Principles
• Identify examples of each Gestalt Principle from print, online and other medial sources

Gestalt principles

• Principles are grounded on the idea that the human brain tries to organize and simplify complex designs
• It rearranges and organizes
• Arrangement is done to create a whole
• Understanding and meaning are created

Figure-Ground

• The figure-ground principle states that people instinctively perceive objects as either being in the foreground or the background.
• They either stand out prominently in the front (the figure) or recede into the back (the ground).
• “This determination will occur quickly and subconsciously in most cases. Figure/Ground lets us know what we should be focusing on and what we can safely ignore in a composition.” – Steven Bradley, a Web designer
• Figure-ground perception refers to the tendency of the visual system to simplify a scene into the main object (figure) and everything else (background)
• The concept is often illustrated with the classic "faces or vases" illusion (Rubin vase)
• Depending on whether you see black/white, faces or a vase can be seen

Similarity

• Multiple elements are grouped with similar things
• The elements perform the same function
• Shape, size, and color make a group

Proximity

• Elements that are closer are more related
• Closer things override color, shape and other factors

Common Region

• Objects in the same region are grouped

Continuity

• Elements placed and lined can be related
• Eyes follow curves naturally