Understanding Art: Universality, Nature, and Experience

• Art is constantly present in every country and generation.
• Philippine art is exemplified by Juan Luna's "Spolarium" (1884).
• Leonardo Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" (1498) represents art in Paris during the 16th century.
• Katsushika Hokusai's "The Great Wave of Kanagawa" (1831) is an example of Japanese art.
• Edvard Munch's "The Scream" (1893) is a notable artwork from Norway.

Art is Universal

• Art transcends time, generations, and continents.
• Age is not a determining factor in art’s quality.
• Art appeals to people regardless of origin, time, and place.

Art is Not Nature

• Art is man's expression and interpretation of nature.
• Art is made by humans, contrasting with nature which is naturally given.
• Art is human expression or interpretation of nature (Caslib et al., 2017; Dudley et al., 1960).

Art Involves Experience

• Art is understood through experience rather than data.
• Experiencing art involves sensing, seeing, and hearing it.
• Art is understood through experience rather than fact or information.
• An artist expresses emotions through art, creating something beautiful (Coolingwood, 1938).

Art as a Form of Creation

• Art is a diverse human activity involving creative or imaginative talent.
• Art expresses technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, or conceptual ideas.
• Creation is bringing something not present into existence.
• Artworks are unique, distinct, and original.
• Divine creation is exemplified by Adam and Eve.
• Creating something out of something involves painting with paint and dresses with cloth, thread, and embroidery.

Creativity as Originality

• Creativity involves originality.
• Examples of originality in art include the Great Wall of China, the Lady of Liberty, and Rizal's Monument and Lapu-Lapu's monument in the Philippines.
• Original art is unique, out of the ordinary, and not a copy or imitation.

Art as a Product of Imagination

• Imagination is more important than knowledge because it encompasses the entire world.
• Imagination leads to action, fueled by ideas (Haralabidou, 2015).
• Art is a form of expression of the deepest emotions according to Jeff Lee (2016).
• The egoic (conscious) and echoic (unconscious) minds contribute to thinking.
• Jose Rizal's works include "El Filibusterismo" and "Noli mi tangere".

Art as Expression

• Art expresses thoughts, emotions, intuitions, and desires, sharing personal experiences.
• It communicates intricate concepts beyond words.

Expression Art Forms

• Art form: Visual Arts.
• Art form: Film.
• Art form: Performance Art.
• Art form: Poetry performance.
• Art form: Architecture.
• Art form: Dance.
• Art form: Literary art.
• Art form: Theater.
• Art form: Interior Design.
• Art form: Fashion Design.
• Art form: Industrial Design.
• Art form: Graphic Design.
• Examples of Visual Arts include, Painting, Drawing, Littering, Sculpture, Digital Imaging, Printing.

Art is Cultural

• Art has been part of human culture for centuries, expressing feelings, exchanging ideas, and transferring knowledge.
• Art plays a significant role in cultural and social lives.
• Art contributes to the understanding of past and present cultures.
• Art strengthens cultural identity.
• Art fosters pride in customs, traditions, and beliefs.
• The artist's sense of work includes painting, sculpture, music, dances, ceramics, and prints.

Subject of Art

• The subject of art refers to any person, object, scene, or event represented.
• Every artwork has a subject, the core of its conception.
• A song may express devotion, a novel may depict war results, and a painting may show nature.
• Subject is any person, animal, thing, or issue described or represented in a work, generating the question, “What is it?”
• Theme is the recurring idea or element in a work of art, relating to the artist's ideas, thoughts, and feelings.
• Everything is considered a subject in art, from simple ideas (e.g., happiness) to complex thoughts.
• Artwork with recognizable subjects is realistic, representational, or objective art.
• Unrecognizable subjects are non-representational or non-objective.
• Arts that have subjects are called representational or objective arts.
• Arts with no subjects are non-representational or abstract.
• Non-objective art has no subject and reference to reality.
• Painters convey messages non-objectively, using bright color for happy moods; use dark color for sober moods.

The Artist and Factors in their Choice of Subject

• Personal choice/personal subject is a factor.
• Medium and availability of material is a factor.
• Context (time, social factor) is a factor.

Kinds of Subject

• Landscape, seascape, and cityscapes.
• Still life: inanimate objects arranged in an indoor setting.
• Animals.
• Portraits: realistic likenesses of a person.
• Attire and accessories are expressive, revealing much about the person and their time.
• Figures: nude/clothed.
• Everyday life: life around the artist or the setting (e.g., children playing, life at the park).
• History and legends, with history consisting of verifiable facts and legends being unverifiable but accepted.
• Religion and Mythology: used to preach and teach by the handmaid of religion.
• Dreams and Fantasy, mostly used by surrealist artist painters.
• Arts with no subject are known as non-representational or abstract.

Ways of Representing Art

• Realism: artistic movement that began in France in the 1850s.
• Realism arose with photography to develop "objectively real" things, as seen, heard, and sensed.
• When things are depicted as they would appear in nature, they are realistic.
• No work of art is truly realistic as it's not an exact copy of reality.
• Distortion: the artist uses imagination and alters the subject.
• Stylized work is a form of distortion such as Norman Belleza's painting.
• When proportions differ noticeably, the object is distorted.
• Distortion can mean twisting, stretching, or deforming the natural shape of the object.
• Distortion is commonly used to dramatize or create emotional effects

Abstraction

• Abstraction is derived from the Latin word "abstractus."
• Abstraction involves removal or isolation from material objects or practical matters.
• Through abstract art, the artist presents the subject with their idea or feeling.
• Styles of visual art include no real-life pictures, scenery, or objects.
• The artist may break apart and rearrange a subject for analysis and synthesis.
• Pablo Picasso innovated this style in the early 1990s.
• It involves simplifying and reorganizing objects/elements.
• Some abstract works retain enough likeness to represent real-world objects.
• Original objects have been reduced to geometric shapes and can be rarely identified unless the artist named it in a title.

Surrealism

• Surrealism is associated with exceptional or "super" realism.
• Surrealism revolves around making things look ordinary.
• It focuses on objects found in imagination or fantasy showing dreamlike images.
• Surrealism is realism + distortion.
• In expressing the subconscious, the surrealist composes dreamlike scenes with irrational arrangements.
• Images are recognizable, sometimes drawn from nature, but combined in unnatural relationships.

Symbolism

• A symbol indicates an invisible idea or standard.
• Symbolism focuses or amplifies meaning rendering artworks more subjective.
• A flag represents nationalism, a lion represents bravery, and a lamb represents meekness.

Fauvism

• Fauvism is derived from "Les Fauves" (The Wild Beasts).
• Fauvism is the last part of the 19th-century artistic movement stressing spontaneity.
• Fauvism utilized of excessive bright colors.

Dadaism

• "Dada" means "hobby horse."
• Dadaism is a "nonsensical" art movement with no clear sense.
• Impressionism is also referred to as optical realism.
• The influence of color, light, and motion is important in the nature of the objects shown.
• Impressionism explains how visual stimuli originate from nature.

Meaning Of Art

• Subject refers to what is depicted by the artist.
• Content is the artist's expression or communication.
• Content reveals the artist's attitude towards his subject.
• Factual meaning is the literal statement of narrative clearly recognized, while conventional meaning is special object or color meaning in a culture.
• Personal meaning is unconsciously conveyed by the artist using private symbolism stemming from their experiences.
• Examples of artwork include Vincent Van Gogh's "Starry Night", Georgia O'Keeffe's "flower paintings", Edvard Munch's "The Scream", and Damien Hirst "The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Someone Living”.