ART APPRECIATION MODULE

Subject: Art Appreciation

Units: 3
Semester: 2nd Semester
School Year: 2022 -2023
Meeting Schedules: MW every Monday
TTh every Tuesday
Prepared by: Doreen Sagge - Inoc – LPT, EdD

COURSE OVERVIEW:

This subject is a 3-unit course that develops the students’ ability to perform,
appreciate, analyze, and critique works of art. Further, it equips the students with a broad
knowledge of the practical, historical, philosophical, and social relevance of the arts to
develop the students’ ability to exercise their understanding of the vast world of arts.

OUTLINE OF CONTENTS: (By Chapter)

MIDTERM COVERAGE (FROM 1ST WEEK – 9TH WEEK)

• Chapter 1 – Assumptions and Misconceptions on the Nature of Art

• Chapter 2 – Functions and Philosophy of Art
• Chapter 3 – Work of Art: Its Subject, Form and Content
• Chapter 4 – Language of Art: Elements and the Principles of Design
• Chapter 5 – Narratives, Appropriation, Borrowing and Ownership of Art

FINAL COVERAGE (FROM 10TH WEEK – 18TH WEEK)

• Chapter 6 – Music and Its Genres
• Chapter 7 – Soul-Making and the Da Vincian Principles
• Chapter 8 – Textile Art and the Art of Weaving
• Chapter 9 – Visual Elements in the Philippine Traditional Motifs and Crafts
• Chapter 10 – Improvisation in Different Art Forms

NOTE: THE CLASS WILL BE DIVIDED INTO 3 GROUPS FOR ALL THE
GROUPED ACTIVITIES. ALWAYS HAVE A REPRESENTATIVE TO
TURIN IN EACH ACTIVITY IN GOOGLE CLASSROOM.
Chapter 1 – Assumptions and Misconceptions on the Nature of Art

Art Imagination and Expression

Art is a part of life. Every now and then, we constantly live with it in our daily living
like in expressing how to cook, speak, sing, dance, and write, being by product of our
productive imagination. What is the difference between imagination and expression in art
studies? Imagination is an abstraction of a certain thought or feeling that produces a good
art based on reality or experience while, expression is an automatic response to it. For
instance, when a mother thinks on what foods to prepare for her children’s meal, she
imagines the ingredients, the kitchen utensils, and the processes to use, before
expressing it into the actual cooking. Unexpressed imagination is not art when an
individual fails to realize its beauty and utilitarian purpose. Vis-à-vis, when the mother fails
her imagination in providing a palatable meal for her children, she duds her art of cooking.
However, expressions of art can either be positive or negative. When both means and
ends of art are constructive, its expression enhances not only to the individual’s quality of
life, essential to his or her progress and development; but to the life of others and the
nation as well. The expression of art in advertisement found in billboards, magazines, and
social media entice public opinion in patronizing certain brands and buy their products, in
order to increase company’s sales, improve employees’ life, and regulate government tax
collections. When neither means nor ends of art expression are destructive like the art of
war, it may result to misery, hinder progress and development, and promote chaos. Thus,
this situation may bring imminent danger to society. The burning of buildings, the looting
of goods, the destruction of properties, and the violent protests in some places in the US
brought by racism and COVID-19 related issues show concern on how we use our means
and ends of art expression more positively. Using this US context, how your means and
ends of art expression respond to this ferocity? With what happens to our existing
environment today, it is imperative to nurture positive and more peaceful expressions of
art rather than the negative.

Etymology and Definition of Art

Don’t you know that art is derived from a Latin term ars, which means skill, talent
or ability? In a broad sense, art is skill in making or doing something because, every
individual has a talent. We are skillful in everything we do that ends with a good purpose.
This ability allows us to claim that we are all artists in our own right, depending on our
preferences and abilities that determine our specific interest in art. The belief that art is
only good for the rich and famous is the second misconception. There is no bifurcation of
art according to status. God created human beings with equal number of neurons,
capable to rationalize compared to other ordinary creations in the animal kingdom. The
human brain is capable to think 5,000 thoughts per day (Laboria, 2013), including thinking
for the art. We are all gifted with art, the problem is when we fail to recognize it and the
lethargy that dictates us not do it, because we want everything easy and instant given in
a ‘silver platter’ to us. It is an urgent call to stop this complacency. We need exposure to
hone our imagination to its maximum potential.

Creativity and Art Appreciation

Do you believe that creativity is the mother of all inventions? While it is true,
imagination remains its grandmother. This metaphor means that imagination allows us to
be creative, in order to create scientific inventions and aesthetic innovations. Creativity is
a metacognitive skill – a form of divergent thinking that allows us to generate relationship,
integrate concepts, elaborate information, brainstorm issues with fluency, flexibility, and
originality (Johnson, 2010), As a thinking outside of the box, creativity is an unstructured
free flowing process to capacitate the body and create art. We appreciate art because art
gives us pleasure. Listening to music is a form of appreciation that makes us enjoy and
provides a panacea of our day’s tedious work. Art allows us to imagine our past
experiences and draws our feelings to appreciate beauty. Inocian, et al., (2019)
emphasized that “Art is an expression of feelings and emotions; craft is a form of work
with the use of available materials. Zulueta (1994) rejoined that art is beautiful rather that
useful; while craft is making something useful more than beautiful.11Art and craft can be
different, but these two can be similar in some ways.” In simpler terms, art is the
expression of imagination; craft is the realization of the expression. Art tinges with a
psychological process; craft provides a utilitarian and mechanical process of creation. As
a form of emotional release, art can stand alone even without craft as a lighter side of our
own humanity. Yet, craft without art is awful with no appreciation. This is the danger when
craft is subjected to a mechanical and systemic routine in industries ran by machines to
yield a mass production of goods. The production process is dull and repetitive; unless
the artists in industries shall continue to imagine the latest product innovation, design,
packaging, and marketing. These industries will become more sustainable to keep their
patrons and make their business alive. Craft producers use colors, motifs or decoration
to suit market demands (Coppock, 2000).

How can imagination and expression take place in the world of the visual arts?
Primarily, the artist is honest about his or her feelings on the realities of nature and
society, affecting his or her life and the life of everybody, either reflecting the core or the
peripheral context of society in the artwork. For instance, how can a lonely artist paint on
canvass? The artist imagines, sensitizes, and clarifies the core and peripheral issues of
loneliness depicting his or her art. He or she imagines the core of loneliness, referring to
any of these psychological issues: struggling for acceptance of rejection, scuffling for
despair, fighting for pain, fearing of the unknown, lingering anxiety, and facing the
uncertainty. These core issues interface with the peripheral, which include the people’s
response to socio-economic, political, environmental, technological, and public health
issues. This explicit expression of feelings from the imagined core and peripheral issues
is a ‘magic recipe’ of art. The visual quality of the artwork depends on craftsmanship on
how the artist selects the art media, uses the brush, mixes colors on palette, contrasts
hues between lighter and darker values of tints, tones, and shades, to enhance the artist’s
techniques of painting. Applying all these into the actual painting proves the artist’s art of
painting and craftsmanship to produce several pieces of artwork for public use. Osborne
(2014) specified that tints are the combination of white to a color that increases lightness;
tones are the combination of a specific color with gray to produce its tinting and shading;
shades are the combination of a specific color with black to increase darkness. These
techniques to an artistic craftsmanship are common in the visual arts more so in the art
of painting. This context shows a classic mix of art and craft principles and techniques in
the arts.

The Humanities

As coined from the Latin words humanus and humanitas, meaning humans, the
field of humanities provides human beings to think critically and creatively, in order to
understand the values and cultures of the world, and to bring clarity to the future
(Standford Humanities Center, 2015). The study of humanities includes philosophy,
history, religion, art, literature, language, and music, which can be remembered through
the acronym called PHARLLM. However, Zulueta (1994) included dance and theater as
part of the humanities.

The Fields of Humanities

Art is at the center of the seven fields because this provides the enhancement of
the individual human potential. Linking art and the other fields of humanities is relevant to
our religious customs and lifestyles (Coppock, 2000). Philosophy is derived from the
Greek words philos or philein, which means love and Sophia, which means wisdom.
Hence, philosophy is defined as the love of wisdom. History is derived from the Latin word
historia, which means to scribble and record the events in the past. History intertwines
together with the development of civics for a democratic citizenship. These two fields
enhance either logical or sequential thinking, which is essential to the artist’s imagination
and expression in the arts. Religion is derived from the Latin word religare or religio, which
means to bind. It is a form of obligation that binds the faithful into one divine power.
Religion enhances the art of meditation and reflection for discernment, good judgement,
self-control, fortitude, and sound decision-making process of the artist. Literature is a
derivative from the Latin word littera or litteratura, which means letter or knowledge of
books. It concentrates on the study of fiction like: myths, epics, folktales, short stories,
poems, and drama. While, non-fiction deals with prose and narratives in essays, news,
research, technical reports, and other printed media that depict cultural implications of
people’s life in the society. Literature enhances the art of writing and reading of an
individual. Not only that these arts are essential indicators to basic literacy of the world’s
human population, these also promote appreciation of beauty of the intangible cultures
and urban legends. From the Latin wordlingua, which means tongue, language provides
avenues for better communication using the art of speaking and listening. Oration,
declamation, story-telling, news reporting, and public speaking are the techniques for
auditory art.

This auditory art is essential to promote understanding, peace, and harmony in the
society, by listening to individual voices, either in print or audio media. The power of words
in effective communication can never be underestimated - it heals or it kills. Poor
language communication breaks communities and sound language builds these
communities to promote alliances. From the Greek word mousa, which means muse and
the Latin word Musa denotes to the goddess of music, in particular who is employed to
represent a song or poetry for appreciation of beauty brings the etymology of music
(Mansfield, 1923). Music is the pleasing combination and succession of sounds (Harper,
2020), with or without the use of musical instruments. This auditory art relaxes the soul
and stirs pleasant and happy emotions, by singing, humming, chanting, rapping, and in
engaging into jingles and tonal rhymes (Inocian, 2018).

Nature and Art History

To Dante Alighieri, nature is the art of God. As an artistic creation of God, nature
comprises plants, animals, lands, and other features and produce of the earth. It has been
used by many artists as one of their sources of inspiration and subject in art. The seven
essential elements of art: line, color, space, form, shape, texture, and value (Ray & Daniel,
2016) are essential to enhance the sense of aesthetics (Silva, 2010). Growing trees show
vertical lines, mountains, cliffs, and hills reflect curve, triangular, and zigzag lines, valleys
and plains are carved with horizontal lines. Lush vegetation shows the different tints and
shades of green, blooming flowers with bright colors, vast space of deserts, oceans and
skies appear with yellowish brown and blue colors. Bumpy, rocky, protruding, rolling,
sparsely, and densely places speak for the environment’s natural texture. Daytime and
nighttime provide the values of sharpness between lightness and darkness of colors, the
shininess or dullness of the surface, and the clarity or dimness (Beardsley, 1981) of the
surroundings. The massive land and water distributions reflect their varied forms and
shapes, with remarkable beauty. Nature is not art but its source. Art is made by man no
matter how close it is to nature (Zulueta, 1994). Before the mass production of colors by
industries, artists and weavers in the past extracted juices from plants as colors used
primarily to dye threads in weaving for cloth. For instance, the Sumbanese women
extracted brown colors from tobacco juices, blue colors from indigo, and other plants to
produce different colors for the weaving or spinning of cloth (Forshee, 2001).

Thus, the elements of art are line, shape, value, form, space, texture, and color.

Art History
 Art history begins with the emergence of human beings whose imagination propels
an expression of great legacies that human civilizations have witnessed. Art is as old as
history, even before the discovery of the cuneiform writing in Mesopotamia and the
hieroglyphics in Egypt. For thousands of years, incessant interaction of early humans to
the environment paved the enhancement of imagination that led to discovery and gradual
evolution of the finer aspects of life. Although culture was unsophisticated, art became a
witness in the early humans ‘quest for people’s struggle for power, security, and survival.
Table 1 highlights the historical development of art from its simplest evolution until its
finest sophistication. Though art history has been characterized with a Eurocentric bias
because of power influence and historical control of the West (Chase, 2014), art historians
and researchers start to unfold the inclusion of the Oriental perspectives. The obvious
bias on the development of art history between the West and the East is reflected in the
art history timeline created by Warhol (2012). This chapter shows only a brief description
of art history based on what is reflected in Table 1 and Figure 9. Its intensive discussions
will be taken up in subsequent chapters of this book, interfacing the art history of Asia,
Africa and other parts of the world reduce its conceived bias.

The 3 Most Influential Civilizations with Their Examples of Contributions to Art

CIVILIZATION PAINTING SCULPTURE ARCHITECTURE

S
Egyptians

Great Sphinx of Giza Great Pyramid of

Wall Painting of Giza
Nefertari

Greeks

Artemis Temple
 Laocoon and His
Sons

Symposium North
Wall
Romans

Pompeii Augustus of Prima Colosseum of

Porta Rome

Note: The civilizations can also be considered as classifications.

Classifications of Painting with Examples

• Early Christian – The Supper at Emmaus

• Byzantine – Madonna Enthroned
• Romanesque – The Three Magi
• Gothic – The Last Judgment
• Renaissance – Mona Lisa
• Baroque – David with the Head of Goliath
• Rococo – The Swing
• Neoclassical – The Death of Socrates
• Romanticism – The Death of Sardanapalus
• Mannerism – Madonna of the Harpies
• Realism – Stacking Grain Sheaves
• Naturalism – The Hay Wain
• Impressionism – Sunrise
• Symbolism – The Death of the Gravedigger
 • Iconography and Iconology – Seven Joys of the Virgin
• Fauvism – Woman with a Hat
• Cubism – Girl with a Mandolin
• Expressionism – The Scream
• Suprematism – A boy Holding a Knapsack
• Surrealism – The Persistence of Memory

Classifications of Sculpture

• Mesopotamian – The Stele of Hammurabi

• Early Christian – Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus
• Renaissance – Donatello’s Bronze Statue of David
• Baroque – A Faun Teased by Children
• Donatello – Magdalene Penitent
• Michelangelo – Statue of David (marble block)
• Bernini – Apollo and Daphne
• Antonio Canova – Venus Victrix
• Clodion – Poetry and Music
• Puget – Milo of Crotona
• Rodin – The Bronze Age
• Lehmbruck – Standing Youth
• Calder – Flamingo
• Maillol – The River
• Brancusi – The Gate of Kiss

Note: The surnames of sculptors are also considered as classifications.

Classifications of Architecture

• Egyptian – Pharaohs of Alexandria

• Greek – Parthenon Temple
• Roman – Segovia Aqueduct
• Mesopotamian – Hanging Garden of Babylon
• Early Christian – Basilica of Santa Maria del Santo Spirito
• Byzantine – Taj Mahal
• Romanesque – Notre Dame Cathedral
• Gothic – The Magic Kingdom
• Renaissance – St. Peter’s Cathedral
• Baroque – Grand Place