History of art

This article is an overview of the history of the visual artsworldwide. For the academic discipline of art history, seeArt history.The history of art is the history of any activity or

The Creation of Adam (1508–1512), by Michelangelo, in theSistine Chapel (Vatican)

product made by humans in a visual form for aestheticalor communicative purposes, expressing ideas, emotionsor, in general, a worldview. Over time visual art hasbeen classified in diverse ways, from the medieval dis-tinction between liberal arts and mechanical arts, to themodern distinction between fine arts and applied arts,or to the many contemporary definitions, which defineart as a manifestation of human creativity. The subse-quent expansion of the list of principal arts in the 20thcentury reached to nine: architecture, dance, sculpture,music, painting, poetry (described broadly as a form ofliterature with aesthetic purpose or function, which alsoincludes the distinct genres of theatre and narrative), film,photography and graphic arts. In addition to the old formsof artistic expression such as fashion and gastronomy,new modes of expression are being considered as artssuch as video, computer art, performance, advertising,animation, television and videogames.The history of art is a multidisciplinary branch of thearts and sciences, seeking an objective examination ofart throughout time, classifying cultures, establishingperiodizations, and observing the distinctive and influen-tial characteristics of art.[1] The study of the history ofart was initially developed during the Renaissance, withits limited scope being the artistic production of Westerncivilization. However, as time has passed, it has imposeda broader view of artistic history, seeking a comprehen-sive overview of all the civilizations and analysis of theirartistic production in terms of their own cultural values

(cultural relativism), and not just western art history.Today, art enjoys a wide network of study, dissemina-tion and preservation of all the artistic legacy of mankindthroughout history. The 20th century has seen the pro-liferation of institutions, foundations, art museums andgalleries, in both the public and private sectors, dedicatedto the analysis and cataloging of works of art as well asexhibitions aimed at a mainstream audience. The rise ofmedia has been crucial in improving the study and dis-semination of art. International events and exhibitionslike the Whitney Biennial and biennales of Venice andSão Paulo or the Documenta of Kassel have helped thedevelopment of new styles and trends. Prizes such asthe Turner of the Tate Gallery, the Wolf Prize in Arts,the Pritzker Prize of architecture, the Pulitzer of pho-tography and the Oscar of cinema also promote the bestcreative work on an international level. Institutions likeUNESCO, with the establishment of the World HeritageSite lists, also help the conservation of the major monu-ments of the planet.[2]

1 Historical development

The Sakyamuni Buddha, by Zhang Shengwen, c. 1173 – 1176CE, Chinese Song Dynasty period

Main article: Art history § Historical development

The field of "art history" was developed in the West,and originally dealt exclusively with European art history,with the High Renaissance (and its Greek precedent) asthe defining standard. Gradually, over the course of the

1

2 2 PREHISTORY AND ANCIENT HISTORY BACKGROUND

20th century, a wider vision of art history has developed.This expanded version includes societies from across theglobe, and it usually attempts to analyze artifacts in termsof the cultural values in which they were created. Thus,art history is now seen to encompass all visual art, fromthe megaliths of Western Europe to the paintings of theTang Dynasty in China.The history of art is often told as a chronology ofmasterpieces created in each civilization. It can thusbe framed as a story of high culture, epitomized by theWonders of the World. On the other hand, vernacularart expressions can also be integrated into art historicalnarratives, in which case they are usually referred to asfolk arts or craft. The more closely that an art historianengages with these latter forms of low culture, the morelikely it is that they will identify their work as examin-ing visual culture or material culture, or as contributingto fields related to art history, such as anthropology orarcheology. In the latter cases art objects may be referredto as archeological artifacts.

2 Prehistory and ancient historybackground

A useful way to examine how art history is organized isthrough the major survey textbooks, which reflect an en-cyclopedic view of great art. Frequently consulted text-books published in English are Ernst Gombrich’s Storyof Art, Marilyn Stokstad’s Art History, Anthony Jan-son’s History of Art, David Wilkins, Bernard Schultz,and Katheryn M. Linduff’s Art Past, Art Present, HelenGardner’s Art Through the Ages, Hugh Honour and JohnFlemming’s A World History of Art, and Laurie Schnei-der Adams’s Art Across Time. One of the best places tofind information on canonical art history is the HeilbrunnTimeline of Art History, sponsored by the MetropolitanMuseum of Art in New York.

Ludovisi Battle sarcophagus (250-260 CE), with battle betweenRoman soldiers and barbarians. The general may be Hostilian,Emperor Decius' son (died 252 CE).

Venus of Willendorf, Naturhistorisches Museum

2.1 Global Prehistory

Main article: Prehistoric art

The first tangible artifacts of human art are foundfrom the Stone Age (Upper Paleolithic, Mesolithic andNeolithic), periods when the first demonstrations that canbe considered art by humans, appear. During the Pale-olithic (25000-8000 BCE), man practiced hunting andlived in caves, where cave painting was developed.[3] Af-ter a transitional period (Mesolithic, 8000–6000 BCE),in the Neolithic period (6000–3000 BCE), when man be-came sedentary and engaged in agriculture, with societiesbecoming increasingly complex and religion gaining im-portance, the production of handicrafts commenced. Fi-nally, in the Bronze Age (c. 3000 – 1000 BCE), the firstprotohistoric civilizations arise.

2.1.1 Paleolithic

Main articles: Paleolithic art and List of Stone Age art

The Paleolithic had its first artistic manifestation on25,000 BCE, reaching its peak in the Magdalenian pe-

2.1 Global Prehistory 3

riod (±15,000-8000 BCE). The first traces of man-made objects appear in southern Africa, the WesternMediterranean, Central and Eastern Europe (AdriaticSea), Siberia (Baikal Lake), India and Australia. Thesefirst traces are generally worked stone (flint, obsidian),wood or bone tools. To paint in red, iron oxidewas used, in black, manganese oxide and in ochre,clay.[4] Surviving art from this period is small carv-ings in stone or bone and cave painting, this especiallyfrom in the Franco-Cantabrian region; there are pictureswith magical-religious character and also pictures witha naturalistic sense, which depict animals, notably thecaves of Altamira, Trois Frères, Chauvet and Lascaux.Sculpture is represented by the so-called Venus figurines,feminine figures which were probably used in fertilitycults, such as the Venus of Willendorf.[5] Other represen-tative works of this period are the Man from Brno[6] andthe Venus of Brassempouy.[7]

2.1.2 Neolithic

Main article: NeolithicThis period—from c. 8000 BCE in theNear East—was a

Cave painting at Roca dels Moros, in El Cogul

profound change for the ancient man, who became seden-tary and engaged in agriculture and animal husbandry,new forms of social coexistence and religion developed.[8]The rock art of the Iberian Mediterranean Basin—datedbetween Mesolithic and Neolithic—contained small,schematic human and figures, with notable examples inEl Cogul, Valltorta, Alpera and Minateda. This kindof painting was also similar in northern Africa (Atlas,Sahara) and in the area of modern Zimbabwe. Neolithicpainting was schematic, reduced to basic strokes (man inthe form of a cross and woman in a triangular shape).There are equally noteworthy cave paintings in PinturasRiver in Argentina, especially the Cueva de las Manos.In portable art, the Cardium Pottery was produced, dec-orated with imprints of seashells. New materials wereproduced like amber, crystal of rock, quartz, jasper, etc.In this period there appear the first traces of urbanisticplanimetry, noting the remains in Tell as-Sultan (Jericho),

Jarmo (Iraq) and Çatalhöyük (Anatolia).[9]

2.1.3 Metal Age

Megalithic complex of Stonehenge

The last prehistoric phase is the Metal Age, as the useof elements such as copper, bronze and iron proved tobe a great material transformation for these ancient so-cieties. In the Chalcolithic (also called Copper Age) theMegalith emerged, monuments of stone, i.e. the dolmenand menhir or the English cromlech, as in the complexesat Newgrange and Stonehenge.[8] In Spain the Los Mil-lares culture was formed, characterized by the Beakerculture and pictured human figures with big eyes. InMalta, noteworthy are the temple complexes of ĦaġarQim, Mnajdra, Tarxien and Ġgantija. In the BalearicIslands notable megalithic cultures developed, with dif-ferent types of monuments: the naveta, a tomb shapedlike a truncated pyramid, with an elongated burial cham-ber; the taula, two large stones, one put vertically andthe other horizontally above each other; and the talaiot, atower with a covered chamber and a false dome.[10]

In the Iron Age the cultures of Hallstatt (Austria) andLa Tene (Switzerland) mark the significant phases inEurope. The first was developed between the 7th and5th century BCE by the necropoleis with tumular tombsand a wooden burial chamber in the form of a house,often accompanied by a four-wheel cart. The potterywas polychromic, with geometric decorations and appli-cations of metallic ornaments. La Tene was developedbetween the 5th and 4th century BCE, and is more popu-larly known as early Celtic art. It produced many iron ob-jects such as swords and spears, which have not survivedwell, but bronze continued to be used for highly decoratedshields, fibulas, and other objects, with different stages ofevolution of the style (La Tene I, II and III). Decorationwas influenced by Greek, Etruscan and Scythian art.[11]In most of the continent conquest by the Roman Empirebrought the style to an end.

• Venus of Brassempouy, Musée des Antiquités Na-tionales, Saint-Germain-en-Laye

4 2 PREHISTORY AND ANCIENT HISTORY BACKGROUND

• Menhir in the region of Brittany (France)

• Circular talaiot in the island of Mallorca (Spain)

• Solar cart of Trundholm (Denmark)

2.2 Ancient Mediterranean Art

Splint on Flood myth, of the Epic of Gilgamesh

Main article: Ancient art

Art, in the first period of history, began with the inventionof writing, founded by the great civilizations of Near East:Egypt and Mesopotamia. This period also differed fromothers because artistic manifestations occurred in everyculture of all the continents. In this period appear thefirst great cities in the main big rivers: Nile, Tigris andEuphrates, Indus and Yellow River.One of the great advances of this period was writ-ing, generated primarily by the need to keep recordsof economical and commercial nature. The first writ-ing code was the cuneiform script, which emerged inMesopotamia c. 3500 BCE, written on clay tablets. It wasbased on pictographic and ideographic elements, whilelater Sumerians developed syllables for writing, reflect-ing the phonology and syntax of the Sumerian language.In Egypt hieroglyphic writing was developed, with thefirst sample being the Narmer Palette (3100 BCE). TheHebrew language was one of the first languages to utilizethe method of writing with an alphabet (Abjad, c. 1800BCE), which relates a unique symbol for each phoneme;the Greek and the Latin alphabet derive from it.[12]

2.2.1 Mesopotamia

Main article: Mesopotamian artMesopotamian art was developed in the area between

Diorite Statue I, patesi of Lagash (2120 BCE), Louvre Museum,Paris

Tigris and Euphrates (modern day Syria and Iraq), wherefrom the 4th millennium BCE many different culturesexisted such as Sumer, Akkad, Amorite, Chaldea, etc.Mesopotamian architecture was characterized by the useof brick, lintel and the introduction of construction ele-ments like arc and vault. Notable are the ziggurats, largetemples with the form of a terraced step pyramid, fromwhich we have practically no traces left except their bases.The tomb was usually a corridor, with a covered chamberand a false dome, as in some examples found in Ur. Therewere also palaces walled with a terrace in the form of aziggurat, giving great importance to gardens (the HangingGardens of Babylon is one of the Seven Wonders of theAncient World).Sculpture was developed through wood carving and reliefand was used in religious, military and hunting scenes,depicting both human and animal figures, whether theywere real or mythological. In the Sumerian period therewere small statues of angular form, with colored stone,bald head and with hands on the chest. In the Akkadianperiod there were figures with long hair and beard, notingthe stele of Naram-Sin. In the Amorite period (or Neo-sumerian) notable is the representation of king Gudea of

2.2 Ancient Mediterranean Art 5

Lagash, with his mantle and a turban on his head and hishands on the chest. During Babylonian rule famous is thestele of Hammurabi. Assyrian sculpture is notable for itsanthropomorphism of cattle and the winged genie, whichis seen flying in many reliefs depicting war and huntingscenes, as in the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III.[13]

With the advent of writing, arose literature as a meansof expressing human creativity. The Sumerian litera-ture is represented by the Epic of Gilgamesh, written inthe 17th century BCE. In it were written thirty mythsabout themost important Sumerian andAkkadian deities,which are: Innanas descent to hell and the cycle of godsEnki and Tammuz. Another example of relevance is thepoem Lugal ud melambi Nirpal (The hardship of Nin-urta), whose content type is moral and didactic. DuringAkkadian period notable is Atrahasis, which includes theflood myth. In Babylonian literature notable is the poemEnûma Eliš, which describes the creation of the world.[14]

The music was developed in this region between 4thand 3rd millennium BCE, used in Sumerian temples,where priests sang hymns and psalms (ersemma) to thegods. The liturgic chant was composed of responsories—song alternated between the priests and choir—andantiphons—song alternated between two choirs. Theyhad several instruments like tigi (flute), balag (drum), lilis(predecessor of timpani), algar (lyre), zagsal (harp) andadapa (pandeiro).[15]

2.2.2 Egypt

Main article: Ancient Egyptian artIn Egypt arose one of the first great civilizations, with

The pyramids of Giza

elaborate and complex works of art, which assume theprofessional specialization of the artist/craftsman. Its artwas intensely religious and symbolic, with a highly cen-tralized power structure and hierarchy, giving great im-portance to the religious concept of immortality, espe-cially of the pharaoh, for whom were built great monu-ments. The Egyptian art spans from 3,000 BCE until theconquest of Egypt by Alexander the Great. However itsinfluence persisted in the Coptic art and Byzantine art.

The architecture is characterized by its monumentality,achieved by the use of stones in large blocks, lintel andsolid columns. Notable are the funerarymonuments, withthree main types: mastaba, tomb of rectangular form;pyramid, which can be a step pyramid (Saqqarah) orsmooth sided (Giza); and the hypogeum, undergroundtomb (Valley of the Kings). The other great building isthe temple, a monumental complex preceded by an av-enue of sphinxes and obelisks, which give way to twopylons and trapezoid walls, a hypaethros, a hypostyle halland a shrine. Notable are the temples of Karnak, Luxor,Philae and Edfu. Another type of temple is the rock tem-ple, which has the form of a hypogeum, like in Abu Sim-bel and Deir el-Bahari.Painting was characterized by the juxtaposition of over-lapping planes. The images were represented hierar-chically, i.e., the Pharaoh is larger than the subjects orenemies at his side. Egyptians painted the head andlimbs in profile, while the shoulders and eyes in front.Applied arts were developed significantly in Egypt, inparticular woodwork and metalwork, with superb ex-amples like cedar furniture inlaid with ebony and ivoryof the tombs at the Egyptian Museum, or the piecesfound in Tutankhamun's tomb, which are of great artisticquality.[16]

Aurochs on a cave painting in Lascaux, France

2.2.3 Greece and Etruria

Greek and Etruscan artists built on the artistic founda-tions of Egypt, further developing the arts of sculpture,painting, architecture, and ceramics. The body becamerepresented in a more representational manner, and pa-tronage of art thrived, at this time.

2.2.4 Rome

Roman art is sometimes viewed as derived from Greekprecedents, but also has its own distinguishing features.Roman sculpture is often less idealized than the Greek

6 3 THE ENCYCLOPEDIC VIEW OF THE HISTORY OF ART

precedents. Roman architecture often used concrete, andthe round arch and dome was invented at this time.

3 The encyclopedic view of the his-tory of art

Although some of the books listed above attempt a globalapproach, they are universally strong in western art his-tory. The books use representative examples from eachera in order to create a story that blends changing styleswith social history. The Western narrative begins withprehistoric art such as Stonehenge, before discussing theancient world. The latter begins with Mesopotamia, thenprogresses to the art of Ancient Egypt, which then tran-sitions to Classical antiquity. Classical art includes bothGreek and Roman work.

3.1 Europe

This encyclopedia view of the history of art begins witha section on the European context in chronological se-quence.

3.1.1 Medieval

The interior of the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, Turkey

With the decline of the Roman Empire, the narra-tive shifts to Medieval art, which lasted for a millen-nium. Early Christian art begins the period, followed byByzantine art, Anglo-Saxon art, Viking art, Ottonian art,Romanesque art andGothic art, with Islamic art dominat-ing the eastern Mediterranean and beyond. TheMedievalera ended with the Renaissance, followed by Mannerism,the Baroque and Rococo. In Byzantine and Gothic art ofthe Middle Ages, the dominance of the church insistedon the expression of biblical truths. There was no need todepict the reality of the material world, in which man wasborn in a “state of sin”, especially through the extensiveuse of gold in paintings, which also presented figures inidealised, patterned (i.e."flat”) forms.

3.1.2 Renaissance and Baroque

The Renaissance is the return yet again to valuation ofthe material world, and this paradigm shift is reflectedin art forms, which show the corporeality of the humanbody, and the three-dimensional reality of landscape. Al-though textbooks periodize Western art by movements,as described above, they also do so by century, especiallyin Italian art. Many art historians give a nod to the his-torical importance of Italian Renaissance and Baroqueart by referring to centuries in which it was prominentwith the Italian terms: trecento for the fourteenth cen-tury, quattrocento for the fifteenth, cinquecento for thesixteenth, seicento for the seventeenth, and settecento forthe eighteenth.

3.1.3 Neoclassicalism to Realism

The 18th and 19th centuries included Neoclassicism,Romantic art, Academic art, and Realism in art. Art his-torians disagree when Modern art began, some tracingit as far back as Francisco Goya in the Napoleonic pe-riod, the mid-19th century with the industrial revolutionor the late 19th century with the advent of Impressionism.The art movements of the late 19th through the early21st centuries are too numerous to detail here, but canbe broadly divided into two categories: Modernism andContemporary art. The latter is sometimes referred towith another term, which has a subtly different connota-tion, Postmodern art.

3.1.4 Modern and Contemporary

Main articles: Modern art and Contemporary artThe physical and rational certainties of the clockworkuniverse depicted by the 18th-century Enlightenmentwere shattered not only by new discoveries of relativ-ity by Einstein[17] and of unseen psychology by SigmundFreud,[18] but also by unprecedented technological devel-opment accelerated by the implosion of civilization in twoworld wars. The history of 20th-century art is a narra-

3.2 The Americas 7

Henri Matisse, 1905-06, Le bonheur de vivre, oil on canvas, 175x 241 cm, Barnes Foundation

tive of endless possibilities and the search for new stan-dards, each being torn down in succession by the next.Thus the parameters of Impressionism, Expressionism,Fauvism, Cubism, Dadaism, Surrealism, and other artmovements cannot be maintained as significant and cul-turally germane very much beyond the time of their in-vention. Increasing global interaction during this timesaw an equivalent influence of other cultures into West-ern art, such as Pablo Picasso being influenced by Iberiansculpture, African sculpture and Primitivism. Japonism,and Japanese woodcuts (which had themselves been influ-enced byWestern Renaissance draftsmanship) had an im-mense influence on Impressionism and subsequent artis-tic developments. The influential example set by PaulGauguin's interest in Oceanic art and the sudden popu-larity among the cognoscenti in early 20th century Parisof newly discovered African fetish sculptures and otherworks from non-European cultures were taken up by Pi-casso, Henri Matisse, and by many of their colleagues.Modernism, in its response to the idealistic 19th cen-tury search for truth, and the century’s progress in gen-eral, gave way in the latter decades of the 20th centuryto a realization of that idealism’s unattainability. Rapidadvances in science and technology were accepted asan unavoidable truth, which led to the late Modern andPostmodern period. In these periods, cultures of theworld and of history are seen as changing forms, whichcan be appreciated and drawn fromwith occasional irony.Furthermore, the separation of cultures had become in-creasingly blurred and it has become more appropriateto think in terms of a global culture, rather than regionalcultures.

3.2 The Americas

Main articles: Native American art, Painting in theAmericas before Colonization and Pre-Columbian art

The history of art in the Americas begins in pre-

Columbian times with Indigenous cultures. Art historianshave focused particularly closely on Mesoamerica dur-ing this early era, because a series of stratified culturesarose there that erected grand architecture and producedobjects of fine workmanship that are comparable to thearts of western Europe. Among the widely read textbooksis one by Mary Ellen Miller titled The Art of Mesoamer-ica.

3.2.1 Preclassic

The art-making tradition of Mesoamerican people beginswith the Olmec around 1400 BCE, during the Preclassicera. These people are best known for making colossalheads but also carved jade, erected monumental archi-tecture, made small-scale sculpture, and designed mosaicfloors. Two of the most well-studied sites artistically areSan Lorenzo Tenochtitlán and La Venta. After the Olmecculture declined, theMaya civilization became prominentin the region. Sometimes a transitional Epi-Olmec periodis described, which is a hybrid of Olmec and Maya. Aparticularly well-studied Epi-Olmec site is La Mojarra,which includes hieroglyphic carvings that have been par-tially deciphered.

3.2.2 Classic

By the Late pre-Classic era, beginning around 400 BCE,the Olmec culture had declined but both Central Mexi-can and Maya peoples were thriving. Throughout muchof the Classic period in Central Mexico the city ofTeotihuacan was thriving, as were Xochicalco and ElTajin. These sites boasted both grand sculpture andarchitecture. Other Central Mexican peoples includedthe Mixtecs, the Zapotecs, and people in the Valley ofOaxaca. Maya art was at its height during the “Clas-sic” period—a name that mirrors that of Classical Eu-ropean antiquity—and which began around 200 CE. Ma-jor Maya sites from this era include Copan where numer-ous stelae were carved in the round, and Quirigua wherethe largest stelae of Mesoamerica are located along withzoomorphic altars. A complex writing system was devel-oped, and Maya illuminated manuscripts were producedin large numbers on papermade from tree bark. AlthoughMaya cities have existed to the present day, several sites”collapsed” around 1000.

3.2.3 Postclassic

At the time of the Spanish conquest of Yucatán duringthe 16th and 17th centuries, theMaya were still powerful,but many communities were paying tribute to Aztec so-ciety. The latter culture was thriving, and it included artssuch as sculpture, painting, and feather mosaic. Perhapsthe most well-known work of Aztec art is the calendarstone, which has become a national symbol of the state

8 3 THE ENCYCLOPEDIC VIEW OF THE HISTORY OF ART

of Mexico. During the Spanish conquest of the AztecEmpire many of these artistic objects were sent to Eu-rope, where they were placed in cabinets of curiosities,and later redistributed to art museums. The Aztec empirewas based in the city of Tenochtitlan which was largelydestroyed during the colonial era. What remains of it wasburied beneath Mexico City. A few buildings, such asthe foundation of the Templo Mayor have since been un-earthed by archaeologists, but they are in poor condition.

3.2.4 Colonial

Art in the Americas since the conquest has been amixtureof indigenous and foreign traditions, including European,African, and Asian settlers. Thus, books about the visualarts of the United States, such as Francis Pohl’s FramingAmerica, start with the conquest and reconstruct manifoldtraditions. Numerous indigenous traditions thrived afterthe conquest. For example, the Plains Indians createdquillwork, beadwork, winter counts, ledger art, and tipisin the pre-reservation era, and afterwards became assim-ilated into the world of Modern and Contemporary artthrough institutions such as the Santa Fe Indian Schoolwhich encouraged students to develop a unique NativeAmerican style. Many paintings from that school, nowcalled the Studio Style, were exhibited at the PhilbrookMuseum of Art during its Indian annual held from 1946to 1979.

3.2.5 Modern

Intertwined with this story of indigenous art, are move-ments of painting, sculpture, and architecture such as theHudson River School and the Ashcan School of the 19thcentury, and Pop Art and Abstract Expressionism of the20th. Some of the most celebrated images were producedby artists of the American West, featuring “Cowboys andIndians,” and some of the most visually complex objectswere created by African Americans.

3.3 Western Asia

Main articles: Ancient art, Art of Ancient Egypt, Artand architecture of Assyria, Persian art, Scythian art,Islamic art and Byzantine Art

Religious Islamic art often forbids depictions of people,as they may be misused as idols. Religious ideas arethus often represented through geometric designs instead.However, there are many Islamic paintings which displayreligious themes and scenes of stories common among thethree main monotheistic faiths of Islam, Christianity, andJudaism.

The Great Wave off Kanagawa by Hokusai

3.4 Central/Southern/Eastern Asian

Main article: Eastern art history

Eastern civilization broadly includes Asia, and it also in-cludes a complex tradition of art making. One Easternart history survey textbook is John Laplante’s Asian Art.It divides the field by nation, with units on India, China,and Japan.

Fresco from Ajanta caves, c. 450-500

Eastern art has generally worked in a style akin to West-ern medieval art, namely a concentration on surface pat-terning and local colour (meaning the plain colour of an

3.6 Oceania 9

object, such as basic red for a red robe, rather than themodulations of that colour brought about by light, shadeand reflection). A characteristic of this style is that the lo-cal colour is often defined by an outline (a contemporaryequivalent is the cartoon). This is evident in, for example,the art of India, Tibet and Japan.

3.5 Africa

One of many ancient Yoruba sculptures discovered at Ife

See also: Egyptian art, Art of ancient Egypt, Africanfolk art and African tribal masks

The long story of African Art includes both highsculpture, perhaps typified by the brass castings of theBenin people, as well as folk art. In the ancient world,Egypt is often thought of as the greatest artistic cultureof Africa, but it is also rivaled by Nubia, which was lo-cated in present-day Sudan. Concurrent with the Euro-pean Middle Ages, in the eleventh century CE a nationthat made grand architecture, gold sculpture, and intri-cate jewelry was founded in Great Zimbabwe. Impres-sive sculpture was concurrently being cast from brass bythe Yoruba people of what is now Nigeria. Such a cul-

ture grew and was ultimately transformed to become theBenin Kingdom, where elegant altar tusks, brass heads,plaques of brass, and palatial architecture was created.The Benin Kingdom was ended by the British in 1897,and little of the historical art now remains in Nigeria. To-day, the most significant arts venue in Africa is the Johan-nesburg Biennale.

3.6 Oceania

Main article: Art of Oceania

The Art of Oceania includes the geographic areas ofMicronesia, Polynesia, Australia, New Zealand, andMelanesia. Nicholas Thomas’s textbook Oceanic Arttreats the area thematically, with essays on ancestry,warfare, the body, gender, trade, religion, and tourism.Unfortunately, little ancient art survives from Oceania.Scholars believe that this is likely because artists usedperishable materials, such as wood and feathers, whichdid not survive in the tropical climate, and there are nohistorical records to refer to this most material. The un-derstanding of Oceania’s artistic cultures thus begins withthe documentation of it by Westerners, such as CaptainJames Cook in the eighteenth century. At the turn of thetwentieth century the French artist Paul Gauguin spentsignificant amounts of time in Tahiti, living with localpeople and making modern art—a fact that has becomeintertwined with Tahitian visual culture to the presentday. The indigenous art of Australia often looks like ab-stract modern art, but it has deep roots in local culture.

4 Art museums

The Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain

The experience of art history, as conveyed by art muse-ums, tends to be organized differently from that of text-books due to the nature of collections and the institu-tions themselves. Rather than a full march through time,museums employ curators who assemble objects intoexhibitions, often with unique commentary that is laterreinterpreted by docents. Because they have the respon-sibility to store objects, museums develop taxonomiesfor their collections, using conventions of classification

10 7 ACADEMIC ART HISTORY

authority for the sake of consistency. This may be under-taken with the museum’s archivist. The result is to occa-sionally find a strong emphasis on the history of media inconjunction with the history of culture.Such an emphasis on media is a natural outgrowth ofthe internal classification systems used in art museums,which usually include departments of painting, sculpture,decorative arts, and works on paper. Painting itself in-cludes several media, such as oil painting, Tempera paint-ing, watercolor. Sculpture can be divided into carvingand casting. The decorative arts are perhaps the mostdiverse, as they include: textiles and needlework, whichincludes weaving, lace, shibori, and other work withfabric; Murals, of which frescoes are one form; and ob-jects of adornment such as silver, ceramics, lacquerware,stained glass, and furniture. Museums generally can-not collect full buildings, but they may acquire piecesof architectural ornamentation, which also fall under thedecorative arts department. Works on paper includesprintmaking, photography, and the book arts such asilluminated manuscripts. Museums may also include adepartment of applied arts, which includes objects ofgood design along with the graphic art, illustration, andother forms of commercial art.

5 Art market

The art market can also be used to understand what“counts” as part of art history. Art dealers and auc-tioneers organize material for distribution to collectors.Two of the largest, and oldest, art auction houses areSotheby’s and Christie’s, and each hold frequent sales ofgreat antiquities and art objects.In addition to upstanding practices, a black market ex-ists for great art, which is closely tied to art theft and artforgery. No auction houses or dealers admit openly toparticipating in the black market because of its illegality,but exposés suggest widespread problems in the field. Be-cause demand for art objects is high, and security in manyparts of the world is low, a thriving trade in illicit antiq-uities acquired through looting also exists. Although theart community nearly universally condemns looting be-cause it results in destruction of archeological sites, lootedart paradoxically remains omnipresent. Warfare is corre-lated with such looting, as is demonstrated by the recentarchaeological looting in Iraq.

6 Nationalist art history

Both the making of art, the academic history of art, andthe history of art museums are closely intertwined withthe rise of nationalism. Art created in the modern era,in fact, has often been an attempt to generate feelingsof national superiority or love of one’s country. Russian

art is an especially good example of this, as the Russianavant-garde and later Soviet art were attempts to definethat country’s identity.Most art historians working today identify their specialtyas the art of a particular culture and time period, and of-ten such cultures are also nations. For example, someonemight specialize in the 19th-century German or contem-porary Chinese art history. A focus on nationhood hasdeep roots in the discipline. Indeed, Vasari's Lives ofthe Artists is an attempt to show the superiority of Flo-rentine artistic culture, and Heinrich Wölfflin's writings(especially his monograph on Albrecht Dürer) attempt todistinguish Italian from German styles of art.Many of the largest and most well-funded art museumsof the world, such as the Louvre, the Victoria and AlbertMuseum, and the National Gallery of Art in Washingtonare state-owned. Most countries, indeed have a nationalgallery, with an explicit mission of preserving the culturalpatrimony owned by the government—regardless of whatcultures created the art—and an often implicit mission tobolster that country’s own cultural heritage. The NationalGallery of Art thus showcases art made in the UnitedStates, but also owns objects from across the world.

7 Academic art history

Laocoön and his Sons,Greek, (Late Hellenistic), c. 160 BCE and20 BCE, White marble, Vatican Museum

The study of the history of art is a relatively recent phe-nomenon; prior to the Renaissance, the modern conceptof "art" did not exist. Over time, art historians havechanged their views about what art is worthy of scrutiny.For example, during the early Victorian era, the 15th-century Italian artists were considered inferior to thoseof 16th-century High Renaissance. Such a notion waschallenged by the Pre-Raphaelite movement. There hassince been a trend, dominant in art history of the 21st

11

century, to treat all cultures and periods neutrally. Thus,Australian Aboriginal art would not be deemed better orworse than Renaissance art—it is just different. Art his-torical analysis has also evolved into studying the socialand political use of art, rather than focusing solely onthe aesthetic appreciation of its craftsmanship (beauty).Whatmay once have been viewed simply as amasterpieceis now understood as an economic, social, philosophical,and cultural manifestation of the artist’s world-view, phi-losophy, intentions and background.

8 Sacred art history

While secular approaches to art history often empha-size individual creativity, the history of sacred art of-ten emphasizes the ways that beautiful objects are usedto convey symbolic meaning in ritual contexts. The tenlargest organized religions of the world each have image-making traditions. They are Confucianism, Buddhism,Hinduism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, Bahá'í,Jainism, and Shinto.

9 See also• Western art history

• Eastern art history

10 References[1] Gardner, p.xlvi

[2] Onians (2008), p. 316-317.

[3] Gardner, p.2

[4] Gardner, p.6

[5] Gardner, pp.3-4

[6] Honour, H.; Fleming, J. (2005). A World History of Art.Laurence King. ISBN 9781856694513. Retrieved 2015-11-20.

[7] Honour-Fleming (2002), p. 36-44.

[8] Gardner, p.12

[9] Onians (2008), p. 20-25.

[10] Azcárate (1983), p. 24-28.

[11] Onians (2008), p. 30-31.

[12] Historia de la escritura

[13] Azcárate (1983), p. 36-44.

[14] Margueron, Jean-Claude (2002). “La literatura sumeria”.Los mesopotámicos. Madrid: Cátedra. 84-376-1477-5.

[15] Robertson-Stevens (2000), p. 13-20.

[16] Azcárate (1983), p. 29-34.

[17] “Does time fly? Peter Galison’s Empires of Time, a histori-cal survey of Einstein and Poincare, intrigues Jon Turney”(Saturday September 6, 2003), The Guardian

[18] “Contradictions of the Enlightenment: Darwin, Freud,Einstein and Modern Art”. fordham.edu. Retrieved2015-11-20.

11 Further reading

• Adams, Laurie. Art across Time. 3rd ed. Boston:McGraw-Hill, 2007.

• Gardner, Helen, and Fred S. Kleiner. Gardner’s Artthrough the Ages: A Global History. 13th ed. Aus-tralia: Thomson/Wadsworth, 2009.

• Gombrich, E. H. The Story of Art. 15th ed. Engle-wood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1990.

• Honour, Hugh, and John Fleming. The Visual Arts:A History. 5th ed. New York: Henry N. Abrams,1999.

• Honour, Hugh, and John Fleming. A World Historyof Art. 7th ed. Laurence King Publishing, 2005,ISBN 1-85669-451-8, ISBN 978-1-85669-451-3

• Janson, H. W., and Penelope J. E. Davies. Janson’sHistory of Art: The Western Tradition. 7th ed. Up-per Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2007.

• Oliver Grau (Ed.): MediaArtHistories, Cam-bridge/Mass.: MIT-Press, 2007.

• La Plante, John D. Asian Art. 3rd ed. Dubuque, IA:Wm. C. Brown, 1992.

• Miller, Mary Ellen. The Art of Mesoamerica: FromOlmec to Aztec. 4th ed, World of Art. London:Thames & Hudson, 2006.

• Pierce, James Smith, and H. W. Janson. From Aba-cus to Zeus: A Handbook of Art History. 7th ed. Up-per Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2004.

• Pohl, Frances K. Framing America: A Social His-tory of American Art. New York, NY: Thames &Hudson, 2002.

• Stokstad, Marilyn. Art History. 3rd ed. Upper Sad-dle River, NJ: Pearson Education, 2008.

• Thomas, Nicholas. Oceanic Art, World of Art. NewYork, N.Y.: Thames and Hudson, 1995.

• Thuillier, Jacques, Histoire de l'art, Paris, Flammar-ion, 2002. ISBN 2-08-012535-4

12 12 EXTERNAL LINKS

• Thuillier, Jacques, History of Art, Paris, Flammar-ion, 2002. ISBN 2-08-010875-1

• Wilkins, David G., Bernard Schultz, and KatherynM. Linduff. Art Past, Art Present. 6th ed. UpperSaddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, 2008.

12 External links• “History of Art: From Paleolithic Age to Contem-porary Art” - all-art.org

• “Art: The history of ideas in literature and the artsin aesthetic theory and literary criticism” - The Dic-tionary of the History of Ideas

• Art History resources

• Ars Summum Project

• Smarthistory.org, The Open Art Project

Timelines

• Art History Timeline - historyexplorer.net

• Timeline of Art History from Metropolitan Museumof Art

13

13 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

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