Art History: The basics Grant Pooke & Diana Newal

There really is no such thing as Art. There are only artists. (Gombrich 1984:4. Art History, page 4)

Art is something which artists do.

The classical concept of art: 
in a western context, art understood as a practical, craft-based activity has the longest history. The Greek word 'techne' denoted a skill or craft and 'technites' a craftsman who made objects for particular purposes and occasions (Sörbom 2002:24). Simirlarly, within the classical world, examples of of craft, such as statues and mosaics, had practical, public and ceremonial roles.

The categories of art and craft have become familiar within specific contexts, cultures and in relation to particular audiences (academies, museums).Of central importance to this were the social institutions such as academies and museums which were established from the late sixteenth century onwards.Collectively, these interests, and those associated with them, establish normative definitions of art, that is, ideas about how art should look and what it should do, variations of which have continued today.

Fine art as an exclusive category:
From the later nineteenth century onwards many avant-garde artists began to make work which questioned either the conventional subject matter and primacy of these distinct categories (history paintings and portraiture), or the tradition of representation which they signified.
The work of Paul Cézanne (1839-1906), Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) and Georges Braque (1882-1963) underlined the importance of still-life as a gengre to the birth of modernism. Development of collage by Braque and Picasso, explored the actuality of the flat structure. Academy-based ideas typically marginalised non-Western art practises which reflected different ideas about aesthetics, culture and meaning. Overseas trade, colonisation and imperialism stimulated interest in tribal masks, carvings, fabrick and fetish objects from regions such as Africa, Asia, India and Iberia. Within the avant-garde artist like Beaque, André Matisse, Picasso and Maurice de Vlaminck popularised the cult of primitivism.

African art.

Art is imitation:

Adam and Eve 1526  by Lucas Cranach I vs Mrs Fiske Warren and her Daughter Rachel, 1903 by John Singer Sargent's


There are differences between these two paintings in terms of subject, date, genre, origin, materials and meaning. Whereas Cranach attempts to convey the symbolism of a Biblical story and Sargent seeks to capture the likeness of his sitter.