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JA8. Effects of Studying Art History on Understanding Different Cultures

Statement

Using all that you have learned in this course, explain how the study of Art History can help someone better understand different cultures. Please include an example of how your own understanding of a different culture changed.

Answer

Art occupies a great place in the consciousness of every culture and it has a significant effect on the individual’s understanding of life and wellbeing. Great artworks give us joy, provoke thought, calibrate emotions, and inspire us to be better. That’s why it is hard to give an exact definition of art (The School of Life, 2015), as it is dynamic and the same artwork can convey different meanings to different people, or even to the same person at different times.

Art History studies the art forms from ancient times to the present day, and the journey that the art took until it reached its contemporary state (Courtauld, 2022). Studying art history is a deep dive into the cultural, social, and political history of cultures as art is always a reflection of the contemporary environment. By studying art history, we can understand the values, beliefs, and traditions of different cultures, and how they have evolved over time. This enriches our awareness and appreciation of the human experience and its diversity, expanding our horizons and making us more knowledgeable and empathetic individuals.

In the Bronze Age, art was used to glorify the gods and rulers as they sponsored artists to create and immortalize their images. In ancient Greece, art was used to celebrate the human form and to explore the ideals of beauty and harmony. Ancient Rome followed Greek art but added a touch of realism. In the Middle Ages, art was sponsored by the church and used to educate about the Christian faith; this led to the Renaissance, where artists wanted to go back to the classical standards and remove the restrictions that the church had imposed on art.

Later many art movements like Baroque, Rococo, Neoclassicism, Romanticism, Realism, Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, Modernism, and Postmodernism emerged, each with its own unique style, philosophy, and reasons for existence; until we reached contemporary art, where artists pushed towards no patronage and doing the art for the sake of art itself generating a style that is a mix of all the previous styles and is characterized by its diversity and freedom of expression.

Prior to studying art history through this course; I had zero knowledge about art, its history, or its significance. I did my first degree in a country where art is not taught properly. I can now understand art movements in their historical contexts and why a certain style emerged at a certain time. I can now understand how magnificent the artworks of the past are and appreciate the effort that was put into them. I can now look at an artwork and maybe determine the style and the historical context in which it was created. I did not appreciate contemporary art before as I saw it as not beautiful, but now I can reason the way it heaves and read it differently.

One particular example that struck me was the Pantheon of Rome. I knew about it for the first time in this course and it was a great example of an artifact that combines the architecture of the building and the art that is used to decorate the inside. I was also amazed by how many buildings in the world today resemble that building and I decided to visit it one day to see it in person.

References

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