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Visual Art requires the individual studying art to use his or her creative and critical thinking skills to interpret what the artist of the works of art he or she is studying is relaying through the art form. Visual Art encompasses a large body of art forms broken into two categories, Fine Arts and Contemporary Arts. Under the umbrella of fine arts includes printmaking drawing, painting, and “sculpture, along with associated activities like graphic art, manuscript illumination, book illustration, calligraphy and architecture” (Encyclopedia of Art Education, 2014).

Contemporary Arts include a number of modern art forms, such as: Mixed-media, Conceptual Art, Installation, Happenings and Performance art, along with film-based disciplines such as Photography, Video Art and Animation, or any combination thereof. This group of activities also includes high tech disciplines like computer graphics and giclee prints. Another modern visual art, is the new environmental or Land art, which also includes transitory forms like ice/snow sculpture, and (presumably) graffiti art. Another set of changes in our classification and appreciation of art began to unfold during the early decades of the 20th century. This was due to the emergence of several new art-forms, such as: collage (from Picasso & Braque's synthetic Cubism c.1912); assemblage and "found objects" (like the "ready-mades" of Marcel Duchamp, 1887-1968); conceptual art (from Marcel Duchamp's works such as Fountain, 1917, Replica, Tate Collection, London); Performance art and Happenings (from the Dada antics of Tristan Tzara (1896-1963) at the Cabaret Voltaire, Zurich, c.1916-20); photomontage (from works by Dadaists like Raoul Hausmann and Kurt Schwitters, which used illustrations and advertisement clippings, c.1918-20); photography and video art (from pioneering work by Man Ray (1890–1976) and others); animation art (from early 20th century works by American animators J. Stuart Blackton, Emile Cohl, Winsor McCay and Walt Disney). New techniques also http://christojeanneclaude.net/projects/the-gates#.U7rwHlJOW00 appeared in traditional fine art disciplines, like painting - with the invention of acrylic paints, used by David Hockney (b.1937) and others - and printmaking - with the introduction of silkscreen printing, famously used by Andy Warhol (1928-87); and with giclee prints (Encyclopedia of Art Education, 2014).

Visual Art Verses Creative Expression Visual Art allows the artist to express his or herself through stationary forms of art as stated above such as printmaking drawing, painting, and “sculpture, along with associated activities like graphic art, manuscript illumination, book illustration, calligraphy and architecture” (Encyclopedia of Art Education, 2014). Creative expression allows the artist to be more mobile so to speak through arts such as drama, music, dance, and more recent as seen in art galleries around the world live art; the process in which an individual poses in an art gallery depicting varies theatrical displays of art using his or hers own body.

Historical, Social, and Aesthetic Values and Eras in Visual Art Visual art comes from a variety of cultural and social experiences that contribute to artists’ creation.

There are three values that serve somewhat as subcategories in order to differentiate between different works of art: historical values, social values, and aesthetic values. The three values when associated with different eras in time demonstrate an enormous influence within the art community. With its many different forms, modern art has been influenced by these values (hubpages, 2014).

According to (merriam-webster dictionary, 2014) Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste and with the creation and appreciation of beauty. Artists use aesthetics to tap into the audience’s emotional values. Different cultures aesthetically create their work of art through their cultural values, which derives from their historical values or social values. When artists implement social values into their pieces, the piece conveys emotions directly motivated by society and social interactions. According to Stanford University (2012), “Definitions of art, consequently, spuriously confer ontological dignity and respectability on social phenomena that probably in fact call more properly for rigorous social criticism and change” (Traditional Definitions). Art impacts society in a big way by being everywhere. Modern day art is on the computer, the television, and the streets. The Sweet Briar College (2010) website sheds light on the fact that “graphic design is just as much influenced by social and cultural factors as fine art, but perhaps in a more noticeable way” (para. 21). Other than technology, the arts’ enormous influence has rarely changed in comparison to the past. Historical values can be defined and comparable to cultural values. Many works of art are influenced by culture, not necessarily the artist’s direct culture. The artist could pay tribute or respect to another culture. Visual Culture is defined within the study of art history, as a focus on cultural meaning of a work of art, rather than on its aesthetic value. When a piece surrounds the significance of the aesthetic value, the artist portrays the philosophical beauty or the emotional connection to the piece. When a piece attempts to convey the historical value, the artist portrays the culture or history of a specific era. There is a large cultural influence involved with visual art (hubpages, 2014).

Interpretation of Visual Arts as a Cultural Value According to (Sayre, 2010) February 12, 2005, an artist couple draped 843-acres of New York City’s Central Park, in 7,503 saffron-colored fabric panels; the art installation was called The Gates. This work of art was interpreted quit differently from many critics here in America and across seas. Viewers from Japan saw it in a different light. For them, it echoed the famous Fushimi Inari Shrine in Kyoto (Fig. 3); dedicated to the Shinto god of rice, where more than 10,000 orange and black torii gates line 4 kilometers of mountain trails. The similarity between the two structures suggested an important environmental message to Japanese audiences. They saw The Gates, especially in its commitment to recycling and its support of the environmental organization, as a commentary on the refusal of the United States to ratify the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement designed to lower the overall emissions of six greenhouse gases that are believed to be a factor in global warming. If the experience of The Gates project was undoubtedly different for its Japanese and American viewers, both groups nevertheless asked themselves the same questions. What is the purpose of this work of art? For many people, the main purpose of art is to satisfy our aesthetic sense, our desire to see and experience the beautiful. Many of Pablo Picasso’s representations of women in the late 1920s and early 1930s are almost demonic in character. Most biographers believe images such as his Seated Bather by the Sea (Fig. 11) to be portraits of his wife, the Russian ballerina Olga Koklova, whom he married in 1918. By the late 1920s, their marriage was in shambles, and Picasso portrays her here as a skeletal horror, her back and buttocks almost crustacean in appearance, her horizontal mouth looking like some archaic mandible. Her pose is ironic, inspired by classical representations of the nude, and the sea behind her is as empty as the Mediterranean sky is gray. Picasso means nothing in this painting to be pleasing, except our recognition of his extraordinary ability to invent expressive images of tension (Sayre, 2010).

Ultimately art is left open to interpretation. Here at the University of Phoenix it is our hope that through Arts/230 Survey of the Visual Arts the student leaves with a clear detailed definition and appreciation of visual arts.