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Clive Bell’s Theory of Significant Form emphasizes a core idea, what makes an artwork valuable is its ability to produce an aesthetic experience. The term was coined by art critic Clive Bell in 1914 to describe the idea that the form of an artwork or forms within an artwork can be expressive, even if largely or completely divorced from a recognizable reality. (Tate) The significant form and success of the artwork can capture the audience’s emotions through its realism, its narrative, and through symbolism. While observing art across many cultural contexts the audience understands that art is deeply intertwined with social significance, religious ceremony, and function. Before the birth of western modern art and the impressionist movement, “high art” was formally attached to an emphasis on a naturalistic representation. Artists such as Cézanne broke away from this formality through the deliberate organization of form, color, and composition over a strict emphasis on realism. In Cynthia ...

Dewey’s philosophy of Art As Experience (1934) describes the idea as a “rhythm of intake and outtake". He writes that an aesthetic experience should involve a certain quality of unity and wholeness that occurs before reflection. He believed that if the audience encountered a unified and dynamic experience during their engagement, followed by an impression or reflection the full experience or rhythm would be complete. For example, while walking among Japanese gardens, or becoming engrossed in the symphony an aesthetic experience becomes art. This intake of a unified experience prompts an outtake of response and reflection creating a whole rhythm. Dewey’s idea extends beyond the gallery and the viewer and affects the artist in a similar rhythm as they create and merge experience, ideas, and emotions with art through the intake and outtake of the creative process. Dewey’s core concept of experience defines art as being that is more than the final product for the artist and the audien...

Plato’s restrictive arguments on art are motivated by a conservatively pragmatic view on governing a democracy. In his criticisms he examines the riskiness of art that encourages diverse human expression and the repercussions that may ensue socially and politically, threatening an ideal government. Plato warned that the imitation of nature, the human experience is only copied and that the greater concern lies in the passion and empowering nature of art capable of perverting the mind and altering a sense of reality. Plato believed that art should only be identified in the realm of a craft or a skilled discipline that serves a necessary purpose such as historical documentation. Looking back at ancient art, the Lascaux cave painters did not consider themselves artists as did many others since they didn’t rely on making a statement and rather used art to observe and represent their surroundings. Aristotle suggests that tragedy and catharsis aid the representation of emotions and expression...

The art critic, Arthur Danto in Vol. 61 of The Journal of Philosophy, “The Art World” (1964)  draws upon Socrates' theory on art as a mirror held up to nature, “reflecting what we can already see, so art, insofar mirrorlike, yields idle accurate duplications of the appearances of things, and is of no cognitive benefit whatever.” Danto’s observations on the philosophy of art “requires something that the eye cannot decry—an atmosphere of artistic theory, a knowledge of the history of art: an art world.” (Danto 1964).    Brillo Box, (Pop Art) 1964 Andy Warhol blurred the lines between commercial art and fine art, his famous work, “Brillo Box (1964) displays facsimiles of the logo for Brillo Pad cartons, stacked neatly in a tower, four boxes high. The bold red and blue block letters in a playful and cartoon-like font replicate the colors of the American flag and evoke a sentiment of bucolic suburban life, the routine of household chores, and a snapshot of American domesticit...

Birth, 2007 Catharsis in art is all around us, from the purpose and the need to make the art to the intention of releasing the emotional burden within the artist. To understand and observe catharsis in art is to understand the emotional power of art. Many artists hope to transcend their surge of emotions by revealing them through raw depictions of ugliness, absurdity, human suffering, and rage against social or political injustice. These portrayals can facilitate self-reflection and empathy and cause the viewer to examine their own pain, fears, perspective, or lack of expression.  Spider, 1996 French American modern and contemporary artist, Louise Bourgeois (1911-2010) is sometimes known as a reluctant hero in feminist art. She referred to herself as a feminist and an artist rather than a female artist. Her most famous works are her installations of her large-scale bronze spider. (1996)  They were made to symbolize the qualities she admired about her mother; her strength, vuln...

Banksy's  Untitled (LA, 2011) Goya's Saturn , 1820-23 Shock and controversy can be powerful tools in art, encouraging a more profound sense of audience engagement by challenging and pushing boundaries. The Aesthetic value of beauty and taste in art is part of the evolution of art history and the climate or culture they amplify. Traditional notions of taste and beauty standards hold boundaries repeatedly broken under novelty. The shock and controversy factor should align with a larger aesthetic concept to reveal a cultural moment. Standards of taste and aesthetic value seem unnecessary, lose their value, or go astray when disconnected from a greater purpose or utilized simply for shock value. Classical art movements, such as the 18th-century Reformation and its Romanticism style of painting, convey a more extreme range of emotions within the human experience. Goya's Romanticism is similar to the Orientalism movement, which was used to fetishize ot...

  Milkscapes 2016, Aimee Koran Breast milk on mylar,  (Inkjets on paper and fabric) Semen and Blood III. 1990. Andres Serrano Blood and bodily fluids have been used with significance throughout ancient art to depict and illustrate scenes of violence and rituals of sacrifice. The Lascaux cave paintings are some of the earliest known examples of human creativity and were created with blood. Artists have used bodily fluids as a medium to represent a primal understanding of survival, belonging, and expression. Artists have used other media to symbolize bodily fluids and provoke emotions for shock value within human society. As intriguing to the audience as using human fluids can be, over time, blood has lost some of its sacred quality, where mass media has made entertainment out of images of sex and violence. In the 20th century, contemporary artists have used bodily fluids to protest violence and to raise awareness about diseases such as the HIV/Aids epidemic. The use of blood ha...

     Shigeko Kubota,  Vagina Painting , 1965 Kant discusses aesthetics with his critique of aesthetic judgment. “Kant’s usage, is a judgment which is based on feeling, and in particular on the feeling of pleasure or displeasure.” (Ginsborg 2022) His philosophy categorizes art as beautiful, what is sublime, or what is made under the headings of fine art, beautiful art, and genius art. Hume addresses that Taste “summarizes the finer emotions of the mind” and that not everyone has the capacity, interest, or connection to art and is willing to observe these finer emotions of the mind. Shigeko Kubota’s “Vagina Painting” (1965) utilizes performance art in a demonstrative painting style as she crouched over a sheet of paper with a paintbrush handle attached to her underwear and used red smears of paint representing menstrual blood. At the time, art critics in Japan were dismissive of female artists and the avant-garde art movement. Something like p...