Human form.
The human form has long been a popular choice of subject matter for artists, but in the last hundred and fifty years the way artist approach the human form has changed dramatically. No longer bound to traditional academics, artist around the turn of the century began representing people in a whole new way. Instead of the idealized forms of classic Greek the new art styles tried to show people how they truly were. Now this is not completely new, works such as Da Vinci’s Grotesque series did much the same thing. The difference came in how the subject was represented. Thanks to new art movements such as impressionism artist now painted people in ways that conveyed not only how the person looked but how they felt. With bold uses of color and gnarled ragged line work artist could show dispositions, pain, heartache and despair.
The choice of what to depict also changed. Artist no longer limited themselves to the reclining beauty, they were now free to draw or paint whoever they wanted. This opened a door for such things as the woman’s rights movement who began showing women in new lights. By doing so this forced society to reevaluate the way they viewed certain groups of people.
With so many doors open to the modern artist a layman might think that the artist of today have it easy. Here they would be wrong. With so many outlets explored the budding artists of today find themselves in dire straits. Within all the movements there are genres and subgenres, there are styles and categories never thought of in generations past, there are crossover styles and mediums the question that is posed to artists of today is not what can I do but how best to do it while maintaining that since of me? There are new restrictions in a PC world that were unknown to the artists of the past putting new strains and social boundaries whom most dear not pass. We speak of freedoms allotted to artist of today by those who suffered before but once more we find ourselves in much the same situation. Once more oppressed by governing bodies, once more confined by style and movements, where do we go from here? The simple and superficial answer is wherever we want; the deeper and more ominous one is nowhere.
How did I get to this subject from the one of human form? Simple, take possible the first and defiantly most represented subject matter in art and study it; when you have done so you will have a core sample of art throughout time, with all of its movements, styles, mediums and indeed restrictions and breakthroughs. When you have done so you will see that a pattern emerges. It starts with freedom, at first there were no rules. Then restrictions, limitations by mediums or lack thereof. Then freedom once more, through new mediums such as marble and pigments. New restrictions, by knowledge of point of view, the human makeup and other sciences. Freedom through knowledge, restrictions by the church/by academics. Freedom from the church, restriction by governments. Freedom from governments, restrictions by social standards/explosion of styles and movements/development of technology and questions about what is art and if it even still exists. When all is said and done we find ourselves in much the same place those artists of the 1880 did. Restricted from all corners, with no real answers of where to go and the future of art and even its very existence in the balance.
This may seem off subject but it was the train of thought that I had during class yesterday.
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