Art history

Ancient art

3000 BCE

The ancient art era was the first time that art was pursued at leisure. Because of the newfound stability that agricultural practices found in societies, like Mesopotamia and Egypt, people were able to pursue their interests more freely. This birthed the ancient art era, truly the beginning of art as we know it today.

The Warka Vase

3000 BCE

This is one of the earliest examples of pottery, coming from the Uruk civilization, and depicting a sort of hierarchal system. The more important figures, people “higher up” in society, were sculpted into the vase larger in proportion to the less important figures. This was important to art history because it represents the start of a common theme throughout art history: story telling.

Medieval art

500

The overall idea of medieval art was to portray biblical scenes for the Catholic Church. This was very important at the time because there was a high rate of illiteracy, so the depiction of scenes from the Bible allowed people to somewhat understand the scriptures, even if they couldn’t read them.

Gothic art

1100

The Gothic era was a Middle Age architectural and artistic era that depicted a slight veer from purely Christian themes in art, The Gothic era featured more historical paintings than Medieval art had. This era was a very important era because of its importance to ideas born away from religion. However, some of the most memorable pieces from this time came were made with religion in mind, like the Duomo di Milano in Italy.

The Norte Dame

1163

This is one of the oldest cathedrals in Western Gothic history. This cathedral represents the start of the gothic architectural style, so it is extremely important to the development of western art culture.

Humanism

1200

Humanism was a philosophical movement that emphasized the importance of human beings and their individuality. This was depicted in the art of the time through showing more emotion in expressions and focusing on the most human parts of people. Humanism was wildly important to the Renaissance because it supported the idea that humans could find meaning in life outside of things like organized religion.

Renaissance art

1300

The Renaissance was the rebirth of classical ideas. Paintings and sculptures were made with Greco-Roman traditions in mind, and European ideas at heart. Renaissance art isn’t just important in that it illustrated a combination of the old and new, but in the fact that it had a major impact on Renaissance society. It even inadvertently caused the Protestant Reformation.

The Mourning of Christ

1305

This painting, and many others of this kind, perfectly represent medieval art as a whole. It depicts a famous biblical scene, and it portrays holy figures as righteous by illuminating the crowns of their heads. These kinds of paintings were extremely important to the medieval art movement and overall art history because it pushed the importance of Christianity and the divinity of Christ.

The Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore

1434

This was an extremely important contribution to the Renaissance because of its impact on architecture and engineering. Because of this construction project, mostly lead by Filippo Brunelleschi, the math is available to create aesthetically pleasing, artistic buildings like this one.

The Last Supper

1495

The Last Supper is one of the most recognizable paintings from the Renaissance period. It showcases a lot of the main themes of the Renaissance, even including humanism. The painting depicts the famous bible scene, Jesus and his disciples at Jesus’s last supper before his crucifixion. This painting is important to the Renaissance art period because it represents most of the themes that were brought to that time.