1.Prehistoric Art: Stone age art provides clues about the most basic
elements of human culture at the very dawn of civilization.
2.Upper or Late Paleolithic: 25,000 - 15,000 B.C.
3.The Panaramitee Petroglypher: 43,000 B.C. Aboriginal abstractions
from South Australia.
4.The Venus of Willendorf carver: 30,000 - 25,000 B.C. 4.5 inch tall
carved limestone figure, found in Austria. A fertility figure.
5.The Lascaux cave painter: 15,000 - 10,000 B.C. Naturalistic pictures of
bulls, horses, mammoths, lions and other animals painted in deep
underground caves on wet limestone walls with powerderd mineral
pigments.
6.The Stonehenge builder: 2100-2000 B.C. Architecture consisting of
huge blue stone megaliths from Wales to Salisbury Plain in England.
Considered the mysteri- ous celestial calendar that mark the summer
and winter Solstice.
7.The Ancient World: Early civilizations developed an art of elegance
and com- plexity.
Mesopotamia, 4000 B.C.
Egypt, 3000-330 B.C.
Greece, 1200-200 B.C.
Rome, 700 B.C. - A.D. 500
8.Mesopotamia, 4000 B.C.: God-kings, bearded bulls and ziggurats (giant
,stepped pyramids) in the cradle of civilization between the Tigris and
the Euphrates rivers.
9.Egypt, 3000-330 B.C.: Pharaohs, pyramids and pictograms. Costume
jewelry around 1600 B.C. real gems were replaced with paste and
cast-glass imitation.
10.Relief of Itwesh, 2475-2345 B.C.: Egyptian. A small limestone relief
only 16 inches high. Carved relief words are juxtaposed with a
surprisingly realistic profile of an Egyptian man, seeming to speak
these words as in a cartoon bubble.
11.Egyptian Man: Static, symmetrical figures painted in flat colors, with
the head and legs in profile and the torso that faces front.
12.Greece, 1200-200 B.C.: Samples, statues, paintings and pots by art's
first Egoist, who set the standards of excellence that are the basis of
all Western art, not to mention bank facades everywhere.
13.Cyclades - Bronze Age 2500 B.C.: Cyclades mean those in a circle is a
Ring of Islands between the Greek Mainland and Asia Minor.
These artisans used white marble to carve highly stylized statuettes of
skinny nude women with crossed arms.
Herring Bone design- 3000 B.C. - incised on Clay jars.
14.Birthplace of Western Civilization: 900 B.C. - Greek culture, also the
birth- place of individual freedom.
15.Greek Vases: Decorated with geometric patterns, zigzags, meanders,
chevrons, checkerboards, diamonds and rosettes.
16.Kouroi - singular is Kouros: Archaic Greek, Standing Youth. Large
carved figures of naked young men, made to mark a grave or to
, honor a God. Stiff but strikingly realistic depictions of living men.
17.Korai - singular Kore: Female statues often draped and depicted with
elaborate braided hairdos.
18.Aristotle - Greek Philosopher: Father of all Art Critics. Invented
Aesthetics, a branch of philosophy dealing with questions of beauty and
art.
19.Aristotle's Esthetics: Art is an imitation of reality, art holds a mirror up
to nature. Beauty is an objective quality of a thing, not a subjective
response of the viewer. Art should strive for unity of forms, without
confusion or digressions.
20.Aristotle's Esthetics continued...: The goal of Art is to represent the
inner significance of things, not just their outward appearance.
The function of art is catharsis, the purification of antisocial emotions and
destructive impulses forbidden by society.
Art appeals to the intellect as well as to feelings, which if properly
combined can give the highest form of pleasure.
21.Classical Greece: Runs from the fifth century B.C. to the death of
Alexander the Great in 323 B.C. Widespread mastery of Anatomy,
spatial illusion and naturalism in art, focusing on the depiction of the
human body.
22.Polyklietos: Sculptor. Famous for bronze statue Doryphoros, 440
B.C. Spear Bearer & The Cannon of proportions. Contrapposto,
classical relaxed stance that puts the body's weight on one leg, as in
Michelangelo's David.
23.Polygnotus: First great master of Greek painting, Athens 480 B.C. .