Why do very old arts (paintings, sculptures) look pretty inaccurate and abstract?
Upvote:2
You are expressing a very strange minority opinion. So the question is really not "why old art...", but "why do you think so...".
People who have seen ancient and pre-historic art are usually very much impressed and rate many things on the highest level. For example, Pablo Picasso, after he was shown the paintings in Altamira cave said: "We have invented nothing new"!
Does this really look "pretty bad and inaccurate" to you:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cucutenimalefigure.JPG
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:GanditorulDinTarpestiCucuteniCultura.JPG
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus_of_Brassempouy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:UrukHead.jpg
http://artdiscovery.info/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/IMG_1499.jpg
https://www.donsmaps.com/images28/lionsendchamber.jpg
https://www.donsmaps.com/images26/chauvetbison.jpg
Then I think you have some minority view. At least I share the Picasso opinion: there is no such thing as "progress" in art, unlike in science and some other areas of human activity.
Upvote:3
Henri Matisse, the great French artist said "Exactitude is not truth".
An accurate and precise representation of something may not convey the meaning that the artist intended. For example the size of a human figure in ancient Egyptian pictures was meant to represent their importance in society, not their physical size. Anyone back then could 'read' the picture and know who were the big shots and who were the slaves. When a caveman drew an antelope on a wall he may have been trying to convey how fast they moved, to emphasise the parts that made the best eating, or the excitement of the hunt, rather than show the exact proportions and details of the beast. Art has always been about feelings, emotions and meaning, not precision.
The Venus of Willendorf is not meant to protray a particular woman, it is probably a symbol of fecundity. To give it a face would give it a specific identity as an individual, but it is meant to stand as a symbol of fertility in general. It ws deliberately created to look like it does for very good reasons.
We all, now, look at all art through twenty first century eyes. We can't see them in the same way their makers or their intended audience saw them, to them. When we look at a painting by Titian in the 15th century, we miss the references and allusions that were obvious to people in Venice back then, in the same way that people in a hundred years won't be aware of some of the things we take for granted now.
More post
- 📝 What is a medieval symbol for money/trade/banking?
- 📝 Why did the Soviet Union name their strongest bomb Tsar Bomba?
- 📝 Were the "Petlurovites" who took Kiev in 1918 commanded by a communist?
- 📝 Nazi Germany - Income of low-wage workers, and prices of food and other items?
- 📝 Why were so few Koreans enlisted in the Japanese Army before conscription was introduced in 1944?
- 📝 If the Ch’in dynasty was so short-lived, why was China named for it?
- 📝 Death of a Jane or John doe
- 📝 A Principality within England
- 📝 Why was France's birth rate low from 1800 to WWII?
- 📝 In the Medieval period, how long would an average swordsmith need to forge an average sword?
- 📝 In the 19th century, what brought on a general election in the United Kingdom?
- 📝 Whereabouts of the ancient Korean cannon in Kamchatka
- 📝 How did old international loans work?
- 📝 What percentage of relocated Armenians died?
- 📝 What did the CIA think about the partition of Pakistan in 1971?
- 📝 Popularity of knight-robbery in the 15th century in Germany, Poland and Silesia
- 📝 How does the "conspiracy theory" work in China and for what purpose?
- 📝 Did the Truman Doctrine contribute to the Cuban Missile Crisis?
- 📝 Did Roman citizens vote in more than one legislative assembly?
- 📝 Who of the British military had access to the ULTRA messages of the Enigma in September 1944?
- 📝 When during their construction did Bible-era Jewish temples become "holy"?
- 📝 Were any other members of the Kennedy (Political) family affected by Addison's disease?
- 📝 What was considered an epoch by the Phoenicians?
- 📝 How is fact checking and referencing done in historical studies?
- 📝 What was the summer uniform of the streltsy?
- 📝 Why was it Italy that attack ed Tripoli under Ottoman control in 1911?
- 📝 Did the Romans have writing desks?
- 📝 Did Industrial Revolution economic systems rely on colonies?
- 📝 Why were fragments of the Mongol empire named after colors?
- 📝 How did Nazi concentration camp staff deal with survivors of gassings?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 Why do very old arts (paintings, sculptures) look pretty inaccurate and abstract?
- 📝 Why were old fortifications shaped like stars and not like circles?
- 📝 Why were the drawings of Colossus burnt after WW2 and why was its very existence "of course" kept secret?
- 📝 Why did really old paintings use such bizarre, unnatural perspective/proportions?
- 📝 Why are there no photorealistic paintings from the old days?
- 📝 Why do we find a large number of nude male characters in ancient Greek paintings and sculptures?
- 📝 How old was Murasaki Shikibu when she married her second cousin? And why did she marry him?
- 📝 Why so many old remains of different animals and almost no remains of humans
- 📝 Why did Al Smith win six "Dixiecrat" states, and very little else?
- 📝 Why do the British Queen's Guard and the Danish Royal Guard Company look so similar?
- 📝 Why China was able to unify and not Europe?
- 📝 Why does the United States keep using "old" date representations and imperial system, while being in the minority?
- 📝 Why is the consensus that WW2 started on September 1, 1939 and not July 7, 1937?
- 📝 Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?
- 📝 Why exactly did telegraphs have to use "STOP" instead of a period and "QUOTE" instead of a quotation mark? (Or special codes.)
- 📝 Why didn't France and the UK invade Germany in September 1939?
- 📝 Why Were Madagascar and New Zealand Discovered So Late?
- 📝 Why are the German and French languages so different?
- 📝 Why did Britain and France not declare war against the Soviet Union when it invaded Poland in WW2?
- 📝 Why did LBJ, a staunch segregationist, champion and sign the 1964 Civil Rights Bill?
- 📝 Why didn't the US and USSR jam each other's early-warning radar?
- 📝 Why were Spain and Portugal neutral / not invaded in WWII?
- 📝 If the Union Jack joins the flag of England and Scotland, why does it have a different shade of blue than the Scottish flag?
- 📝 Why is AD in Latin and BC is in English?
- 📝 Why did Greeks and Romans dilute their wine?
- 📝 Why were helmets and other body armour not commonplace in the 1800s?
- 📝 When and why did having long hair become associated with women, and short hair with men?
- 📝 Why did Bayer lose aspirin and heroin trademarks under the 1919 Treaty of Versailles?
- 📝 When and why did garum disappear?
- 📝 Why did only the English adopt, evolve and use the longbow en masse in war?