Explain the Christian Identity as Revealed in Art Architecture and Music?

Chapter 8: Fine art and Identity

Peggy Blood and Pamela J. Sachant

8.1 LEARNING OUTCOMES

After completing this chapter, y'all should be able to:

• Name and categorize ways that artists explore the concept of identity

• Understand how art serves equally a commentary on society

• Clarify how politics and societal concerns may influence art

• Understand how art expresses individual and group identity

• Sympathise how art preserves national culture and personal identity

8.2 INTRODUCTION

One of the more important themes emerging from the last century has been the private'due south search for identity. For case, genealogical websites have proliferated and special television set programs are devoted to the subject. Since it first aired on PBS in 2012, Henry Louis Gates Jr.'s Finding Your Roots has been a popular program. The British version, The Guardian , has been successful since 2006.

Some anthropologists suggest that the deep-rooted interest in identity or ancestry is partly shaped by evolutionary forces dating back to early on humans supporting each other in extended family groups. Anthropologist Dwight Read theorizes that the Neolithic people were the beginning to understand the concept of the family tree and the perception of cocky in a family unit and in society. ¹ If connected through blood, people have the tendency to be more than willing to care for each other; a mutual involvement and support arrangement is readily realized inside a clan or a group.

Early on humans created twoand 3-dimensional likenesses of themselves in their environs to help understand who they were in relation to the other members of their group. Contemporary humans do the same; they make records of themselves with family members, most normally in photographs and Selfies, and on Instagram. It is the same central concept and placement in an environment that collectively identifies who we are in society, for example, in social gatherings, organizations, and religious settings. This means, higher up all, that we must place ourselves within the world in order to obtain identity. Children search for their identity at a very young age past observing and recognizing their parents and family members. Their markings inside a simple drawing of cocky and family—similar to those of early humans—help them to vindicate and confirm who they are and how they are perceived by their family unit group.

Like children, artists sometimes explore their identity through self-portraits and symbolically in works of art that relate to ancestry or culture. Doing and so allows them to have a look inside their core and see how they fit inside their contemporary culture; this investigation of self plays an important role in how artists empathize their environment and the earth.

Vincent van Gogh is known as a person who spent much of his time in solitude. He painted more than thirty self-portraits between the years 1886 and 1889, placing him among the most prolific cocky-portraitists of all fourth dimension. Indeed, some of his most respected works are his self-portraits that trace his epitome throughout the last years of his life, the most crucial to his career. (Figures viii.1, 8.2, and 8.3) While Van Gogh used the report of his ain image to help develop his skills every bit an artist, these self-portraits also give u.s.a. insights into the artist'due south life and well being, how he fit in lodge, and his place among the groups with whom he associated.

Effigy eight.i | Self-Portrait with Straw Hat

Artist: Vincent van Gogh

Author: Met Museum

Source: Wikimedia Eatables

License: Public Domain

Figure 8.2 | Self-portrait as a painter

Artist: Vincent van Gogh

Author: Spider web Museum

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

Figure viii.three | Self-portrait with a bandaged ear

Artist: Vincent van Gogh

Author: The Courtland Institute of Art

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

Like Van Gogh, Pablo Picasso painted a number of self-portraits. Throughout his career, Picasso painted various likenesses that reflected changes in himself, his fashion, his artistic development, besides as in his life way and behavior—all of which may be viewed closely from the content of his paintings. (Figures 8.4 and 8.v) The starting time self-portrait, painted in 1901 while he was establishing himself as an creative person in Paris, France, and still spending time in Barcelona, Spain, reflects the somber mode and tones of his Bluish Period (1901-1904). The second, dated to 1906, at the very end of his Rose Menses (1904-1906), Picasso depicts himself every bit the artist who by that time was moving in artistic circles, gaining respect, and acquiring patrons.

Figure 8.4 | Self-portrait

Artist: Pablo Picasso

Source: WikiArt

License: Public Domain

Figure 8.five | Cocky-portrait

Creative person: Pablo Picasso

Source: WikiArt

License: Public Domain

Frida Kahlo (1907-1954, Mexico) used the iconography of her Mexican heritage to pigment herself and the pain that had go an integral part of her life post-obit a bus blow at the age of 18 in which she suffered numerous injuries. She identified as a group member of her country, with Mexican culture and beginnings, and as belonging to the female gender. Kahlo'due south self-portraits are dramatic, encarmine, brutal, and at times overtly political. ( Self-Portrait , Frida Kahlo ) In seeking her roots, she voiced business for her country every bit it struggled for an independent cultural identity. She spoke to her land and people through her art. Kahlo's art was inspired by her public beliefs and personal sufferings; she wanted her fine art to speak from her consciousness.

Although cocky-portraits of today may be slightly different from those of earlier decades, they still depict self-exploration and identity through club and groups that communicate who we are. Cai Guo-Qiang (b. 1958, Red china, lives U.s.a.) exploded small-scale charges of gunpowder to create an image of himself. ( SelfPortrait: A Subjugated Soul , Cai Guo-Qiang ) Different from those by Van Gogh, Picasso, and Kahlo, Cai's self-portrait does not have any likeness or resemblance to his personal features, only information technology too sends a message about our society and how Cai relates to it. For example, the artist associates the lack of identifying data, rendering him bearding, with contemporary society, and the fired gunpowder with both anarchy and transformation.

Despite the altitude in time that separates early and modern humans, the search for their place in gild and who they are remains of fascination and a mystery to all humans regardless of their time in history.

eight.3 INDIVIDUAL VS CULTURAL GROUPS

Often when 1 thinks of an artist, the image is of someone doing solitary work in a studio. During the Romantic period of the late eighteenth century until around 1850, artists, writers, and composers were associated with individualism and with working lone; this trend connected to develop up until recent times. The Romantic period valued and celebrated private originality with musical and literary geniuses such Ludwig van Beethoven, Frédéric Chopin, Robert Schumann, John Keats, Edgar Allen Poe, and Mary Shelley. The visual arts boasted such geniuses as Francisco Goya, Eugène Delacroix, William Blake (1757-1827, England), and Antoine-Jean Gros (17711835, France). (Figures 8.6 and 8.7) Artists of the period exemplified the Romantic values of the expression of the artists' feelings, personal imagination, and creative experimentation every bit opposed to accepting tradition or popular mass opinion. Artists in the period broke traditional rules; indeed, they considered information technology desirable to break the rules and overthrow tradition.

Figure 8.6 | Oberon, Titania and Puck with Fairies Dancing

Artist: William Blake

Writer: Tate Uk

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

Effigy 8.7 | The Boxing of Abukir, 25 July 1799

Creative person: Antoine-Jean Gros

Author: User "DcoetzeeBot"

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

From the Medieval to the Baroque periods, all the same, artists worked together in workshops and guilds, and schools were formed that stressed the importance of preserving heritage and history through rigorous and systematic creative training. Large-calibration commissions ofttimes required numerous hands to complete a work, emphasizing collaboration. Nevertheless, the artwork was expected to take a consistent style and quality of craftsmanship. To satisfy those various needs, artists often specialized in a particular type of subject matter. For case, Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640, Germany, lived Flanders) and Jan Brueghel the Elderberry (1568-1625, Flemish region) collaborated on more than 20 paintings over twenty-five years. (Effigy 8.8) In their Madonna in a Garland of Roses , Rubens'southward celebrated skill as a figurative painter tin can be seen in the serenely glowing confront of the Virgin Mary and energetic cavorting of the cherubs surrounding the round arrangement of flowers painted with accuracy and delicacy by Brueghel, who was known for his lively nature scenes.

Figure eight.eight | Madonna in a Garland of Flowers

Artist: Peter Paul Rubens and Jan Brueghel the Elder

Author: The Bridgeman Art Library

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

A recent study by a Yale Academy researcher found the perception of loftier quality fine art today is that information technology is produced by a single private. If produced by two or iii people, as in a landscape or public work projects, the value of the art drops. For creative works, perceptions of quality therefore appear to be based on perceptions of private, rather than full effort. All the same, a new trend across the world in full general suggests that this tradition, which first arose in the Westward during the Renaissance, is non the norm around the globe; that is, the value of fine art as located in the single artist who produces art individually and alone may be more than specifically based in sure cultures. Artists in the twenty-first century are collaborating with others through social media and/or face-to-face encounters. It is interesting to call up that the discussion "art" derives from a root that means to "join" or fit together. A whole constellation of ideas and practices tin can be accomplished through networking and collaboration as artists participate in group residencies and apprenticeships like to workshop traditions of centuries agone to acquire the customary methods and advanced techniques of their art.

8.3.1 Nation

The Kingdom of Benin, located in the southern region of modern Nigeria and habitation to the Edo people, was ruled by a succession of obas , or divine kings. It grew from a city-state into an empire during the reign of Oba Ewuare the Great (r. 1440-1473). From 1440, obas ruled the kingdom until it was taken over by the British in 1897. Remarkably, the obas and people of Benin remained in control of their trading relations with Europeans and without interference from the rulers of the nations they traded with until the 2nd half of the nineteenth century, prior to strange dominion. The city of Benin prospered and grew through trade with the Portuguese, Dutch, and British.

One of the benefits of dealing with merchants-sailors who traveled the seas was the variety of appurtenances they brought with them and were eager to merchandise for foodstuff grown or refined past the Edo people. In particular, the Edo treasured contumely and coral, along with the ivory they acquired through elephant hunts. Those materials were reserved for the oba and his court, and were used in abundance in the wide assortment of formalism and sacred objects created under each ruler. Kingship was passed from begetter to firstborn son, and, upon ascending to the throne, the new oba was expected to create an altar made of brass for his male parent, every bit well as 1 for his mother, generally in ivory, if she had attained the status of queen mother. The new oba besides created a brass head to honour his predecessor. (Figure viii.9) Over time, objects such as plaques, bells, masks, chests, and additional altars made of brass or ivory, some adorned with coral, were added. Some were used to commemorate momentous events and honor heroes, simply the majority of majestic objects were used in ceremonial and symbolic back up of the oba, his ancestors and subjects, and the kingship itself.

Effigy 8.nine | Head of an Oba

Source: Met Museum

License: OASC

This nineteenth-century brass head of an oba, for instance, is not meant to be a portrait of an individual king so much as a representation of the divine nature and power of being male monarch. The oba derives his power from his interactions with and control over supernatural forces. He is centrolineal with and assisted by his deified ancestors, whom he honors through rituals, offerings, and sacrifices. In stressing this continuity of kingship and his rightful place in that unbroken concatenation, the oba strengthens his own power and that of his people and nation.

The welfare of the kingdom rests on the oba's head, a heavy burden, which is emphasized in representations of him using a proliferation of objects weighing upon him ( Oba Erediauwa ). Only, he does non bear the weight of ruling alone; he works with and relies on his advisors and subjects as they support him. That support is shown literally when the oba is in full formalism regalia. In this photograph of the current oba, Erediauwa, the Rex is shown in his royal garb, heavily beaded in coral with ivory bracelets and plaques at his waist; an bellboy, supporting his correct arm, is helping Oba Erediauwa acquit the weight of kingship on behalf of the nation of Edo people.

Post-obit George Washington'south celebratory visit to Charleston, S Carolina, in May 1791, the Charleston City Council voted to gloat the national hero by having John Trumbull (1756-1843, The states) paint a life-size portrait of the President and hero of the Revolutionary War (1775-1783) to "manus down to posterity the remembrance of the homo to whom they are then much indebted for the blessings of peace, liberty and independence." ^two Having been Washington's aide-de-camp during the War of Independence, Trumbull chose to portray Washington as the steadfast and majestic general at the start of the Battle of Trenton, a pivotal engagement for colonial troops discouraged in the backwash of several contempo defeats. (Figure 8.10) The painting depicts clouds in a nighttime, clouded heaven turning pink with the rise sun juxtaposed with the general'due south equus caballus, frightened by the ongoing battle, held tightly by his aide. Washington stands with confidence, i glove off to hold a spyglass in his correct hand, looking in the distance as if heeding a faraway call for victory.

Effigy viii.10 | General George Washington at Trenton

Creative person: John Trumbull

Source: Art Gallery at Yale

License: Public Domain

Trumbull was pleased with "the lofty expression of his animated expression, the high resolve to conquer or to perish" that he captured in George Washington before the Battle of Trenton. ³ His patrons in South Carolina were not, though, and rejected the portrait when he presented it to them in 1792. Speaking on behalf of the people of Charleston, South Carolina Congressman William Loughton Smith "thought the city would exist better satisfied with a more thing-of-fact likeness, such as they had recently seen him calm, tranquil, peaceful." ⁴ This was not an isolated occurrence: the question of how a statesman and war machine hero should be represented had not been resolved to the satisfaction of artists or patrons in the eighteenth century, in the years both before and after the founding of the Usa. As a representative democracy, the country'due south leaders should exist depicted as a commander-in-main who is also one of the people, many argued. But American artists unfortunately had no clear model for a "matter-of-fact likeness" in the portraits of European royalty and heads of state that they used every bit examples. Anthony van Dyck (1599-1641, Flanders), who was court painter to the King of England, around 1635 painted Charles I at the Hunt . (Figure 8.11) The informal yet dignified stance van Dyck adopted for his prototype of the sovereign, a gentleman out in nature, quickly became the favorite pose for aristocrats and other dignitaries sitting for a non-ceremonial portrait. The pose still remained a standard at the time Trumbull painted George Washington before the Battle of Trenton , but, as indicated by the painting's reception, it was not considered appropriate in a representation of the leader of a autonomous nation. In addition, as the portrait was to commemorate Washington's visit to Charleston, townspeople thought the boxing setting should exist replaced with a view of that metropolis.

Effigy 8.11 | Charles I at the Hunt

Artist: Anthony van Dyck

Author: User "Tetraktys"

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

Trumbull took notation of his patrons' wishes and painted another version. ( General George Washington at Trenton , John Trumbull ) While Washington's pose remains nearly unchanged, Trumbull lightened the sky and inserted a view of Charleston Bay with the city on the far shore. Charleston leaders were satisfied and Trumbull promised commitment of the painting after some small additions. The add-on turned out to be the General's equus caballus, but reversed from the original painting, with its hindquarters prominently displayed in the space between Washington's canary yellow breeches and his walking stick, and the distant city visible between the horse's legs. The painting still hangs in the Historic Council Bedroom of Charleston City Hall.

8.3.2 Cultural Heritage and Ethnic Identity

Ane of import attribute of cultural and indigenous identity is shared histories or common memories. Such histories are our heritage. However, heritage is not the full history. It connects to culture and ethnicity in order to convey the total story about who we were and who we have become as a society or individual. Self or national identity is built on its foundation. Defining terms will help in understanding how each interplay to identify who nosotros are as an individual or nation.

Christian Ellers, a popular contemporary writer on cultures, defines identity every bit whatsoever a person may distinguish themselves by, whether it exist a particular land, ethnicity, religion, arrangement, or other position. Identity is ane manner amidst many to define oneself. Ellers defines ethnicity every bit a group that normally has some connections or mutual traits, such as a common language, mutual heritage, and or cultural similarities. The American Dictionary defines culture as the way of life of a detail people, especially as shown in ordinary behavior, habits, and attitudes toward each other or one'south moral and religious beliefs ("Civilization"). We will look at these terms as they relate to artists, the visual documentarians of club.

Kimsooja (b. 1957, South Korea), a multi-disciplinary conceptual, reflects on her group identity past exploring the roots of her Korean culture. She draws upon tradition and history by selecting familiar everyday items such every bit fabric to communicate her bulletin. Fabric wrapped into a bundle known as a "bottari" is commonly used to transport, carry, or shop everyday objects in Korean culture. What is unlike is Kimsooja's use of fabric equally an art form. Since 1991, Kimsooja has used fabric, sometimes in the course of a bottari, in an on-going series, Deductive Objects , exploring Korean folk community, daily and common activities, and her cultural groundwork and heritage in relation to her life and experience. ( Bottari Truck-Migrateurs , "Je Reviendrai", Thierry Depagne and Jaeho Chong ) In this example, she photographed figures draped in Korean printed fabric that conceals their ethnicity, civilisation, and identity. Their identity is left to the viewer'southward imagination, and their civilisation is left for the viewer to consider, using the print of the fabric as a clue.

A number of artists such equally Kimsooja choose to communicate through their art who they are in relation to their culture and ethnicity. Their art becomes a means of validating their cocky-identity. Her Korean heritage represents a treasury of symbols that commemorates who they are every bit a people and a distinct civilisation with a mutual artistic sensibility. Their national self-image is, on one level, unambiguously divers by the convergence of territorial, ethnic, and cultural identities. The geographical weather condition of the Korean Peninsula provide a cocky-contained nautical and continental environs with plenty of resource with which to create and be innovative. These conditions take given the people since prehistoric times a rich and unique civilization to draw from and make contributions to humanity. Koreans take great pride in their homogeneous culture, and in their heritage.

Russia, similarly self-contained, for many centuries developed cultural characteristics and ethnic identities distinctly their own, too. Russia's rich cultural heritage is visually stunning, from its vivid folk costumes to its elaborate religious symbols and churches. (Figure 8.12) Almost Russians identify with the Eastern Orthodox (Christian) religion, only Judaism, Islam, and Buddhism are also practiced in Russia, making information technology a rich land of diverse ethnic groups and cultures. St. Basil's Cathedral, located on the grounds of the Kremlin in Moscow, and hundreds of other orthodox churches symbolize Russia's heritage; indeed, citizens proudly place pictures of the cathedrals in their homes and offices. The churches in Russia are astonishingly cute and very much a part of Russia'due south heritage.

Figure eight.12 | St. Basil Cathedral, Moscow

Author: User "Ludvig14"

Source: Wikimedia Eatables

License: CC By-SA 3.0

Ironically, then, in light of such a rich internal history, why did Russia'due south rulers expect to western European artists and artistic traditions to develop a new artistic identity in eighteenth century?

Carlo Bartolomeo Rastrelli (1675-1744, Italian republic, lived Russian federation), an Italian sculptor who moved to Saint petersburg, Russia, in 1716, is associated with the formation of Russian federation's "new" civilization. Equally a young creative person, Rastrelli moved from his native Florence during an economic downturn to Paris in search of greater opportunities. The lavish and imperial works he created there in the late Baroque manner did not earn him the success he sought, but did bring him to the attending of Tsar (and later Emperor) Peter the Bully (r. 1682-1725), who lured him and his son Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli (1700-1771, French republic, lived Russian federation) to the Russia courtroom.

Peter the Great co-ruled with his brother, Ivan V, and other family members until 1696, when he was twenty-four years quondam. At that time, Russia was notwithstanding very much tied to its internal religious, political, social, and cultural traditions. Peter the Great set out to modernize all aspects his land, from the structure of the military to education for children of the dignity. The Tsar traveled widely in Western Europe, implementing governmental reforms and adopting cultural norms he saw there. France was the model for sweeping changes he had carried out in courtroom life, way, literature, music, art, architecture, and fifty-fifty language, with French becoming the language spoken at courtroom over the course of the eighteenth century.

Carlo Bartolomeo Rastrelli and his son Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli were amidst the painters, sculptors, and architects, then, who were instrumental in introducing to Russia the new conventions and styles that supplanted Russia'south cultural heritage and identity. For instance, Carlo Rastrelli's portrait bust of Peter the Groovy bears a striking stylistic resemblance to a portrait bust of French Rex Louis 14 (r. 1643-1715) by sculptor and builder Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680, Italy). (Figures 8.thirteen and 8.xiv) Bernini's bust, created during a visit to Paris in 1665, shows Louis 14 every bit a visionary and majestic leader who is literally higher up vagaries of human existence such as the wind that billows his drapery. Carlo Rastrelli's portrait of Peter the Great, completed posthumously in 1729, draws upon the same traditions—dating back to images of Roman emperors such equally Augustus (see Effigy 3.23)—of showing absolute authorization through such devices as the lift of the head, eyes scanning the altitude, and wearing of war machine armor.

Figure eight.13 | Peter I

Author: User "shakko"

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: CC Past-SA 3.0

Figure viii.14 | Bust of Louis XIV of France

Creative person: Gian Lorenzo Bernini

Author: User "Coyau"

Source: Wikimedia Eatables

License: CC By-SA iii.0

His son Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli was an architect who also worked in the Baroque way. He received his first majestic commission in 1721, at the age of twenty-1, but he is mainly known for opulent and imposing buildings he designed later on Peter the Great's death in 1725. Continuing the modernization and transformation of Saint petersburg, Francesco Rastrelli's structures are associated with luxurious exuberance of the Baroque, and Russia's Romanov rulers of the eighteenth century. One of Francesco Rastrelli's most famous buildings is the Winter Palace, also bears a hitting stylistic resemblance to a French palace: Versailles, built for Louis Fourteen past architects Louis Le Vau (1612-1670, French republic) and Jules-Hardouin Mansart (1746-1708, France). (Figures viii.15 and 8.sixteen)

Effigy 8.15 | Winter Palace, St. Petersburg

Author: User "Florstein"

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: CC BY-SA 4.0

Figure 8.16 | Versailles

Author: Marc Vassal

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: CC By-SA 3.0

viii.three.iii Sex/Gender Identity

Kehinde Wiley (b. 1977, USA) is a contemporary portrait painter. In his work, he refers back to poses and other compositional elements used by earlier masters in much the same way that Trumbull did in his portrait of George Washington. Wiley means for his viewers to recognize the earlier work he has borrowed from in creating his painting, to make comparisons between the two, and to layer meaning from the before work into his own. Due to the potent contrasts betwixt the sitters in Wiley'southward paintings and those who posed for the earlier portraitists, nonetheless, this comparison often makes for a complex interweaving of meanings.

Wiley's 2008 painting Femme piquée par un serpent, or Adult female bitten by a serpent, ( Femme Piquée par united nations Serpent, Kehinde Wiley ) is based upon an 1847 marble work of the same proper name past French sculptor Auguste Clésinger (1814-1883, France). (Figure 8.17) When Clésinger's flagrantly sensual nude was exhibited, the public and critics akin were scandalized, and fascinated. Information technology was not uncommon in European and American art of the nineteenth century to use the field of study of the work as justification for depicting the female nude. For instance, if the subject was a moral tale or a scene from classical mythology, that was an acceptable reason for showing a nude figure. In Clésinger's sculpture, the pretext for the adult female's indecent writhing was the snake bite, which, coupled with the roses surrounding the woman, was meant to suggest an apologue of love or beauty lost in its prime rather than simply a salacious delineation of a nude. Unfortunately, the model was easily recognized as a real person, Apollonie Sabatier, a courtesan who was the writer Charles Baudelaire'due south mistress and well known among artists and writers of the day. Clésinger dedicated his sculpture as an artful study of the human form but, having used the features and body of a contemporary woman, his sculpture'southward viewers objected to the prototype as too real. Wiley's painting is the opposite: it is clearly intended to be a portrait of i individual, but he is clothed and inexplicably lying with his dorsum to the viewer while turning to look over his shoulder. In his painting, Wiley retains the extended artillery, and twisted legs and torso of Clésinger'southward effigy, but the sculpted woman's thrown back head and closed eyes are replaced by the man's turned head and mildly quizzical gaze.

Effigy 8.17 | Femme Piquée par un Snake

Creative person: Auguste Clésinger

Author: User "Arnaud 25"

Source: Wikimedia Eatables

License: Public Domain

Wiley takes that pose and its meanings—indecency, exposure, vulnerability, powerlessness— and uses them in a context that seemingly makes no sense when the subject is a fully clothed black male person. Or does it? By using the conventions for depicting the female nude, Wiley asks usa to examine the following: what happens when the figure is clothed—with a proffer of eroticism in the glimpse of dark-brown peel and white briefs above his low-riding jeans; what happens when a young human being gazes at the viewer with an unguarded expression of open inquisitiveness; and what happens when a black male presents his body in a posture of weakness, potentially open to attack? The creative person uses these juxtapositions of pregnant to challenge our notions of identity and masculinity. Past expanding his visual vocabulary to include traditions in portraiture going back hundreds of years, Wiley paints a young black man at odds with gimmicky conventions of (male) physicality and sexuality.

Ideas about gender identity, that is, the gender one identifies with regardless of biological sexual activity, take developed scientifically and socially, and have in contempo years become both more than complex and more fluid in numerous cultures. Within other cultures, still, in addition to male or female person, there has traditionally been a third gender, and gender fluidity has been part of the fabric of guild for thousands of years. Among the ancient Greeks, for example, a hermaphrodite, an individual who has both male and female sex characteristics, was considered "a higher, more than powerful form" that created "a third, transcendent gender." ⁵ In Samoa, there is a strong accent on i's role in the extended family, or aiga . Traditionally, if there are not enough females within an aiga to properly run the household or if in that location is a male child who is specially drawn to domestic life, he is raised as fa'afafine or "in the manner of a woman." Thus, fa'afafine are male at birth simply are raised every bit a tertiary gender, taking on masculine and feminine behavioral traits.

In India, those of a third gender are known as hijra , which includes individuals who are eunuchs (men who accept been castrated), hermaphrodites, and transgender (when gender identity does non match assigned sex). The role of hijras is traditionally related to spirituality, and they are often devotees of a god or goddess. For example, the hijras or devotees of the Hindu goddess Bahuchara Maja are often eunuchs, having had themselves castrated voluntarily to offer their manhood to the deity. Other hijras live as part of the mainstream community and dress as women to perform only during religious celebrations, such every bit a nativity or wedding, where they are invited to participate and bequeath blessings.

Although hijras had been a respected tertiary gender in much of Southeast Asia for thousands of years, their status changed in late nineteenth-century India while under British dominion. During the twentieth century, many hijras formed their own communities, with the protection of a guru, or mentor, to provide some financial security and safekeeping from the harassment and bigotry under which they lived. In 2014, the supreme court of India ruled that hijras should be officially recognized every bit a third gender, dramatically irresolute for the better the educational and occupational opportunities for what is estimated to be half a 1000000 to 2 million individuals. ^six

Tejal Shah (b. 1979, India) is a multi-media artist who often works in photography, video, and installation pieces. She began the Hijra Fantasy Series in 2006, ( Southern Siren Maheshwari from Hijra Fantasy Serial, Tejal Shah ) creating "tableaux in which [three hijras ] enact their ain personal fantasies of themselves." ⁷ Shah was interested in how each woman—they all had transitioned from male to female—envisions her ain sexuality, separate from the perceptions and projections of others. As described by Shah, "In Southern Siren—Maheshwari , the protagonist envisions herself as a archetype heroine from South Indian movie house in the throes of a passionate romantic meet with a typical male hero." ⁸

In the tableau , or staged scene, Masheshwari sees herself equally resplendently dressed in a blue sari, a traditional Indian draped gown, an object of admiration and desire. In this photo and the others in the series, Shah constitute it noteworthy that each hijra , participating fully in the creative process, expressed feelings almost herself by using visual cues and types from mainstream sources such as, in this example, Indian popular civilization. How each hijra represented herself was the stuff of universal human fantasies, Shah plant, regardless of sexual or gender identity: "being beautiful, glamourous and powerful, having a family unit, giving love and existence loved in render." ⁹

8.three.iv Class

Maria Luisa of Parma was a fellow member of the highest circles of European royalty. Born in 1751, she was the youngest daughter of Phillip, Duke of Parma, Italy, and his wife, Princess Louise-Élisabeth of France, the eldest daughter of Male monarch Louis 15. In 1765, she married Charles IV, Prince of Asturias. She was the Queen consort of Spain from 1788, when her husband ascended to the throne, until 1808, when Male monarch Charles Iv abdicated his throne under pressure from Napoleon.

Regal marriages were intended to foster allegiances and cement alliances. The bride and groom by and large did non run into one another until later on lengthy negotiations were completed and the hymeneals date was virtually. It was non uncommon for portraits of the prospective couple to exist exchanged; in improver to the descriptions by the negotiators and others, an artist's representation was the simply way to acquire what ane'southward possible spouse looked similar at a time when journeys were not easily or speedily undertaken. At the time of their engagement, Laurent Pécheux (1729-1821, French) painted this portrait of Maria Luisa (Figure 8.18) in 1765 for Princess Maria Luisa fiancé'south family.

Figure viii.xviii | Maria Luisa of Parma

Artist: Laurent Pécheux

Source: Met Museum

License: OASC

Maria Luisa of Parma depicts the 14-year-old bridehoped-for property a snuffbox in her right hand containing a miniature portrait of her future husband inside its lid. This detail was a formula in formal engagement portraits: the sitter holds a souvenir such as this finely made and costly trinket to express appreciation and budding affection for one's betrothed. Additionally, to demonstrate her wealthy and cultured family groundwork, Maria Luisa is posed within an interior setting displayed in a silk brocade gown trimmed with lengths of delicate, handmade lace, a medallion of the Gild of the Starry Cross suspended from a diamond-encrusted bow on her breast, and diamond stars in her powdered hair. While this is indeed a likeness of the princess, the portrait is meant to convey far more than the color of her eyes or shape of her nose. This portrait is a statement about the prestige and power she will bring to the marriage, and a congratulatory note to the groom's family on the dazzler and worth of the mutually beneficial nugget they are gaining.

Maria Luisa's clothes is the exclamation signal to that visual statement. She is wearing a style known as a mantua or robe a la française (in the French mode), a dress for formal courtroom occasions, of silk brocade woven into alternating bands of aureate thread and pinkish flowers on a cream field. This very costly cloth, probably made in France, is stretched over panniers, or fan-shaped hoops fabricated of cane, metal or whalebone extending side-to-side. The panniers create a horizontal but flattened silhouette that immune the tremendous quantity of magnificent fabric required to exist fully displayed. To wear such a gown was a pronouncement of i's wealth and status, a sign of which was ane's comportment, that is, one's begetting and behavior. And, it was indeed a challenge to stand or move with the grace expected of a blue-blooded woman in eighteenth-century society while wearing such cumbersome, restrictive, and heavy clothing. Maria Luisa, however, is depicted as poised and charming, the perfect consort for a king.

Xx-four years subsequently her portrait by Pécheux, Maria Luisa was thirty-viii years old and had borne x children, five of whom were yet alive, when Francisco Goya created this portrait, Maria Luisa Wearing Panniers . (Figure eight.19) , Francisco Goya was named painter to the court of Charles Four and Maria Luisa in 1789, and in celebration of Charles Four's ascension to the throne, created a portrait of the King, to proceed with the Queen'south portrait. Neither the years nor Goya were kind to Maria Luisa. (Betwixt 1771 and 1799, she would have fourteen living children, 6 of whom grew to machismo, and 10 miscarriages.)

Figure 8.nineteen | Maria Luisa of Parma Wearing Panniers

Artist: Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes

Author: Prado Museum

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

In Goya's delineation, she is even more richly dressed than in her earlier portrait, only her elaborate and sumptuous costume serves only to provide an unflattering contrast with the Queen's demeanor. Goya depicts Maria Luisa with her artillery awkwardly held to each side to accommodate her rigid, box-like tontillo (the Spanish variation of panniers); her plain, dead face is almost comically topped by a complexly constructed hat of lace, silk, and jewels. The chapeau represents ane extravagant trend in women's fashion of the 1780s, and Goya did paint its proliferation of textures and surfaces with great skill and sensitivity, only the contrast between the Queen's hat and her features makes them appear even more coarse and unrefined, regardless of her wealth and class.

What explanation could there have been for the court painter to create such an unflattering representation of Maria Luisa, Queen consort of Spain? In her years of living in her adopted land, she had non endeared herself to members of courtroom or her subjects. Considering that the King preferred to chase, running the country fell largely on the shoulders of Maria Luisa, who was vain and bad-tempered. Goya's presentation does non, in fact, contradict that assessment. The emphasis on her luxurious and elegant attire and on the robe and crown to Maria Luisa's right—signaling her condition equally Queen consort—represent that she is the individual who is literally in touch with the robes of land. This piece of work and her engagement portrait of nearly xx-five years before were not so much depictions of her as a person every bit they were means to communicate the ability and prestige of her place and her office.

Honoré Daumier (1808-1879, France) in 1864 painted a different sign of prestige, or lack thereof, in The Third-Class Carriage ; it was 1 of iii paintings in a series commissioned by William Thomas Walters. (Figure 8.20) The other two paintings were The Starting time-Class Wagon and The Second-Grade Carriage , the only one in the series thought to exist finished. (Figures 8.21 and 8.22) Walters, an American businessman and art collector, would afterward constitute the Walters Fine art Museum in Baltimore, Maryland, with work from his collection, including these three paintings.

Figure 8.20 | The Third Class Carriage

Artist: Honoré Daumier

Source: Met Museum

License: OASC

Figure 8.21 | The First Course Carriage

Artist: Honoré Daumier

Author: Walters Fine art Museum

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

Figure eight.22 | The Second Class Carriage

Artist: Honoré Daumier

Author: Walters Art Museum

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

When Daumier created the works, he had been working prolifically as a painter, printmaker, and sculptor for twoscore years. In his lifetime, he would create approximately 5,000 prints, 500 paintings, and 100 sculptures. From the showtime of his career, he was interested in the impact of industrialization on modernistic urban life, the plight of the poor, the quest for social equality, and the struggle for justice. He was specially known for his biting satire of politics and political figures, and his less stinging, ironic commentary on current order and events. Considering of the subject matter he chose—everyday people, gimmicky life—and the straightforward, truthful, and sincere manner in which he depicted them, Daumier is considered to exist part of the Realist movement or mode in fine art.

In The Third-Class Wagon , the artist presents four figures in the foreground, bathed in light, with numerous, less individualized figures crowded in the background. The young mother nursing her baby, an elderly adult female sitting with folded hands, and a boy sleeping with his hands in his pockets cover four generations, as well equally different stages of life. Although the passengers sit near one some other, they appear isolated from each other. They, including the boy, are probably traveling to or from work in the city, and both their body postures and facial expressions convey the price of difficult labor and long hours. Daumier shows pity for these workers whose lives hold aught but repetitious drudgery.

Forever changing the mainly agricultural society that existed in much of Europe and the United States prior to the 2d one-half of the eighteenth century, the Industrial Revolution is the showtime of the mechanization and manufacturing that would atomic number 82 to people shifting from country to city life, and from farms to factories. While the shift to an industrial, coin-based guild improved the lives of many and created the middle class as we know it today, Daumier was well aware that others were existence left behind and were essentially trapped in a wheel of footling education, unskilled labor, and depression wages.

The artist represents different life expectations based on class through the way he paints the windows and through his utilise of low-cal in each of the iii paintings. In The 3rd-Class Carriage , the figures in the foreground have light shining on them from a window to the left, outside the film plane. At that place are windows in the background, besides, but nix tin be seen outside of them. Daumier is implying there is nix to be seen, peculiarly in the instance of the literally not-existent window. In The Second-Grade Railroad vehicle , a landscape tin be seen through the window, and one of the figures looks out intently. The other three, paying no attending to the globe outside, are cocooned in their winter clothes in an try to fend off the cold in their unheated railroad train car. Merely the human being who leans forrard to detect the passing scenery appears to be younger and is perhaps more eager and capable of adapting to and moving upward in the earth of business organization—suggested by the bowler hat he is wearing, which at the time was associated in urban center life with civil servants and clerks. In First-Class Railroad vehicle , the passengers are all alert, each attending to their own business. One young woman looks out at a greenish landscape; considering her lightweight outerwear, it appears this is a springtime scene, which is suggested, too, past the colorful ribbons on the two women'south fashionable bonnets. With their relaxed postures and placid, composed expressions, these first-class passengers give the impression of confidence. They are more secure in themselves and their places in the world than either the 2nd-class or third-class passengers.

8.3.5 Group Amalgamation

History suggests that the quality of human survival is best when humans function equally a grouping, allowing for commonage support and interaction. Social psychological research indicates that people who are affiliated with groups are psychologically and physically stronger and better able to cope when faced with stressful situations. Gregory Walton, a social psychologist who studies group interaction, has concluded that i benefit individuals receive is the satisfaction of belonging (to a group, civilisation, nation or) to a greater community that shares some common interests and aspirations. The unity of groups is accomplished through members' similarities or their having experiences based on the history that brought them together.

Artists throughout history have been associated with groups, movements, and organizations that protect their interests, forrad their crusade, or promote them equally a group or as individuals. The most visible groups during the Renaissance period in Italy, for case, were people belonging to the Cosmic Church and other religious organizations, wealthy merchant families, civic and regime groups, and guilds, including artists' guilds. (Figures 8.23 and 8.24)

Effigy 8.23 | The Syndics of the Amsterdam Drapers' Guild,

known as the "Sampling Officials"

Artist: Rembrandt

Author: Google Cultural Establish

Source: Wikimedia Eatables

License: Public Domain

Figure eight.24 | Officers of the St. George Borough Guard, Haarlem

Artist: Frans Hals

Source: Wikimedia Commons

License: Public Domain

viii.3.6 Personal Identity

The city of Palmyra, in modernistic Syria, had long been at the crossroads of Western and Eastern political, religious, and cultural influences, as it was a caravan finish for traders traveling the Silk Road between the Mediterranean and the Far East. In the beginning century CE, the urban center came under Roman rule and under the Romans, the metropolis prospered, and the arts flourished. Following a rebellion by Queen Zenobia of Palmyra in 273 CE, Roman Emperor Aurelian destroyed the city, ending the period of Roman command.

The Palmyrenes, or people of Palmyra, built three types of elaborate, large-scale monuments for their dead chosen houses of eternity. The first was a tower tomb , some as high as four stories. The 2nd was a hypogeum , or underground tomb, and the third was a tomb congenital in the shape of a temple or house. All were used by many generations of the same extended family and were located in a necropolis, a city of the dead, what we today telephone call a cemetery. Inside the tombs were loculi , or pocket-sized, separate spaces, each of which formed an private sarcophagus, or stone coffin. Inside the opening to the tomb, the beginning sarcophagus held the remains of the clan's founder; it was often faced with a stone relief sculpture depicting him as if attending a banquet and inviting others to bring together him. Surrounding the founder in the loculi , on the face of each family member's sarcophagus would be a relief portrait of each person interred in that location. ( Loculi )

This stele, a portrait of a father, his son, and two daughters, dates to betwixt 100 and 300 CE, sometime during the era of Roman rule. (Figure eight.25) The man is reclining on a burrow busy with flower motifs within circles and diamonds. He holds a bunch of grapes in his right hand and, in his left, a wine cup decorated with flowers similar to those on the burrow. His two daughters flank his son in the groundwork; the son holding grapes and a bird. The son and daughters all wear necklaces. Additionally, the daughters article of clothing pendant earrings and brooches property the drapery at their left shoulders. The chiton, or tunic, and himation, or cloak, that each daughter wears has some affinities with Greco-Roman types of habiliment, simply the style of the ornamented veil covering their heads is a local type of garment, based on Parthian, or Persian, styles. Also wearing local garments, the ii males wear a loose fitting tunic and trousers, each with a decorative edge. The fine fabrics indicated by the embellished borders of both men and women's clothing indicate goods and wealth clustered from trade, as does the arable utilise of precious metals and gems in the variety of jewelry adorned by the Palmyrenes. Thus, the stele is a blend of Greco-Roman and Palmyrene (and larger Parthian) styles and cultural influences.

Figure 8.25 | Funerary Relief

Source: Met Museum

License: OASC

Coupled upon many Palmyrenes grave steles are inscriptions of text in both Aramaic and Latin that give the person's name and genealogy, markers of distinctive private and family traits. While many of the depictions of the frontal-facing, broad-eyed figures—a defining feature of Palmyrene fine art—show little individualization of features, the coupling with such inscriptions are evident signs that each stele was intended to denote the characteristics of the person entombed within. The figures actively engage the viewer, and provide the reminder that personal identity is an amalgamate of individual, socio-cultural, spiritual, and historical influences.

In July 2015, the city of Palmyra, its people, and its art were again in danger. In April of 2015, Islamic State (ISIS) forces overtook the 3,000-year-onetime Assyrian city of Nimrud and destroyed its buildings and art. On May 21, 2015, ISIS overtook the city of Palmyra, inducing fear that they would destroy buildings and fine art there as they did in Nimrud. On July ii, 2015, ISIS was reported to have destroyed grave markers similar to the ane discussed here. ( Grave Marker Reliefs ) They lined up six bust-length reliefs of people who lived in Palmyra nearly 2,000 years ago, and smashed them, obliterating the visual and written record of each person. So many have had their portraits fabricated for posterity with the hopes of staying alive, against the odds. And, this is why nosotros need fine art: it gives u.s.a. memories of ourselves and our deeds, who we identify with, and how nosotros identify others.

8.4 BEFORE YOU MOVE ON

Primal Concepts

National and personal identities do not magically happen; they are congenital on and influenced by firsthand and by events, environments, traditions, and cultural legacies. Artists capture and document not only the physical conditions of a society but likewise the emotional and mental conditions. They construct a sense of who we were and are as a person and as a nation. Social club's identity is e'er fluid. When we see identity as static, we record people with stereotypes and practice non come across them for who they are. Art is one style to challenge static notions of identity past engaging the viewer in visual narratives that are unfamiliar to them, and that educate and challenge their previously held notions.

Since the 1970s, postmodern theories have challenged historical and traditional notions of indigenous and cultural identity by developing a model that views identity as beingness multifaceted, fluid, and socially constructed. Some scholars contend that we are in a menstruum of post-identity and post-ethnicity, repudiating the old essentialist view of identity. Globalization of people, the Internet, and travel have all brought about fluid cultures—which may have contributed to people's more fluid sense of identity, and also to their interest in researching their heritage, culture, and indigenous identity. Heritage is the treasure and symbols of pride for an individual, land, and nation. Many works of art are seen equally function of national heritage considering they aid citizens capeesh their past. Fine art provides life to the by, something that can be visualized, touched, walk through, and identified as being part of a legacy and culture.

Exam Yourself

1. On the surface Kim Sooja'southward fine art seems elementary, simply underneath information technology is an enigma of traditions that make a metaphoric identity argument; for case, her use of cloth as an art form evokes intimacy and honor of her culture and history. Discuss and identify at-least two artists whose piece of work makes a personal and historical statement. Be specific every bit you reference each image associated with your essay. (minimum of 500 words).

2. A number of circumstances throughout history have compelled artists to confront the context of social problems, select at-least two works of art that best draw an issue or issue. Discuss the problems associated with the issue, and how the upshot and fine art shaped the legacy or identity of the country or nation. Describe the power the work communicates, discuss the significance of the piece of work and how information technology convey a message, and identity of the people in that menses of time. At the end of your essay make commentary on why you selected the art works what you recall nigh the art. (Attach selected work with captions.) Respond to the question is located throughout the affiliate)

3. Throughout history building were constructed in a manner to symbolize power; spirituality; and godlessness. Structures house institutions that guide, influence and shape a society's morals, values, politics, religious and social conditioning. Select 4 structures that best symbolize the identity or culture of a gild. Describe its impact on influencing a nation, significance to the nation and how the structure contributes to national or individual identity. At the stop of your essay discuss why you selected the structures and the aesthetics of the building. (Attach selected structures with captions.)

4. Compare and contrast iv works of art that all-time describe a personal or national identity. Discuss with specifics how the artist is able to capture the grapheme of the person or nation. At the stop of your essay add a commentary why yous selected the works and their significance. (Attach selected works with captions.)

8.9 KEY TERMS

Baroque : a style of architecture and fine art that originating in Italy in the early seventeenth century

Bottari : Textile wrapped and tied around clothes , textile, or/and items into a parcel for carry

Grave stele : is a stone or wooden slab, generally taller than it is wide, erected usually in Greek cemeteries equally a monument, for funerary or commemorative purposes.

Hypogeum : an underground prehistoric burial site

Impressionism : is a nineteenth-century fine art move that adult in France during the late nineteenth century by a group of artists chosen the Bearding Society of Painters, Sculptors

Impressionist : A painter whose painting have characteristics of the impressionism movement, emphasizing authentic depiction of calorie-free in its changing qualities, uses minor, thin, nonetheless visible brush strokes, open composition,

Individualism : emphasizes potential of manand self development ain beliefs. The Individualism during the Renaissance period became a prominent theme in Italy

Industrial Revolution : period during the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in western Europe and the United States when industry rapidly developed due to the invention of steampowered engines and the growth of factories. Fundamental changes occurred in agriculture, fabric and metal industry, transportation, economical and policies, and had a major impact on how people lived

Obas : The title of "oba," or king, is passed on to the firstborn son of each successive king of Republic of benin, Africa at the time of his expiry

Renaissance Period : a period of time from the fourteenth to the seventeenth century in Europe. The era bridged the fourth dimension between the Middle Ages and modernistic

Tableau : is an incidental scene, every bit of a group of people

Belfry tomb : are mausoleums, congenital in 1067 and 1093

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1. Ghose, Tia (October. 26, 2012). Why we care about our ancestry, Live Science. ↩

2. George and Martha Washington: Portraits from the Presidential Years , exhibition, National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC, 1999, accessed July 6, 2015, http://www.npg.si.edu/exh/gw/trenton.htm ↩

3. Ibid ↩

4. Ibid ↩

5. Aileen Ajootian, "The Just Happy Couple: Hermaphrodites and Gender" in Naked Truth: Women, Sexuality and Gender in Classical Fine art and Architecture , ed. Ann Olga Koloski-Ostrow and Claire L. Lyons (New York: Routledge, 1997), 228. ↩

6. http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2014/04/18/304548675/a-journeying-of-hurting-and-dazzler-on-becoming-transgenderin-india ↩

7. Tejal Shah, Artist Statement, Hijra Fantasy Series , accessed July 7, 2015, http://tejalshah.in/project/what-are-you lot/howdy jrafantasy-series/ ↩

8. Ibid. ↩

9. Ibid. ↩

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