CHAPTER 2
THE FUNCTIONS OF ART 3. Social Function
 Art can be generally classified into two:
Directly Functional and Indirectly
Functional.
a) Directly Functional Art – Art that
we use in a daily basis and serves a
literal or tangible function in our
lives. (e.g. Clothes, Architectural
and Engineering, Structures,
Money, Furniture)
b) Indirectly Functional Art – Art
that are ‘perceived through the
senses.” Not used literally to live
but accompanies life (e.g. Painting,
Theatre, Literature)
 Both Directly Functional and Indirectly
Functional Arts tend to cross each other’s
paths and change roles or even fuse
purposes.
 Some Directly Functional Art have a sole
purpose which is for functionality, but the
designs incorporated made the decorative
art transcend from its basic form to a
highly artistic form of art.
 Artistic Functions can be classified
into 4:
1. Aesthetic
2. Utilitarian
3. Social
4. Cultural
1. Aesthetic Function
 An artwork functions aesthetically when it
becomes an instrument for mankind to be
cognizant of its beauty where feelings of
joy and appreciation are manifested.
2. Utilitarian Function
 Art serves this function when it is used to
give comfort, convenience, and happiness
to human beings. It served basic functions
such as clothing, food, and shelter, and
other things that make humans live with
happiness and ease.
 Art serves this purpose when it bridges
connection among people. Also when it
encourages unity and good relationship
among people. With this, people become
more understanding and could somehow
create a better society.
4. Cultural Function
 Art serves as an aperture towards skills,
knowledge, attitudes, customs, and
traditions of different people. The art helps
preserve, share and transmit culture of
people from one generation to another.
PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVES
A. Plato’s Theory Of Mimesis
 In his theory if Mimesis, Plato says
that all Art is mimetic by nature;
art is an imitation of life. He
believed that ‘idea’ is the ultimate
reality. Art imitates idea and so it is
imitation of reality.
B. Aristotle’s Theory of Representations
 All the Arts have their own
techniques and rational principles,
and it is through mastery of these
that the artist/ craftsman brings his
conceptions to life. Yes, the arts fo
copy nature but their
representations are fuller and more
meaningful than nature gives us in
the raw. That is their strength. We
do not therefore need to insist on
some moral purpose for art, which
is thus free to represent all manner
of things present, past, imagined or
institutionally-required.
C. Kant’s “L’Art por L’Art( Art for Art’s
Sake)
 Kant argued the purpose of art is to
be ‘purposeless’. It should not have
ri justify any reason of existing and
being valued other than the fact
 that it is art. Our experience of art -
the ways we appreciate and
criticize work – is therefore wholly
commanded by aesthetic pleasure
and delight, separate to the rest of
the world.
 Practically speaking, it usually
meant that art should avoid social,
political, and moral themes and
concentrate instead on creating
beauty, so it really meant “art for
the sake of beauty and its
elevating effects.”
D. Art as an escape
 “ The ceremony of art touches the
deepest realms of he psyche and
he sacred dimension of the artistic
creative process. The sacred level
of art not only transforms
something into art, but also
transforms the artist at the very
core of his or her being. This way of
doing and relating to art makes the
process and context of art-making
infinitely more important than the
product.”
 It’s an escape from the hustle and
bustle of a long active day of work
and meetings. It’s an escape from
the chaos that our uncertain
thoughts cause within us. It’s an
escape our unrelating running
footsteps that we focus on more
intensely than reminding ourselves
to take magical depths of deep
breaths.
ARTISTIC INTEGRITY
 Never settle for anything but your
absolute best effort – an effort that may
be exhausting and frustrating but that will
ultimately serve you in good stead as an
artist and as a human being.
CONSONANCE and DISSONANCE
 The impression of stability and repose
(consonance) in relation to the impression
of tension or clash (dissonance)
experienced by a listener when certain
combinations of tones or notes are
sounded together.
SCALE and PROPORTION
 Scale refers to the size of an object (as a
whole in relationship to another object (as
another whole). In art the size relationship
between an object and the human body is
significant.
 Proportion refers to the relative size of
parts of a whole (elements within an
object). We often think of proportions in
terms of size relationships within the
human body.
CLARITY and RADIANCE
 A clear design values clarity over
novelty. (Clear instead of clever.)
Novel for novel’s sake is for designers
who create solutions for themselves.
Solutions that don’t value goals or
problems.
 Radiance is a type of glowing: either
from a light source like the sun or a
healthy, beaming person.
THE REPRESENTIONAL THEORY
 States that the fundamental, definitive
quality of art is the ability to capture some
aspect of reality.
THE SUBJECT
 The Subject of art refers to any person,
object, scene or event described or
represented in a work of art.
 Representational )e.g. Paintings,
Sculptures, etc.)
 Non-Representational (e.g. Architectural
Structures)
 Many contemporary painters have turned
away from representational to non-
objective painting. They have shifted their
attention to the work of art as an object in
itself, an exciting combination of shapes
and colors that fulfills an aesthetic need
without having to represent images or tell
a story.
 Many modern paintings are like this
making them more difficult to
comprehend.
WAYS OF REPRESENTING SUBJECTS
REALISM/NATURALISM
 Generally the attempt to represent subject
matter truthfully, without artificiality and
avoiding artistic conventions, or
implausible, exotic, and supernatural
elements.
ABSTRACTION
 The artist selects and renders the objects
with their shapes, colors and positions
altered.
 In others, the original objects have been
reduced to simple geometric shapes and
they can be rarely identified unless the
artist named in in title.
 Artist’s concern is the rendering of the
essence of the subjects rather than the
natural form itself.
DISTORTION
 Could mean twisting, stretching or
deforming the natural shape of the object.
 It is usually done to dramatize the shape
of a figure or to create an emotional
effect.
SURREALISM
 It is a method where the artist in giving
expression to what it is in the
subconscious composes dreamlike scenes
that show an irrational arrangement of
objects.
 The images are recognizable, sometimes
drawn from the nature but they are so
combined in utterly fantastic and
unnatural relationships.
KINDS AND SOURCES OF SUBJECTS
o Nature
o Animals
o Portrait or Human Figures
o History and Legends
o Still Life
o Religion and Mythology
o Dreams and Fantasies
o Cityscapes
o Seascapes
ART and BEAUTY
 “Beauty is in the Phi of the Beholder.”
 Dr. Stephen Marquardt has studies human
beauty for years in his practice of oral and
maxillofacial surgery. Dr. Marquardt
performed cross-cultural surveys on
beauty and found that all groups had the
same perceptions of facial beauty.
 1.618:1
 This particular relationship is the Golden
Ratio. It is a mathematical ratio that
seems to appear recurrently in beautiful
things in nature as well as in other things
that are seen as “Beautiful”
THE UGLY AND THE TRAGIC IN ART
 There is nothing that may be considered
as in improper subject when it comes to
art.
 The grotesque the ugly, and the tragic are
all legitimate subjects as the pleasurable
and the beautiful are.
 Many, in fact, have often deviated away
from the stereotyped and beautiful
subjects.
 The greatest play, movies, and musicals
are invariably tragedies.
 And many our songs speak about love
denied or lost.
CONTENT (LEVELS OF MEANING)
Factual Meaning
 The literal statement or the narrative
content in the work which can be directly
apprehended because the objects
presented are easily recognized.
Conventional Meaning
 Refers to the special meaning that a
certain object or color has a particular
culture or group of people.
Subjective Meaning
 Any personal meaning consciously or
unconsciously conveyed by the artist
using a private symbolism which stems
from his own association of certain
objects, actions or colors with past
experiences.