Originally coined by Ellen Dissanayake, the ridiculous mouthful* “palaeoanthropsychobiological” is a term used to describe an “unfamiliar perspective” (p15) on the history of the Western idea of art. It is an expansive term that includes the idea that “art encompasses all of human history,” “that it include all human societies,” and “that it accounts for the fact that art is a psychological or emotional need and has psychological or emotional effects,” (p15). It suggests that art be viewed as an inherent universal trait of the human species.

Dissanayake later goes on to describe art as a “making special” of things – to differentiate “from the mundane, the everyday, the ordinary,” (p22). This is important because it adds value to an otherwise meaningless existence, and provides incentive for human beings to “work together in confidence and unity,” (p24). In this way art transcends mere beauty and becomes “art for life’s sake,” (p24). In other, very simple words, it gives purpose.

Among her own perspective on art, Dissanayake also provides examples of other artistic movements/lenses. Following the medieval period, as early as the 14^th century, the renaissance period marked a shift from art in service of religion – as was the case in medieval times – towards “man-centered concerns” that portrayed “a recognizable world, whether actual or ideal, and the art was in accurately representing that subject matter, using craftsman-like standards of beauty, harmony and excellence,” (p16). It marked a period of re-birth, including the development of perspective and an attempt to represent the natural beauty of the world through the study of light, shadow, and the human form.

Following this innovative period the 18^th century gave rise to the modernist movement, influential in that thinkers began to define “a special frame of mind for appreciating works of art – a “disinterested”  attitude that is separate from one’s own personal interest in the object, its utility, or its social or religious ramifications,” (p17). It gave rise to the belief that “what is said or written about a work is not only necessary to its being art, but is indeed perhaps more important than the work itself,” (p18).

Postmodernism** followed, and persists to this day. It declares an “end to all –isms,” and “repudiates the “high” art” (p19) of modernism. It challenges “the aura of exclusiveness and religiosity of the museum,” (p20). “Art is created on the street, in remote desserts, or is found in humble or trivial objects and materials,” (p20). It serves to deconstruct all previous notions about what art is, taking former works and appropriating them in new and critical ways.

 

*OMG, I hate words like this. In an effort to reduce word count we actually create a single word more cumbersome than using several words to describe a concept. (And the way Dissanayake pats herself on the back, “an unfamiliar perspective, one that is so different, in fact, that it doesn’t have a name,” “an adjective that is quite literally stunning.” Puke. I want to slap her.)

**Total postmodern, cynical, nihilist, here.  I could just eat it up – all of it.