Murals refer to the paintings and pieces of artwork which are applied or painted on the ceiling, wall and so on. According to the article named Food as Art, which is written by Elizabeth Telfer, art is defined as man-made stuffs which are made and appreciated with aesthetic consideration. I think in order to make murals be made and appreciated with aesthetic consideration (Telfer, 2002), the murals must accord with the public aesthetic standard at that time.

I have seen murals in many places. For example, I can find murals in many parks in China. Some of the murals are painted by the government, but some of the murals are painted by some common people. Some of the murals are painted for some political purpose; they are painted for the purpose of calling people to building a harmonious society and other political purposes (Willsdon, 2000). But some murals are painted to express the painters’ personal feeling. However, some murals can be controversial, because they are public and art (Doss, 2006). Both of art and public are controversial so that murals are bound to be controversial.

There are many reasons for morals to be controversial. First, everything public must be controversial, no matter how good or how bad one thing is.  Secondly, as a piece of art, mural is controversial because many people evaluate it to see whether it need to be improved, whether it accord with the aesthetic standard, what the identity of the people in the murals and so on. For example, the mural found in the Chauvet Cave, which is located in Ardèche department, southern France. When it is first found, its history is controversial. Then people evaluate people’s appearance, who the people appeared in the mural is, what the murals represents and function. Moreover, as different people have different opinions toward one thing, different people express different views to the  mural found in Chauvet Cave.

Even though different people have different aethestic standards, there is a public aethestic standard accepted by most of the public at the times. Therefore, murals must be judged by the beautification. As the western countries used to think that woman who is full and white is pretty, the women in the murals are full and white.  Of course, different countries have different aesthetic standard. But all in all, murals need to accord with the beautification at that time.

As most of murals in western countries appeared in Egyptian tombs, Pompiii and the Minoan  palaces, most of murals in eastern countries appeared in China, Indian, Egypt and so on, the murals in these places refer to the situation of these countries at that time. In order to have deeper understanding of the murals, people need to learn much about the history of these countries and places. In the 1930s, Mexican murals are used a political and social method. The murals at that time are called the “basement” of the politics. As murals are related to the history, murals are controversial.

The murals in China show rich culture of Buddhism. The murals in China show the Buddhist belief in China at that time.  The murals are placed and painted in the places which are important part of the Buddhism. As is known to all, Buddhism has great influence on the development of China in history. Most of murals found in China are related to Buddhism, especially the murals in Dunhuang.  The murals in Dunhuang are regarded as the evidence of the spread of Buddhism form India in history. Therefore, the places of murals are also controversial.

Murals are controversial also because of the way they are created. Some murals are pained on the wall, ceiling and so on. Some murals are pasted, and some are made with wood and many other methods. And some murals now are painted with the help of computer graphs. They are paint with computer first and then painted by machines. The use of machine and computer can increase efficiency. No matter which way the murals are painted, we cannot stop people from evaluating by their own standard.

As a well-known genre of public art, murals are controversial since the day they are found. Just like other art, murals are appreciated by different people from different points of view. Besides people’s personal opinion, murals are controversial because it is closely related to the aesthetical standard at that time, the purpose of politics, the place, its history, the culture and so on. When appreciate a mural, we should study some background information of the mural first. By learning history and other background information of the murals, we can have a deeper understanding of the murals. There are many ways to create murals before. With the development of technology, there are some new ways to create murals such as using computers and machines which can increase the efficiency. No matter which way murals are created, murals are influential in people’s life.

References:

Telfer, E. (2002). “Food As Art”. Arguing About Art: Contemporary Philophical Debates. Taylor-Francis e-Library, 17-26.

Doss, E. (2006). Public Art Controversy: Cultural Expression and Civic Debate. New York: Americans for the Arts.

Willsdon, C.A.P. (2000). Mural Painting in Britain 1840-1940: Image and Meaning. Oxford: Oxford University Press

When I thought about what the art was, the 7 key words appeared in my mind soon. So I searched these following words from google: Heart, Magical, Music , Goddess, Nature, Flower, Water. As you see, I thought that the art was complex and hard to say what it was.  Hope you guys can enjoy it!

Computer Graphics: Effects of Origins, which is written by Beverly J. Jones, refers to the theory that when developing technology, we need take advantage some artistic concept. By using the concept of art, the image of science and technology tend to look more real than the image without using artistic concept (Jones, 1990). For example, the widely use of three-dimensional films and pictures make the world look more real in the audiences’ eye so that the audiences can enjoy the image better than before. Taking advantage of the artistic concept, the audience has stronger feeling about what the usage of art during the development of technology can bring the common people a great value of entertainment and visual feast.

However, the widely use of artistic concept in the development of technology is unpredictable for many people, especially some scientists. They could not predict there are so many people using microcomputers at that time, either. The example of this theory is the Mercedes Benz Corporation, which can prove that the people including some scientists did not think the use of microcomputer can spread so widely. The Mercedes Benz Corporation limits the sales of automobiles to very small number so that very few drivers can drive the automobiles. The example of Mercedes Benz Corporation can prove the fact that people, including some scientists at that time could not predict there will be so many people using microcomputer and computer become an obbligato object in people’s daily life now.

However, there is no doubt that the wide use of artistic concept in the development of technology has win great success and brought a big revolution to the entertainment of the world now. When we walk in the cinema, we can find that there are many three-dimensional films on show. Besides, many classics and old movies are reproduced into three-dimensional version and won great success. For example, Titanic was first released in 1997 and it has won itself a great reputation and is regarded as classic. Since the wide use of three-dimensional vision has attracted many audiences, it is reproduced into three-dimensional version and was released in 2013. Though it has been seen by many people many years ago, Titanic still achieved impressive box-office results in 2013. Its domestic ticket box is $57 million and its world-wide ticket box is $344 million (2014). The ticket box of the three-dimensional Titanic proves that the technology using artistic concept has win great success in the world now. Technology using artistic concept enrich the world and make the audiences have a new way to enjoy entertainment. I believe the wide use of artistic concept will also help the development of technology and bring people convenience in the future.

 

References:

Jones, B. J. (1990). Computer Graphics: Effects of Origins. Oxford: Pergamon Press.

 

Titanic. (n.d.). Retrieved August 40, 2014, from

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?page=main&id=titanic.htm

1.  As far as I am concerned, spirituality is the resource of art. Only when an artist has spirituality, can he create a piece of art touches the deepest part of people’s mind. Even though inspiration is import in the process of creating art as well, comparing to spirituality, inspiration is like spark. Inspiration can help people create a piece of art by accident. Normal people can have the inspiration to create a piece of art but only artists have the spirituality to create art. Besides talent, spirituality includes rich knowledge, experience and so on. Therefore, I think spirituality is the basement of artists but spirituality needs much time and energy to prepare. Only when the artists have rich knowledge and experience, can artists create art.

2. As spirituality has close relation with knowledge and experience, I believe spirituality will be different in different religion. Let’s take painting as example. Since long time ago, the western countries have different painting style from the western countries. The European paint oil painting while the Chinese enjoy wash painting. The European like painting people and objects, while Chinese like painting mountains-and-waters painting. We can conclude that spirituality differ from religion and people in different places tens to create different genres of art.

3. I refer creativity to people’s ability to create something new. Not only artists but also inventors need to take advantage of their creativity to create art. Only when they have creativity can they create art. But there are many factors which can influence the inventors and artists’ creativity such as education, daily life, experience and so on. The environment of the artists and inventors can also affect their creativity. Artists and inventors tend to create something which is closely related to their daily experience and the environment around them.

4. As artists tend to create something closely related to their daily life, artists tend to use their daily experience and the things which have touched them as the source of their creativity. For example, the western artists tend to paint the object which apparent to them every day such as egg, woman, fruits and so on. Just like the inventors tend to create some inventions which should be used in their daily life like washing machine and dish-washing machine, artists have the tendency to create something close to their daily life. Artists also create something abstract, but I think the source of it is still their daily experience.

In this chapter, the author has put forward a theory that there are two kinds of culture. One, which emphasizes the importance of professionals, is called RO and the other one emphasize the importance of both amateurs and professionals is called RW (P. 84). There are many differences between RO and RW. RO tends to teach and deliver culture and knowledge without asking question such as the law school, while the RW tends to ask more questions than RO. And the device to make RO work is very common and cheap in the nowadays (P. 89). We should make more emphasize on the competition because it is competition rather than copyright that make great contribution to the development of the economy. And the development of economy is closely related to connectivity. However, compared to neglect the importance of RO and completely focus on the development of RW, we should develop both RW and RO together, because without the protection of copyright, no one will be willing to make some inventions and take part in the fair competition. The environment of economy will be chaos. I think even though we should keep close eyes on the development of RW, we should never overlook the importance of RO. The development of the economy nowadays lies much in the development of technology. Let’s take telephone for example. The use of telephone is a fashion. Once a new kind of telephone is released, many people are willing to line up over night to buy a telephone. Buying a new kind of technology is a fashion that the people nowadays like to follow. And competition of the technology between producers is very fierce. The competition contributes much on the development of the economy so that we should keep close eye on the competition. Meanwhile, we can not emphasize the importance of copyright too much. Though competition is obviously important to the development of economy, the protection of copyright should never be neglected during the development of economy as well. The protection of copyright is the rule which is used to keep the market in order. Only when the copyright of the invention is protected well enough, will the economy have stable and healthy development. Otherwise, once an inventors release a new product, other competitors will plagiarize and make the same products, the effort of the inventors is wasted and no one is willing to make some invention so that the competition between different produces is not healthy.

With the development of the society and economy, the competition on technology is becoming fiercer and fiercer in the recent years. And the change of medium has been rapid and dramatic now. Besides the usage of the technology, people also expect the technology look pretty as well. Therefore, it is common to embed some culturally accepted conception some scientific and technical imagery in order to achieve the purpose of entertainment and art. For example, the three-dimensional vision is a good example. The three-dimensional films bring the audience such a visual feast. And the technology makes a big revolution to the world. The frame in terms of technology and art changes in different material and symbolic culture (P. 28). Though the competition of technology is fierce now, but the importance of setting logical limits of the possible according to the experience, conceptual frames and knowledge is realized. And the use of artistic practice can help the graphic images more vivid than other images. The difference between the artists and scientists on their view of the world leads to the development of the technology. And the combination of both art and technology can bring the world a brand new visual revolution. I think the development of technology with the use of culturally accepted art has great influence on the world now. The 3D movies are now popular. Since Hollywood makes many action movies, science fiction movies and so on. All of these movies are more attractive on three-dimensional vision than two-dimensional vision. Moreover, besides making new movies on three-dimensional vision, some old movies like The Titanic and Jurassic Park are remade and released into three-dimensional movies. And the box office of these old movies is as good as people’s expectation. The wide use of artistic practice in technology has great influence on the world, so does the games. Since the technology has rapidly developed in recent years, many games are improved. Nowadays, computer games are so popular that the many people have spent much of their time on playing computer games, especially the youth. And many young people get addicted to these games so that there are many arguments about computer games. However, I think the artistic practice has improved the quality of games rapidly. Not only the scenery of the games is delicacy, but also the design of games now is well-organized. I think combing artistic practice into games and technology is a good improvement for the world.

The article named Deeply Seeing makes a distinction between look and see. The author thinks that sometimes we see things with our self-contained state of ego, but sometimes we see the world only with eye. We distinguish ourselves and the outer world with egoic boundaries (P.71). For example, I see the people we love with aesthetic thinking, but we look many other people with no sense of aesthetic consideration.

I think sometimes that we cannot see the world even though it is right in front of us because we are absent-minded. Only when we keep both our eyes and hearts can we feel the world. That can also be called the difference between seeing and looking. I think the difference between seeing and looking lies in the point that whether we have used our heart to feel it. The famous philosopher named Saint Bonaventure has put forward the idea that there are three eyes of knowing- the eye of flesh, the eye of reason and the mystic eye of contemplation (P.73). Meanwhile, there are also three eyes of knowing for artists. I believe that we spend most of our time of the look of flesh. We see many things with no thinking and attention. After seeing, we forget it and get used to it. Some educators have put forward the theory that children like repeat their actions again and again because they do have no idea of what the world is, so they have the feeling of safe by repeating their actions. We adult have got used to the world and we are so familiar to the world that we do not want to waste our time on observing the world. As the old saying goes, “Beauty means this to one and that to the other.” And a Chinese poet says, “Darkness gives me a pair of black eyes, but I use it for search of light.” Beauty can be found here and there in the world, but we tend to be less interested in looking for the beauty of the world. Nowadays, with the development of the society and the science, people spend more and more time on the technology such of telephone, ipad and so on. I think only when we feel the earth with our feet, touch the trees and flowers with our hands and see the world with our heart, can we enjoy the pleasure which is brought by the nature.

As is known to all, every behavior occurs has it own reason, so does horror films. Some research has shown us that horror films are the most stable kind of films because they have their own fans, who are willing to see the horror films as soon as it is released. The situation, of course, has its own reason.

A famous philosopher named Noel Carroll has put forward the idea in an article named Why Horror? that while people are scared of horror, they cannot help giving rise to a sense of pleasure. This is a paradoxical psychological situation. Noel Carroll points that it is the way the strategy is worked into the plot that gives rise to the sense of pleasure, instead of the strategy itself (Carroll, 1990). And curiosity makes the audience getting involved in the processes of discovery, explanation, confirmation, disclosure, proof and hypothesis. (Carroll, 1990) Therefore, the horror films, which are mostly made in the form of narrative, can make the audiences happy because they successfully arouse the curiosity deed down in the audiences’ mind. Every one has the sense of curiosity, therefore, as the old saying goes, “Curiosity kills the cat.” There is no doubt that the scene of the natural and the unnatural in the horror films call up people’s curiosity. Therefore, many factors like mise-en-scene, diegetic sound and non-diegetic sound is widely used in horror films. People wonder about many things, and the horror films reflect and response to the curiosity. In Nobel Carroll’s eyes, that is the reason the paradoxical psychology situation that people have the sense of pleasure when facing horror.

Daniel Shaw, who has written the article named The Humean Definition of Horror, has many disagreements with Noel Carroll. He says the sense of pleasure when facing horror at the same time is related to emotion and cognizance. Daniel Shaw thinks that there is no clear definition of art, even though many philosophers have tried to make a definition of art. And he also feels the phenomenon of art-horror, which is put forward by Noel Carroll, is adequate enough to convince people. Moreover, he also believes that the idea of art-horror cannot successfully recognize how the paradox between horror and pleasure (Shaw, 1997). Daniel Shaw points that Carroll has paid little attention to the existential dimension.

Tanya Krzywinska has put many ideas which are different from Carroll and Shaw. Krzywinska thinks that in horror films, many charting generic crosscurrents, moral occult and interactive evil are used. Meanwhile, tension and spatial orientation increase the pleasure in people’s mind as well. Sometimes, horror films will also make audiences have the sense of horror by leading the audience to think back to their horror experience (Krzywinska, 2002). By dating back to their horror experience, the audiences get involved to the horror films in no time. Meanwhile, the charting generic crosscurrents skillfully arouse the sense of horror in the audience’s mind. And the moral occult and interactive evils also make the audience thinking, and help them get involved in the films as well. Even though Tanya Krzywinska has thought horror films in the view which is different from Noel Carroll and Daniel Shaw, some of Tanya Krzywinska’s idea accord with Noel Carroll and Daniel Shaw’s ideas. All of them believe that it is important for the horror films to get the audiences involved in the films. And all of them emphasize the inner emotion of the audience. They do not think the paradox as an acquired situation but the inborn inner paradox psychological problem instead.

As far as I am concerned, human being have the sense of curiosity in born and we cannot help being curious of the things which we do not know for sure. And that is the reason why we have evolved in the history. However, facing the unknown, we have the feeling of horror. I think this kind of paradox is reasonable. I do not agree with Carroll because he thinks that people have the sense of pleasure because of the structure of plot. I think people are born to have the sense of horror and the sense of pleasure at the same time. Let’s take another paradoxical psychological thinking for example. People are afraid of the occurrence of bad things, but some philosophers also point that as a matter of fact, people expect the occurrence of the bad things deep in their minds at the same time. Maybe the paradox psychological situation is inborn.

References:

Carroll, N., (1990). “Why Horror?”, The Philosophy of Horror (pp. 275–293). New York: Routledge.

Shaw, D. (1997). ”A Humean definition of Horror”, Glasgow: Film-Philosophy.

Krzywinska, T. (2002). “Hands-On Horror”, Re-imagining the Horrific Visual Media and Culture. London: Special Issue of Spectator 22:2 (Fall 2002) 12-23

Just like the girl in all over the world, I like shopping and buy many kinds of clothes. I have a big closet in my room, but without any effort, I make the closet full with my clothes in no time, so that I need to give the closet a regular clean and throw some of them away or donate them to others who need them. I have all kinds of clothes, but I like colorful dress most. Most of the clothes are bright and I do not like wear dark clothes. Moreover, instead of wearing trousers, I like wear skirt and dress. Therefore, the bright skirt and dress take up most of my closet’s space. The space left is taken up by the bright casual clothes. Meanwhile, I like wear all kinds of high-heeled shoes and plimsolls. You can find me wearing bright dress and high-heeled shoes all the time. But sometimes, you can still find me wearing casual clothes and plimsolls. I do not like wear adornment. Even though I like collecting various adornments, I do not enjoy wearing them.

The style of my dress is close related to my traditional values and brief. As I am a girl, my mother keep telling me that girl should be wear bright color clothes while boys should wear dark clothes since I was a child. And my mother also tells me that girl should wear skirts and dresses instead of trousers, trousers are made for the male. Because of my mother’s values and briefs, my mother kept buying me bright clothes and dresses and skirts and dressed me like a princess when I was a little child. Influenced by mother, I get used to the bright color clothes, dress, and skirt and I cannot help buying these kinds of clothes when I grow up. Maybe deep in my mind, just like my mother, I believe that girl should wear bright clothes, dresses, skirts and high-heeled shoes instead of trousers. However, at the mean time, the idea that male and female is equal is widely spread. And I am in the society which is become freer and freer so that I wear causal clothes and plimsolls sometimes as well. Therefore, my clothes reflect my paradoxical values and briefs. On one hand, I am traditional and like wearing like a princess. On the other hand, I accept the value of the society nowadays and dress neutral clothes.

When shopping, I choose the clothes without thinking twice. Instead, I buy clothes according to my mood at that time. I think the choice I made can reflect my subconscious. Sometimes, I feel like wearing bright clothes, but sometimes, I just want to relax and wear casual clothes. But the style of my clothes changes as days go by. When I was a child, I liked wearing bright dress and skirts. When wearing bright clothes, I wore many different kinds of adornment such as necklace, hairpin and so on. But when I grow up, I do not wear adornment at all.

My family is a traditional Chinese family, which believes that girls should wear bright dresses, skirts and clothes, while boys should wear dark clothes and trousers. And they think that girl should be conservative, while the boys should be brave and open-minded. Therefore, my mother keeps wearing bright dresses and my father keeps wearing dark clothes. And as days go by, nothing of their style in dress has changed.

The situation is completely different when it comes to my peer community. Most of my girl friends like wearing neutral clothes, while most of my boy friends enjoy wearing clothes of different colors. And most of the time, the girls around me do not enjoy wearing adornment. But some boys around me begin to like wearing rings, necklaces, bracelet and so on. I thinks it is because the idea of everybody is equal is widely spread and accepted. And as days go by, the difference between males and females become blurry. And as the pressure about the dress of female and male from public opinion become less and less with the development of the society, girls begin to enjoy wearing neutral clothes and behave like boys and boys also want to break the limitation and wear bright clothes and adornment. The great change of my peer community’s body adornment and dress reflect the values and briefs of the society is changing in high speed and the idea of equality between male and female is widely spread in the world.

Food as art is written by Elizabeth Telfer, a famous philosopher who masters the relationship between philosophy and food. In the book named Food as art, Elizabeth makes a deep research on the top which concerned with whether food can be regarded as a work of art. She tends to put forward the question and then try to answer the question step by step instead of answering the question at the beginning. In order to answer the question whether food is art, Elizabeth makes an introduction of the definition of aesthetic reaction. And then she cites Urmson’s definition of art in order to give rise to the discussion of the definition of art. Therefore, she makes a conclusion that only when the food is delicious and man-made, and made with aesthetic consideration by the makers and cooks. Moreover, the aesthetic standard of the society and the intention of the makers should also be taken into consideration when discussing whether food can be considered as a piece of art. The food can be considered as art if the makers want the eaters have a sense of pleasure and the food is so tasty and delicious that the eaters enjoy the food very much.

When I see the topic of discussing whether food can be regarded as art, I cannot help thinking that food must be a piece of art because I enjoy eating very much. But when reading the article named Food as art written by Elizabeth Telfer, I learn to analyze the topic in the view of philosophy. I realize that in order to figure out the question, we need to consider in many factors. However, I feel a little confused the standard which we should use to conclude whether food can be considered as a piece of art. Let’s take fast food as example. We eat fast food all the time because fast food can bring us convince. However, can we that fast food is art. Fast food is made both human being and machines. And it sometimes tastes good. But the intension of the makers is to make the food fast and not wasting too much time, instead of making it in order to make the eaters feel happy. Aesthetic reactions are the species of pleasure to something (Telfer, 2002). That is to say, fast food can not be treated as art because it can not fulfill the requirement of aesthetic consideration. Therefore, fast food can not be considered as art.

Ellen Dissanayake is an American anthropologist, who also makes many research of art. According to his experience of living in many countries for more than ten years, she writes a book named What is art for?, which makes a great contribution to the world’ study on art. According to Ellen Dissanayake, art is about emotion and psychology, which accords with Elizabeth’s idea which thinks that the food which can bring eaters a sense a pleasure can be regarded as art. Moreover, Dissanayake also thinks that art is inherent characteristic of human being which includes society and history (Dissanayake, 1992). Dissanayake thinks that art is concerned with the society and history which also accords with Elizabeth’s idea that art should be conform to the aesthetic standard of the society. However, Dissanayake put forwards the phrase of “making special”, which is the core of the term of Behavior of Art. But Elizabeth does not think that the food which can be considered as art should be special. Elizabeth thinks that the food should smell and taste good but she does not require the food to be special. Elizabeth has said that the food which can be regarded as art is too complex so that it is long-drwan-out to be understandable (Dissanayake, 1992).

As far as I am concerned, I think that sometimes food can be considered as a piece of art but sometimes it can not. I believe that besides the taste, the smell, the society’s aesthetic standard, the history, the intention of the makers, the food which can be considered as a piece of art must be made not only by the hand of the makers, but also by the hearts of the makers. Only when the makers make the food with their hearts, can be food be considered as art, can the food brings the eaters the sense of pleasure. I believe that only when the food can make people happy, can be food be called as a piece of art. There are many kinds of food in the world, but some of the food is used to make people to survive but some is used to make people happy. The enjoyable food should be art.

 

 

References:

Dissanayake, E. (1992). “Art for life’s sake”. Art Therapy: Journal of the American Art Therapy Association, 9/4, 169-178.

Telfer, E. (2002). “Food As Art”. Arguing About Art: Contemporary Philophical Debates. Taylor-Francis e-Library, 17-26.