How is Art Classified?
Traditional and contemporary art encompasses activities as diverse as:
Architecture, music, opera, theatre, dance, painting, sculpture, illustration, drawing, cartoons, printmaking, ceramics, stained glass, photography, installation, video, film and cinematography, to name but a few.
All these activities are commonly referred to as “the Arts” and are commonly classified into several overlapping categories, such as: fine, visual, plastic, decorative, applied, and performing.
Disagreement persists as to the precise composition of these categories, but here is a generally accepted classification.
- Fine Arts
This category includes those artworks that are created primarily for aesthetic reasons (‘art for art’s sake’) rather than for commercial or functional use. Designed for its uplifting, life-enhancing qualities, fine art typically denotes the traditional, Western European ‘high arts’, such as:
- Drawing
Using charcoal, chalk, crayon, pastel or with pencil or pen and ink. Two major applications include: illuminated manuscripts (c.600-1200) and book illustration.
- Painting
Using oils, watercolour, gouache, acrylics, ink and wash, or the more old-fashioned tempera or encaustic paints. For an explanation of colourants, see: Colour in Painting and Colour Pigments, Types, History.
- Printmaking
Using simple methods like woodcuts or stencils, the more demanding techniques of engraving, etching and lithography, or the more modern forms like screen-printing, foil imaging or giclee prints. For a significant application of printmaking, see: Poster Art.
- Sculpture
In bronze, stone, marble, wood, or clay.
Another type of Western fine art, which originated in China, is calligraphy: the highly complex form of stylized writing.
The Evolution of Fine Arts
After primitive forms of cave painting, figurine sculptures and other types of ancient art, there occured the golden era of Greek art and other schools of Classical Antiquity. The sacking of Rome (c.400-450) introduced the dead period of the Dark Ages (c.450-1000), brightened only by Celtic art and Ultimate La Tene Celtic designs, after which the history of art in the West is studded with a wide variety of artistic ‘styles’ or ‘movements’ – such as: Gothic (c.1100-1300), Renaissance (c.1300-1600), Baroque (17th century), Neo-Classicism (18th century), Romanticism (18th-19th century), Realism and Impressionism (19th century), Cubism, Expressionism, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism and Pop-Art (20th century).
For a brief review of modernism (c.1860-1965), see Modern art movements; for a guide to postmodernism, (c.1965-present) see our list of the main Contemporary art movements.
The Tradition
Fine art was the traditional type of Academic art taught at the great schools, such as the the Accademia dell’Arte del Disegno in Florence, the Accademia di San Luca in Rome, the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris, and the Royal Academy in London. One of the key legacies of the academies was their theory of linear perspective and their ranking of the painting genres, which classified all works into 5 types: history, portrait, genre-scenes, landscape or still life.
Patrons
Ever since the advent of Christianity, the largest and most significant sponsor of fine art has been the Christian Church. Not surprisingly therefore, the largest body of painting and/or sculpture has been religious art, as has other specific forms like icons and altarpiece art.
- Visual Arts
Visual art includes all the fine arts as well as new media and contemporary forms of expression such as Assemblage, Collage, Conceptual, Installation and Performance art, as well as Photography, (see also: Is Photography Art?) and film-based forms like Video Art and Animation, or any combination thereof. Another type, often created on a monumental scale is the new environmental land art.
- Plastic Arts
The term plastic art typically denotes three-dimensional works employing materials that can be moulded, shaped or manipulated (plasticized) in some way: such as, clay, plaster, stone, metals, wood (sculpture), paper (origami) and so on. For three-dimensional artworks made from everyday materials and “found objects”, including Marcel Duchamp’s “readymades” (1913-21).
- Decorative Arts
This category traditionally denotes functional but ornamental art forms, such as works in glass, clay, wood, metal, or textile fabric. This includes all forms of jewellery and mosaic art, as well as ceramics, (exemplified by beautifully decorated styles of ancient pottery notably Chinese and Greek Pottery) furniture, furnishings, stained glass and tapestry art. Noted styles of decorative art include: Rococo Art (1700-1800), Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (fl. 1848-55), Japonism (c.1854-1900), Art Nouveau (c.1890-1914), Art Deco (c.1925-40), Edwardian, and Retro.
Arguably the greatest period of decorative or applied art in Europe occurred during the 17th/18th centuries at the French Royal Court. For more, see: French Decorative Arts (c.1640-1792); French Designers (c.1640-1792); and French Furniture (c.1640-1792).
- Performance Arts
This type refers to public performance events. Traditional varieties include, theatre, opera, music, and ballet. Contemporary performance art also includes any activity in which the artist’s physical presence acts as the medium. Thus it encompasses, mime, face or body painting, and the like. A hyper-modern type of performance art is known as Happenings.
- Applied Arts
This category encompasses all activities involving the application of aesthetic designs to everyday functional objects. While fine art provides intellectual stimulation to the viewer, applied art creates utilitarian items (a cup, a couch or sofa, a clock, a chair or table) using aesthetic principles in their design. Folk art is predominantly involved with this type of creative activity. Applied art includes architecture, computer art, photography, industrial design, graphic design, fashion design, interior design, as well as all decorative arts. Noted styles include, Bauhaus Design School, as well as Art Nouveau, and Art Deco. One of the most important forms of 20th applied art is architecture, notably supertall skyscraper architecture, which dominates the urban environment in New York, Chicago, Hong Kong and many other cities around the world. For a review of this type of public art, see: American Architecture (1600-present).