Art And Culture Of The Renaissance

Art and Culture of the Renaissance through Baroque Eras

Western world’s ability to rise from the slugged economy of the Middle Age had large effects on the period. The most significant and popular progresses were made in the cultural, social and political institutions. This Renaissance era allowed art to develop far beyond the traditional and conventional religious subject matters. Art advanced to replicate human emotion and, all this time; the driving factor was the culture. How the culture was depicted was what called for art. Artists in given cultures looked for new techniques to express their culture or cultures. Techniques like linear perspective, laws of portion, balance, and physical presence were discovered and used to express the culture using art. Now, is art influenced by culture or culture influenced by art? The question begs for an ambiguous answer. Depending on the understanding of the Renaissance period, art could influence culture, though to a smaller extent and culture influences art, and this is the greater aspect that influences the other. The latter is a view that needs more clarification than the previous one. There are things that were done and some were observed to tell it clearly that it was culture that influenced art and not the other way round.

Firstly, from the layman understanding of art as a way of expressing culture we pose a view that culture has to exist first for it to be expressed. This alone dictates how the art should come out. It should come out exactly like the culture is. Cultural rules and laws, appearance and set up are all the things that art shows. This means that art waits for culture to take shape and then define the art. For instance, the Baroque period of art was mapped with sculptur...

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...encing the culture and not the other way round. However, in most cases it is culture that dictates art. Art comes from what the culture deems necessary and adoptable. Artists paint communal happenings and figures that are already there or were there before. This could be appreciative or teaching to the current culture and its subjects that art is there to appreciate upholding of culture. Art may not be there if there is no culture in the first place. Heroic songs cannot be sung nor heroes’ paintings done if there are no cultural norms that appreciate heroes. It is, therefore, fair to say from one side that culture shapes art and from another side art shapes culture. Art needs culture for it to be relevant and existing just as culture needs art for its spread and continuity it does not matter which one needs the other more, both art and culture influence each other.