“Art is not an end in itself, but a means of addressing humanity.”
Modest Mussorgsky
As philosopher Richard Wollheim says, art is “one of the most elusive of the traditional problems of human culture.” In its simplest manifestation, art is a form of communication that serves as a vehicle for the expression of emotions and ideas. As ideas and beliefs are culturally specific and constantly changing over time, there really is no generally agreed definition of what constitutes art. That being said, the classical branches of the visual arts are identified as painting, sculpture and architecture. Literature and poetry are considered part of the humanities or as one of the arts, while music, alongside theatre, film and dance belong to the performing arts. In this section you will discover not only specific explorations of individual art forms, but also a more detailed probing of the relationship between the visual arts and music, including painting and music, sculpture and music and architecture and music. Originally, poetry and music were treated as a unity, but gradually they have become more independent. Nevertheless, the two art forms have never forgotten their shared genetic makeup, and been intertwined for millennia. Art and music have engaged in a dynamic relationship that reveals a diverse range of human activity intended to be appreciated for their beauty.
Liszt : Les Jeux d’eau a la Villa d’Este (1882) Ravel : Jeux d’Eau (1901) Tan Dun : Memories in Watercolor (2003) Debussy : Preludes (1910-1913) – Des pas sur la neige Debussy : Preludes (1910-1913) – Brouillards Debussy :
Eric Satie Parade (1917) Gymnopédies (1893) In their respective fields, Paul Cézanne and Claude Debussy influenced the artists of the early 20th century, which found their counterparts in intellectual circles formed around writers and poets such as Stéphane Mallarmé, Guillaume
Debussy La Mer (1905) Estampes (1903) Prélude à l’après midi d’un faune (1894) The works of the great Romantic musicians, painters and writers contributed not only to Impressionism, one of the most important artistic and cultural evolutions in the mid-
Beethoven Minuet in G Beethoven “Moonlight” Piano Sonata no.14, C sharp Minor Carl Maria von Weber Der Freischutz, J277 Schubert Winterreise, Op. 89, D. 911 The events during and following the French Revolution in 1789 represented not only a complete
In the middle of the 18th century the last shadows of the Baroque faded into the more intimate, colorful and pastoral Rococo period. All of the art forms, particularly those in painting and music, emphasize the “artificial” disguised as the
The Baroque period began toward the end of the 16th century, reached into the middle of the 18th century, and is generally seen as the art of the Counter-Reformation. With the Reformation, the Catholic Church had lost a very large
The idea of the Renaissance, in which language, literature, the arts and music saw a remarkable change and renewal, started gradually taking shape in the 14th century, celebrated then and later by writers, artists and musicians such as Petrarch, Boccaccio,
Over the course of centuries, the relationship between music, the arts and literature has always focused on their similarities and differences. The difference between painting, which one sees and music, which one hears, has always been considered obvious. However, as
