Mod 8 video reviews

The video More Human than Human discusses our relationships as humans with human art forms.  It speaks of the different theories for human bodies in art.  The small Female Figure statue, that was discovered in Austria, shown on page 323 in the text, is also discussed in the video as the first sign as to why humans chose to make human art unrealistic to the human body.  The text states that there may not be one simple explanation for this while the video goes into more depth.  A study of the way birds reacted to exaggerated symbols representing their needs (the red stripe study) may reveal that brains are pre-programmed to desire the exaggeration.  In the case of the small statue the motherly features and the plump body are enhanced because that is what would be desired of those peoples.  Both the text and the video discus the commonality of Egyptian art and that is did not change much over thousands of years.  In this case the image of the human body was created due to the Egyptian culture.  This may explain the obsession with human form today.  We are well aware that media today displays the human body in advertisements in the way culture thinks as desirable, thin and muscular. The Greeks felt that human bodies were based on the gods leading to the fascination with human bodies. They studied the human body to make art forms as realistic as possible for the first time in history.  Once perfected they reverted back to the inborn desire for exaggeration.  The body was then formed in statutes such as Warrior A, page 339 of the text, as being more perfect than humanly possibly.  The video goes into great detail describing the process that brought these statues about while the text simply states of their existence. I enjoyed the way the video tied all the theories together in explaining the human art form.

                 


I chose the Cairo Museum video for a few reasons.  I have always found Egyptian art to be interesting considering its amazing longevity.  I also enjoyed the Egyptian display that was at Albright Knox Art Gallery.  I learned several interesting facts about the Cairo Museum from the video.  The museum had been in existence for over 100 years and contains hundreds of thousands of artifacts of which maybe only half are on display.  The others are meticulously stored and logged carefully in the basement as well as other outside facilities.  More artifacts are being discovered on a regular basis.  They need to be extracted in a way as to not disturb how they were discovered and then they must be cleaned and restored to the best of the archeologist’s ability. These artifacts tell a history that is more than double in years to what we know here in the United States. The reading in the Egypt section of the text discusses some of the oldest artwork that has been discovered.  Most of the pieces in the video resembled the items from the text.  There were statues of leaders, “stories” embossed on walls and gold/leather clothing.  The prized possession of the architect in the video was the statue of the priest Kai which strongly resembles the Seated Scribe on page 330 of the text.  These videos are very informative and add information that is not in the text.  It is interesting to see a glimpse of how the artwork is cleaned and restored.