SOC 202 Chapter Notes - Chapter 5: Memento Mori, Oil Painting, Bourgeoisie
24 Dec 2016
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Document Summary
Western art is characterized by the desire to possess the object. Paintings are objects that can be bought and owned, are an instrument of possession . Art of a period tends to serve the ideological interests of the ruling class . V specific medium that served and best expressed attitudes to property and exchange. Oil paintings huge disparity between masterpiece and average work. Unique because it can render the tangibility of what it depicts. Oil painting: celebration of wealth, demonstration of the desirability of what money could buy tangibility. Looks unconvincing = makes the metaphysical implication obvious. Mary magdalene"s story of repentance and renunciation isn"t seen in paintings because she"s still painted as an object. Except william blake--figures lose substance, become transparent and indeterminate. The world is there to furnish your residence in it. Their gaze is aloof and wary--they expect no reciprocity. Oil paint = verisimilitude, proximity implying intimacy, but formal portraits still insist upon a formal distance.
