V Questions for discussion:

1. What does the term history of art refer to?

2. What was taken as the defining standard in the field of art history?

3. Where did the Renaissance begin?

4. Where did Renaissance thinkers learn from?

5. How did the Renaissance affect European intellectual life in the early modern period?

6. What was the Church’s attitude to the Renaissance art?

7. How did the artists develop art techniques?

8. What gave people access to books?

VI Render the text in brief in a written form

Text C

I Mind the following words and word-combinations:

1. inventor – винахідник

2. archetype – прообраз

3. infinite – безмежний

4. curiosity – цікавість

5. to equall – дорівнювати

6. diversely – різноманітно

7. renowned – визнаний

8. primarily – в першу чергу

9. vastly – широко

10. to conceptualise – замислювати

11. solar – сонячний

12. tensile strength – сила натягування

II Listen to the text. Decide if the statements are true or false:

1. Leonardo da Vinci was an Italian a scientist, engineer, anatomist, painter, sculptor, botanist, musician and writer.

2. He is perhaps the most diversely talented person ever to have lived.

3. Leonardo is renowned primarily as a musician.

4. As an engineer, Leonardo conceptualised a plane.

5. As a scientist, he greatly advanced the state of knowledge in the fields of anatomy and hydrodynamics.

III Listen to the text again and be ready to answer the questions:

1. What is the most famous portrait by Leonardo da Vinci?

2. How is Leonardo da Vinci often described?

Unit 2 The history of arts

Text A

I Listen and remember the following words:

1. to survive – виживати

2. vague – слабкий, невиразний

3. haziness – невиразність

4. sublimity – величність

5. untamed – неприборканий

6. to wane – занепадати

7. exponent – представник, зразок

8. sought (p.p. від to seek) – шукати, намагатися

9. coherent – пов’язаний, послідовний

10. quest – пошук

11. realm – королівство

12. obscure – темний, похмурий

II Read and remember the following phrases:

1. enlightenment period – просвітницький період

2. in confronting – у порівнянні

3. profound influence – глибокий вплив

4. prevailing academic tradition – переважаюча академічна традиція

5. to shift away – переміщуватись

III Read and translate the following text:

The history of arts. Brief overview Part II

Neoclassicism and Romanticism

In the visual arts the European movement called "neoclassicism" began after 1765, as a reaction against both the surviving Baroque and Rococo styles, and as a desire to return to "purity" of the arts of Rome, the more vague perception ("ideal") of Ancient Greek arts (where almost no western artist had actually been) and, to a lesser extent, 16th century Renaissance Classicism.

Contrasting with the Baroque and the Rococo, Neoclassical paintings are devoid of pastel colours and haziness; instead, they have sharp colours.

Romanticism is an artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that originated in 18th century Western Europe, around 1790, during the Industrial Revolution. It was partly a revolt against aristocratic, social, and political norms of the Enlightenment period and a reaction against the scientific rationalization of nature in art and literature. It stressed strong emotion as a source of aesthetic experience, placing new emphasis on such emotions as trepidation, horror, and the awe experienced in confronting the sublimity of untamed nature. It elevated folk art, nature and custom, as well as arguing for an epistemology based on nature, which included human activity conditioned by nature in the form of language, custom and usage.

The Birth of Realism

As the Romantic movement waned, exponents of the visual arts sought to depict the world in a more literal way. Focus shifted away from idealism to a more realistic rendering of nature, social relationships, and the characteristics of the individual, society, and the nation at large. This new realism assumed various forms in the different countries where it took root.

Realism was a historical movement that had a profound influence on the literature and figurative arts of Europe. The most systematic and coherent form evolved in France during the revolutions of 1830 and 1848. It reached its peak during the Second Empire (1852-70) and began to wane in the 1870s.

Modern Art

The beginnings of modern painting started in 19th-century France. The paintings of Gustave Courbet, Edouard Manet, and the Impressionists represent a deepening rejection of the prevailing academic tradition and a quest for a more naturalistic representation of the visual world. From about the 1890s on, different movements and styles arose, such as Neo-Impressionism, Symbolism, Fauvism, Cubism, Futurism, Expressionism, Suprematism, Constructivism, Metaphysical painting, De Stijl, Dada, Surrealism, Social Realism, Abstract Expressionism, Pop art, Op art, Minimal art, and Neo-Expressionism. Despite the enormous variety seen in these movements, most of them are characteristically modern in expressing a spiritual response to the changed conditions of life in the 20th century.

An important trend throughout the 20th century has been the abstract, or non-objective, art – i.e., art in which little or no attempt is made to objectively reproduce or depict the appearances or forms of objects in the realm of nature or the existing physical world. It should also be noted that the development of photography and of allied photomechanical techniques of reproduction has had an obscure but certainly important influence on the development of modern art, because these mechanical techniques freed (or deprived) manually executed drawing and painting of their crucial role as the only means of accurately depicting the visible world.