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With the quarter coming to an end, I have been thinking about all the different art we have looked through. Though all of it was impressive in its own way, the one that I found particularly impressive was the Egyptian art. It feels like they had such a influential impact on art and culture from the time they were at the height of their existence all the way up until today.

The work that the Egyptians produced is incredible. Their use of precious materials within their art shows what kind of appreciation they had for the things they made and how much it meant to them to have lavish things. It is also the reason a large portion of it has been burgled through out the years. Just looking at the funeral mask of Tutankhamun illustrates how much they respected their pharaohs, to send him to his grave with such a finely detailed, golden mask that only he would enjoy once buried. I am also impressed by the Egyptians ability to communicate messages in their art using mostly pictures. Their written language is made up of symbols and their use of heiroglyphs, references to religion and images of important people in their work to convey a message is something the Egyptians did very well, and many of their techniques were picked up by other cultures. The palate of Narmer is a piece that, when viewed by an Egyptian, would tell a fairly detailed narrative about king Narmer ruling all of Egypt with the support of Egyptian gods. They also show there strength and power in sculpture, such as in the statue of Khafre carved from a solid dark stone, that glows with a blueish hue when the light hits. It has such a strong and solid appearance, that shows a leader like that equals a strong and solid Egypt. On top of that, large architecture and sculpture like the great pyramids or the Great Sphinx are like nothing that had been done before. I really wish I could have seen the pyramids when they were still cased with lime stone and had their golden caps. They are awesome now, I can only imagine the sight back then. And somehow, because it is still debated, the people of Egypt created these things. Its just amazing.

I have to talk about the traditional Egyptian style and their cannon of proportions because it was so important to them. These rules for artwork were in place for years and created such a signature look to their art that even today, at a glance a piece can be identified as Egyptian or not. The profile head and legs, with the front view eye and torso is such an interesting and effective way of depicting a human. But not just any human, these styles were reserved for kings or gods and lower class people were often depicted in a more natural way. They also incorporated the idea of a hierarchy of scale to draw attention to images of importance, to show status from one person to another.

This class was great. It exposed me to a ton of new artwork and working chronologically I was able to see when and how ideas were used and became popular. How techniques for depicting humans. painting, sculpting, and architecture were first introduced, improved and done away with. Of all the periods we covered I feel like the Egyptians were the most original, creative, lavish, and influential.