Perseopolis

When watching the videos on Perseopolis I noticed right away that they had simliaraties to other cultures we haved studied. They had huge bulls on the columns decorating the entrance. These looked like the style of the Ancient Near East and also they even had the man bird bull creature on the walls. The one thing different was the texture ofthe beards were more like round dots. I thought it was cool that this culture viewed equality of the nations of the Persian Empire as important. They showed a procession wall relief of people representing different parts of the area offering gifts to the king. The offerings were said to be out of respect for the king but to me it seemed like just gifts so the king will leave their region alone. Also they did not really show any thing about women playing any roles of importance. I wonder why they cared about equality enough to create the wall relief and yet they do not show any thing of women. They said all that marble once was black. I didnt see the originals but so the marble is white and they just paint it black? for some reason I was thinking there was such a thing as black marble as a resource, but if its paint then I understand that it was just faded away with time.

Greek Sculpture

I think greek statues are inspiring because like they said in the video, they are examples of a super human;more human than human. When we learned about Egypt I found that the gods like Anubis and Horace were super hybrid animals; aspects of the best qualites of that animal compiled into one. Its seems thats what the Greeks did with the human figure once they grew tired of making realistic statues they exaggerated the muscles for an ultimate althete-like god. They reached such a far realistic point compared with what they began with it makes me question what else would they have done after that? Also their progress changed so quickly I wonder what else besides observing help aid this progression? Were their tools getting more advanced? Maybe they sketched the human body and drew up plans before sculpting or did they just sculpt without them? The theme that exaggeration was hardwired in humans intrigued me.I think that holds true to even today.

Ancient Aegean

The two videos on Ancient Aegean brought up the main question of how much is fiction and how much is real?In the Ancient Island of Crete video it seemed like Evans used the Minoians as therapy for himself; living in a paradise for himself, since they mentioned that war was going on at the same time he worked on this. Its like a monument of his own imagination than what it really might have been. Although I do think it was a great idea for them to recreate it so people could have a tangible visual of how it could have looked.But that does bring up what if he ruined the real work by doing this. The frescoes looked similiar to the Ancient near east and Egyptians. Also the thick lines were like the Japanese with the cartoonlike paintings. In the second video they had mentioned a maze underneath the building and they even said it could have been the inspiration to the labrinyth maze tale. That makes me wonder weather more buildings had maze in the interior? Could they have been the norm of the time? That would be an interesting way of life, getting lost all the time.

Shinto

Shinto or "Kami-no-michi" which means the way of the gods is a religion in Japan that focuses on the relationship and harmony of human beings and the earth. They value the importance of nature. Shinto does not have official holy books, a founder, teachers or saints. It is based on mythology which can be found in Kojiki, the Records of Ancient Matters and the Chronicles of Japan; these were written in the 8th Century, even though the myths were orally passed down until the 5th century.

                                         
 Shinto had Amaterasu the sun goddess,Egypt's Ra came to mind. I researched a bit on her because I thought it was interesting that she was infact a goddess. Amaterasu was born from Izanagi's (I guess he just came back from the underworld looking for his sister) left eyeball, along with other heavenly people who were born from his body parts. She had symbols of a necklace of light, the milky way and her jeweled clothes. She introduced weaving clothes from silk to the humans. I also found out that she had a trouble some rival named Susano. He did horrible things like covering her temples floors with dung, killing horses, and servants. I guess this caused her to want to hide in a cave which she did not leave until a gods party intrigued her and also her own reflection and when she emerged from the cave, pushing a boulder away, supposedly the first dawns light happened. Susano got punished; having his nails and beard trimmed and sent to earth. (if you want to read the full detailed myth I have a link at the end of this blog)

This depicts the sun godess emerging, very cartoon like style here.

                                                             
          Kami is the word for gods and they were believed to purify the land. The Japanese have shrines to honor their gods. They are built on moutains and uneven land. Their are pilgrimages to these shrines, this is like many of the cultures we have been studying like Egypt giving offering to animal-god temples,and also with having temples where to pray is like both India, and china. Buddism influenced things. Shinto shrines originally were simple in design and left unpainted but then with Buddism became popular the shrines were then painted with bright colors. Also the images of the gods changed they were just symbols but later made into human images.

(brightly painted in comparison to the image of Ihrine Ise Bay Shrine)

 

                                       

        One of the oldest and most important shrine is the Ihrine Ise Bay shrine. Legends has it that the shrine has correlation to Amatersau's mirror which she gave to the first emperor, Jimmu (supposedly descented from gods) In the image of this shrine you can see the difference of the buddist influenced and with the original design. Also it seems more in harmony with nature and the Shinto way because of the green growth on the roof.

              Izumo Taisha Jinja is another shrine. Kamis are said to gather to the shrines every October, so I guess they are there right now!

            Also I found a cool image of kitsune guardians that can be found in shrines.(once more I think of Egypt and china because of the usage of animal icons as protectors with importance) At the museum in the China room they had akita like dog statues which protected the tomb.

 

 

So many Videos!!!!!!!!

an example of a Lantern Festival in the shrines This video is short and gives insight of celebrations of the shrines.

fox statues in shrine it just shows a shrine with the fox statues similar to the image above

Kami talks of the gods

Creation Myth story story of Izanami and Izanagi

Amaterasu visual art story of the sun goddess

 

 

                                                             Department of Asian Art. "Shinto". In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/shin/hd_shin.htm (October 2002) Web. 10. 2012.

"Shinto." The Columbia Encyclopedia. New York: Columbia University Press, 2008. Credo Reference. Web. 10 October 2012.

"Shinto." The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia with Atlas and Weather guide. Abington: Helicon, 2010. Credo Reference. Web. 10 October 2012.


 If you want to read the whole story of Amaterasu http://www.credoreference.com/entry/bloommyth/amaterasu

Art of Asia:Architecture-Four rooms

When watching these two videos I thought how peaceful and soothing it must have been to be in these rooms. In the part where they were discussing the Japanese large formal reception room  they had mentioned that the carpenders made sure when doing the wood trimming that they discarded wood with knots and they also  embellished the rooms;the architecture seemed kind of percise with the construction and lines. I thought just this part was in a way contradicting what Chinese and Japanese theme of nature emerging with people. The part of the Chinese room of the Wu family I thought it was interesting that the size and position of the chairs correlated with the importance of the guests. I guess the smaller the chair the less important you were. I wonder how the person with the tiniest chair felt about this; they must have been aware of the tradition. It seemed like they worshipped their ancestors like gods by having offerings given to them. This makes me think of the other cultures we have studied; like India and Egypt because they have multiple gods. They had talked of the tea ceremony which reminded me in ceramics we have learned about how important it was and how serious they took this. This culture seems to really emphasize the value of cherishing things that somepeople may think is small, by taking it all in. I wouldnt mind having my very own scholars room. I could have my birds singing, music playing, tickling crickets, drinking tea while painting. It sounds like a good idea right now especially after getting done with homework.

Chinese Traditional Music

Since I had researched eariler about the Chinese bells and music is a part of culture and art  I was inspired to research more into Chinese Traditional music. In the Song Dynasty this ermerged. It was very important to them and was mainly storytelling through music. It relates to the other cultures we have been studying because like Egypt's hieroglyphics or statues of India that tell of rulers or gods music conveys these aspects as well and are passed down through generations. Musical storytellers were highly respected as professionals. There are  two main forms which are Jingyun daguandtanci, its also known as Peking drumsong, and also Tanci, which is southern style storytelling. They both are musical narratives,but Jingyun focused on stories about China's history while Tanci told about romantic tales of Ming and Qing periods. I learned that these types of musicals became more popular in the 19th and 20th century and are still being played today.
             In the storytelling they would usually have a couple musicians playing and half singing, half speaking the tales. The instruments they used were made of silk thread. Instruments which were played are the Dizi, Qin(like a zither),Zheng, Erhu(a bowe lute),Shend, Pipa(plucked flute), Yueqin(struck lute), and Lithophone, qing. Here are some photos that illustrate the use of the instruments.

dizi

Qin

Zheng

Erhu

Shend

pipa

Yueqin

Lithophone

 

I wanted to know how the instruments sounded so I watched some videos of traditional chinese music. I like the Erhu instrument the best. It has a nice melancholy sound to it.

Pipa instrument

Erhu,Dizi,Pipa,guzheng

I think the music makes sense with the art. Looking at the silk and paintings you can defiently see(or hear) the connection.

The use of thin lines and open space somehow reminds me of the light parts and heavyness of the music. or maybe I have been just listening to it for too long.

 

 

 

 

"East Asia." The Harvard Dictionary of Music. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003. Credo Reference. Web. 01 October 2012.