Hirst Vanitas In Art

The piece reflects the human sacrifices that took place 18 times a year in the Aztec culture. On the sculpture of the Goddess hangs a necklace of hands, hearts, and a dangling skull. She also represents the women who die in childbirth, and for Earth that provides everything but also consumes everything that lives. With two serpents, the eyes are her eyes, and replace her head that was cut off which represent gushing blood, as she bore Huitzilopochtli full grown and armored. The sculpture of a god reflect their beliefs within their cultures, in which they strongly worshipped gods, and built temples, as well as statues in their honor.

iii. The site azcentral.com mentioned earlier also tells us that skulls are used to symbolize death and rebirth.

As the name suggests the skull instantly draws the eye, the hollow face of the skull is in the center of the oil on wood painting. The skull extends to the right where one sees an empty glass on its side resting at an angle to the skull. The glass is reflecting light along its curve but does not give one an actual reflection. Beneath both the skull and glass is a book and a sheaf of papers in a portfolio. The book’s binding is brown and the pages are yellowing, whereas the papers in the moss green portfolio are a contrasting white. The presence of paper fits with the other object in the title the writing quill, whose feather rests on the book and sheaf. The head of the quill points to the right of the painting where it rests on an overturned ink well. In the background of this painting smoke is rising off a recently extinguished oil lamp, partially in

In their decorations, the skull or skeleton is often used. They are often made to be grinning or to be doing things like drinking, eating, and even riding horses. The skeleton is turned into a mocking of death itself, and is a symbol of celebration of passing into the next life.

Grupo Mondongo’s medium choice is quite new and their collage is quite extraordinary, its basically a sculpture of small things that most people have likely seen, put together to make it look like a skull in a size of about 5 foot by 4 foot. The artist probably chose to make it a skull because Calavera is a sugar skull that is eaten on days leading up to ‘The Day of the Dead’ in most Latin American countries. The title of the artwork is obviously shown in the sculpture, it shows a skull and has a picture of a skull. The references to these sculptures has a lot of different historical paintings such as, “The Last Supper”, “Lady with an Ermine”, “The Great waves of Kanagawa” and “Michael Jackson and Bubbles.” There are also famous movies such as “King Kong,” “Star Wars,” and “The Terminator.”

They celebrate the dead by letting the spirits know they have not forgotten about them. The skull is

The Nok heads and sculptures of Nigeria are made hallow, life-sized terra-cotta figures with a coiling technique commonly used to make pottery vessels (Thames & Hudson, 2015, pg.451). Nok heads were made with clay and although clay is very durable it is also breakable. However, very few sculpture have been found undamaged. The head of the figures was larger than the bodies because the artists wanted to emphasize the association between the head with knowledge and identity. The Nok head below is from Rafin Kura, sculpted in c. 500 BCE-200 CE. Like many Nok heads, this sculpture has a unique hairstyle, with three buns on top. It also has triangular- shaped eyes with holes in the pupils, nostrils, mouth, and

This Etruscan- Roman piece of art is detailed all around, but also ideal as depictions look influential throughout the generations from the living patrician man holding the lifeless portrait busts of the two very distinct ancestors. The surface of the marble used to carve the male figure, and the portrait heads is very smooth and pale in colour, as the natural agent simulates’ realistic complexion through the veins present within the marble creating a three- dimensional illusion of meticulous naturalistic rendition of the human anatomy engraved with relief detail all around. The function of the portrait sculpture was to have a permanent documentation motivated by the realistic commemoration of one’s ancestors in a religious and ritualistic funeral use of death masks, that would have been cast from the face of the deceased. This became an obvious style of presenting recognizable prestige that conveyed the significance of

In terms of subject matter, both works are visual depictions of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. In each painting, Christ is the central figure, surrounded by two groups of figures. On the left, a group of women that includes the Virgin Mary mourns over the dead body of Christ, while on the right is a group of soldiers and other lamenters. Both works feature a rocky landscape on which the figures are positioned. Encircling Christ are several angels whose gestures of lamentation echo those of the figures below. Highlighting the severity of each scene is the blood that pours from Jesus' wounds. The blood from his feet drips onto human bones that are embedded in the rocky terrain below. The skull serves as a "memento mori," or a reminder of death, an idea that has been repeated in several other depictions of Christ's crucifixion.

The bulge of skulls as a Day of the Asleep amount harkens aback to the canicule of the Aztecs. Aback then, skulls were important icons that illustrated their acceptance in the actuality of an animate afterlife. In Mexican culture, skulls abide to betoken afterlife and

Standing at a height of twelve inches tall, this Vessel was one of many Aztec artifacts form 1300 A.D. It is made from brown earthenware clay and is painted with red with intricate details in black. It was used to represent death and the power in it, through the red and black paint. This piece is highly polished to show the black and red color contrast. This vessel was from The Aztec who was inspired by the horror of blood and death. On this piece, as well as of the other pieces in this collection, there is a stamp of the horror of death, to express that there is no higher brutality than the deceased. This stamp signifies the religious and cultural significances of the Aztec barbarians since it displays the warrior of a cruel God and that they

Both Etruscan and Roman tomb sculpture function to memorialize the departed allowing them to move on from the world of the living and seeks to comfort those who have lost the ones they love. The two societies have differing practices in regards to death and therefore sculptures concerning the subject are somewhat different with a few identifiable similarities. While both societies seek to comfort the living and commemorate the dead this is achieved through different approaches. The Etruscan Sarcophagus with reclining couple from Cerveteri, Italy and the Mummy of Artemidorus from Roman Egypt are two examples of contrasting representations of the dead. When analyzing tomb sculpture one of the main questions is whether the work adapts a retrospective approach (presentation of the deceased as they were in life) or a prospective one (the viewpoint of looking forward to life beyond the grave). While the Etruscan sarcophagus gives a more retrospective memorialization through the depiction of the couple in a state of regularity the Roman Mummy of Artemidorus presents a more prospective approach concerning the deceased through the emphasis of funerary practices.

There have been countless duels between two opposing sides in the history Roman artistry. This sculpture relief signifies the classic battle of good versus evil. Time and time again, benevolent heroes find themselves in a struggle to combat worthy yet malicious adversaries. The Roman sarcophagus, a two by five feet marble coffin, is certainly no exception. It represents another division to this timeless good-evil epic, its visual characteristics, emphasis on contrasts, and its extensive array of details give it an identity that is uniquely its own. It portrays a sense of legendary fantasy to the viewer, one pertaining to hostility, violence, and pure anger. The sculpture seems overly shallow due to

Non-conformist to traditional art forms, Conceptualism challenges the viewer to delve into the mindset of the artist. It is often seen as multidimensional as it forces the audience to decipher the artists intentions. This art movement has been completely rejecting the standard ideas of art since the mid-1960’s. Since then, many artists have made a name for themselves by self-consciously expanding the boundaries of art. Many of these artists have said they’ve linked their work to artist Marcel Duchamp.

The sculptures and paint show details how society viewed and interpreted women body, sexuality, and maternity. In addition, revealed that these women were protected from threats around them with ornaments. Civilizations since early times, believed that we were in permanent threat from forces we do not see or cannot explain and because of it, we protected ourselves with artificial elements in a form of jewelry, crowns or caps. This idea has been continue from one generation to the next to the point that in modern societies some of us still use this type of protection in our bodies (e.g., small cross, divine images, tattoos, etc.).These pieces of art also indicate that humans believed in gods with superpowers and they are looking over us constantly. Humanity also believes in dark forces or demons trying to makes us do things that would upset the good gods. Some of the differences between these sculptures and paint are the material in which each one of them were created. The first figure, the Woman of Willendorf was carved in limestone, the second piece, the portrait of Queen Tiye was carved in wood and the last piece, the Virgin and Child Icon was created of tempera on a wood. You can also notice how the details on their faces and bodies changes throughout the time and years. The woman of Willendorf figurine offers details of a voluptuous nude women’s body but there is not face, or feet. Queen Tiye statue shows the face of a woman in detail closed to the gods but without any body parts and lastly The Virgin and Child Icon, is an expression of divinity of the views, reflections and beliefs from the gospel. Because communities started to innovate on the art of carving and painting, populations began to discover and/or create art with the objective of expressing different purposes of our daily lives, such as the beauty of a woman’s body, or to commemorate an ancient