{"id":866,"date":"2017-08-07T05:33:03","date_gmt":"2017-08-07T05:33:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/course.oeru.org\/art103\/?page_id=866"},"modified":"2017-08-07T05:33:03","modified_gmt":"2017-08-07T05:33:03","slug":"third-level-of-meaning-context","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/course.oeru.org\/art103\/learning-pathways\/how-art-speaks\/third-level-of-meaning-context\/","title":{"rendered":"Third level of meaning-Context"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Overview of Context<\/h2>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\n\t
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The decorative arts have meaning too, primarily in the functionality of the art works themselves, but also in the style and decorations afforded them. A goblet<\/a> from the 17th century has an aesthetic meaning in its organic form, in its function as a means to hold and dispense liquid, and a particular historical meaning in the way it is embellished with diamond point engravings that depict the flow of the river Rhine (click \u2018Fullscreen\u2019 at the bottom of the image, and use the ‘+’ tool to see the goblet in detail). The goblet\u2019s detailed map of the Rhine gives it specific context: the historical, religious or social issues surrounding a work of art.\n<\/p>\n

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Funerary mask, 10th\u201311th century Peru, Sic\u00e1n (Lambayeque), gold, copper overlays, cinnabar, 29.2 x 49.5 cm, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

These issues not only influence the way the viewer finds meaning in particular works of art but also how the artists themselves create them. For instance, this hammered gold mask from Peru\u2019s Sican culture is simple and symmetrical in form and striking in its visage. <\/p>\n

For the Sican people the mask represented either the Sican deity from the spiritual world or the lord of Sican, a man who represented the deity in the natural world. Masks were stacked at the feet of the dead lord in his tomb. In this cultural context the masks had significance in the life, death and spiritual worlds of the Sican people.\n<\/p>\n

To view James Rosenquist\u2019s painting F-111<\/i> is to be confronted with a huge image of a fighter jet overlaid with images from popular culture, all in bright colors and seemingly without connection.\n<\/p>\n