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Art History & Time Periods: Home

A research topic guide covering art history, including major time periods.

Art Movements & Time Periods

This guide covers major art history time periods throughout history. It is meant as an overview of the broader topic. Links are provided to additional internet resources, reference works, journal articles, streaming films, and books. 

Databases

Art Through Time: A Global View

 

This 13-part series examines themes connecting works of art created around the world in different eras. It is an exploration of diverse cultural perspectives on shared human experiences.

Watch on Films on Demand>>

The Evolution of Art

For thousands of years, artists were anonymous, yet today they are frequently honored as celebrities. How did this change in perspective come about? This program tracks the cultural evolution of art—from the ancient Greeks to the modern world, where art is big business—and addresses the technological changes that have fueled various artistic revolutions down through the centuries. Featured experts are sociologist Vera Zolberg, of the New School for Social Research; Catherine Millet, editor-in-chief of Art Press; and art historians Marylin Stokstad, of the University of Kansas, and Jean-Luc Chalumeau, of Verso arts et lettres. (53 minutes)

Source: Evolution of Art

Perspectives

Art: a New History

In Art: A New History, Paul Johnson turns his great gifts as a world historian to a subject that has enthralled him all his life: the history of art. This narrative account, from the earliest cave paintings up to the present day, has new things to say about almost every period of art. Taking account of changing scholarship and shifting opinions, he draws our attention to a number of neglected artists and styles, especially in Scandinavia, Germany, Russia and the Americas. Paul Johnson puts the creative originality of the individual at the heart of his story. He pays particular attention to key periods: the emergence of the artistic personality in the Renaissance, the new realism of the early seventeenth century, the discovery of landscape painting as a separate art form, and the rise of ideological art. He notes the division of 'fashion art' and fine art at the beginning of the twentieth century, and how it has now widened. Though challenging and controversial, Paul Johnson is not primarily a revisionist. He is a passionate lover of beauty who finds creativity in many places. With 300 colour illustrations, this book is vivid, evocative and immensely readable, whether the author is describing the beauty of Egyptian low-relief carving or the medieval cathedrals of Europe, the watercolours of Thomas Girtin or the utility of Roman bridges ('the best bridges in history'), the genius of Andrew Wyeth or the tranquility of the Great Mosque at Damascus, the paintings of Ilya Repin or a carpet-page from the Lindisfarne Gospels. The warmth and enthusiasm of Paul Johnson's descriptions will send readers hurrying off to see these wonders for themselves.

Janson's History of Art

For courses in the History of Art. "R"ewritten """and reorganized, this new edition weaves together the most recent scholarship, the most current thinking in art history, and the most innovative online supplements, including MyArtsLab and the Prentice Hall Digital Art Library. Experience the new Janson and re-experience the history of art." The Portable Edition of Janson's History of Art, Eighth Edition features four lightweight, paperback books packaged together along with optional access to a powerful student website, www.myartslab.com, making the text more student friendly than ever. "Janson's History of Art "is still available in the original hardcover edition and in Volume I and Volume II splits. The Portable Edition is comprised of four books, each representing a major period of art history. Long established as the classic and seminal introduction to art of the Western world, the Eighth Edition of "Janson's History of Art "is groundbreaking. When Harry Abrams first published the "History of Art" in 1962, John F. Kennedy occupied the White House, and Andy Warhol was an emerging artist. Janson offered his readers a strong focus on Western art, an important consideration of technique and style, and a clear point of view. "The History of Art," said Janson, was not just a stringing together of historically significant objects, but the writing of a story about their interconnections, a history of styles and of stylistic change. Janson's text focused on the visual and technical characteristics of the objects he discussed, often in extraordinarily eloquent language. Janson's "History of Art" helped to establish the canon of art history for many generations of scholars. The new Eighth Edition, although revised to remain current with new discoveries and scholarship, continues to follow Janson's lead in important ways: It is limited to the Western tradition, with a chapter on Islamic art and its relationship to Western art. It keeps the focus of the discussion on the object, its manufacture, and its visual character. It considers the contribution of the artist as an important part of the analysis. This edition maintains an organization along the lines established by Janson, with separate chapters on the Northern European Renaissance, the Italian Renaissance, the High Renaissance, and Baroque art, with stylistic divisions for key periods of the modern era. Also embedded in this edition is the narrative of how art has changed over time in the cultures that Europe has claimed as its patrimony.

Art History: a Very Short Introduction

This clear and concise new introduction examines all the major debates and issues using a wide range of well-known examples. It discusses the challenge of using verbal and written language to analyse a visual form. Dana Arnold also examines the many different ways of writing about art, and thechanging boundaries of the subject of art history. Topics covered include the canon of Art History, the role of the gallery, 'blockbuster' exhibitions, the emergence of social histories of art (Feminist Art History or Queer Art History, for example), the impact of photography, and the development ofArt History using artefacts such as the altarpiece, the portrait, or pornography, to explore social and cultural issues such as consumption, taste, religion, and politics.Importantly, this book explains how the traditional emphasis on periods and styles originates in western art production and can obscure other critical approaches, as well as art from non western cultures.

Art Across Time

Art across Time combines sound scholarship, lavish visuals, and a lively narrative to provide students with a comprehensive, accessible, and engaging introduction to Art History. Popular with majors and non-majors alike, the text offers readers more than a chronology of art by placing each work within the time-and-place context within which it was created. Encountering and interpreting a work of art in context offers the reader the richest possible experience of it. Large scale and high quality visual reproductions of artworks are often presented from multiple perspectives to enhance visual appeal and allow students to view details and elements of composition with greater ease. A thoughtful pedagogical approach helps students consider what they are viewing.

Gardner's Art Through the Ages

GARDNER'S ART THROUGH THE AGES: A GLOBAL HISTORY provides you with a comprehensive, beautifully illustrated tour of the world's great artistic traditions! Easy to read and understand, the 15th edition of the most widely read art history book in the English language continues to evolve, providing a rich cultural backdrop for each of the covered periods and geographical locations, and incorporating new artists and art forms -- all reproduced according to the highest standards of clarity and color fidelity. A complete online learning environment, including all images and an eBook, also is available. The unique Scale feature will help you better visualize the actual size of the artworks shown in the book. "The Big Picture" overviews at the end of every chapter summarize the chapter's important concepts.

A History of European Art

Forty-eight lectures of thirty minutes each by William Kloss, independent art historian with Smithsonian Associates, the Smithsonian Institution.

Sister Wendy's Story of Painting

Not since Gombrich's Story of Art has a popular guide to painting been so accessible and influential. This stunning guide to 800 years of Western art moves effortlessly from Byzantium to Bauhaus via 750 full-color photographs and illustrations, and Sister Wendy's benchmark style: informative, conversational, engaging. Movements are highlighted, as are individual artists, and the various techniques they use as masters are brilliantly exposed.

Museum Masterpieces the Louvre

This series of lectures introduces the greatest of universal museums. Its aim is not comprehensive. The focus is narrowed to the Department of Paintings, which is responsible for European paintings from the Middle Ages until the mid-19th century. These works of art form an encyclopedic summary of the achievements of painters that can be called the single most important such collection in the world. The aim of these lectures is to both prepare new viewers for a visit and to be a "study aid" for those who have been and gone before. Critic and historian Richard Brettell begins with an overview of the Louvre's colorful history as royal palace, art academy, and national showcase. The lectures explore some of the most beautiful and renowned examples of European painting, including masterworks by Raphael, Caravaggio, Leonardo da Vinci, Watteau, Rubens and Vermeer.