The great civilizations of history – Mesopotamian, Persian, Chinese, Indian, Roman, Egyptian and Greek – were all centres of unique styles of art and design that contributed towards the modern understanding of art, and the contemporary theory of aesthetic philosophy.
One can watch the interpretation of fluid aesthetic through time through the artistic representation of the human physical form. Dating to early Greek sculpture and drawing, the human form has provided a timeless model for the cultivation and evolution of art and aesthetics. Features like proportion, musculature and accurate representation are used as an unchanging baseline through time – allowing artists and aesthetic periods to deviate from imitation to interpretation. Aesthetic similarities in different cultures are also observable in the artistic representation of the human form. Features such as body hair are often omitted, showing a near-universal preference for hairlessness.
The universality of some aesthetic qualities are observed in the recognition of many human facial expressions across cultures. In innate ways, humans appear to share some aesthetic judgments on a primal, or instinctual level. Similarly, certain things cause similar reactions across cultures, such as objects of disgust or pleasure, which support a theory of shared human perspective. As with all things human, there will be deviants to all rules, revealing that much of art and life is judged on an individual level.
Cultural norms and societal values also influence accepted aesthetic judgments. In artistic works, the female form has seen several incarnations, expressing societal expectations. In some cultures and some eras, curvaceousness and ample flesh are appreciated as symbols of beauty and prosperity. In these depictions, a woman’s health and reproductive strengths are imparted through the shape of her form, also implying wealth and status. In other eras and cultures, the female form is most appreciated slender and well toned, implying wealth and privilege in another time.
Aesthetics as a philosophy is differently understood in the post modern era, and many thinkers now refuse to accept dominant theories of beauty or art. Instead, expression and experience, in the moment, are the aesthetic. However, as a field of study, a discussion continues about the meaning of art, beauty, and meaning itself.
Read more: Aesthetics in Culture