History of Western Art Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

History of Western Art - Essay Example This piece was made in 1656, and exhibits some similarities to â€Å"The Arnolfini Marriage.† Velasquez uses refined technicalities, and combines them with profound representations, in order to create a court picture. The first similarity that can be made of these two works of art is in their content. They have human subjects as the main characters, but also incorporate dogs in them. The intended audience for both works is supposedly human. In Las Meninas, the mirror in the background reveals two people. They seem to be approaching Margarita (La Infanta), and her maids of honour. In Arnolfini Wedding, the portrait is a visual record of an event that takes place inside the confines of a palace. The audience in this case, is also reflected in the convex mirror placed on the wall behind Arnolfini and his bride. The three people reflected in the mirror are thought to be the audience to the event. In this portrait, there is a dog that is at the feet of the bride. The styles of the two portraits are also closely related. The body expressions used by the subjects are illustrative of the message being passed. In Las Meninas, the maid attending to Margarita is leaning towards her, indicating servitude. The other maid of honour behind Margarita is in a curtsy stance, to welcome the approaching party. The persons approaching this group as seen from the reflection in the mirror seem to be Margarita’s parents. In the Arnolfini Wedding, the bride has her hand in the palm of the groom. This is taken to be a symbol of her giving herself to him. The lighting in the portraits is from natural sources. In Las Meninas, light comes in through the door that appears to be close to an opening letting in sunlight. There also seems to be a light source towards the direction that margarita has turned her head. In Arnolfini Wedding, natural light come in through the open window. There are minimal facial expressions in both portraits. Natural colours are used in the portraits with various shades black and white featuring most in Las Meninas. In Arnolfini Wedding, blue, green and a deep shade of red break this monotony. The main context in both portraits appears to be family. In Las Meninas, there is Margarita who is being served by her maids of honour. From the mirror, her parents are seen seemingly approaching the group. This is why Margaritas head is tilted towards the direction that other subjects in the portrait are looking. The royal family in this case is present in the room. The setting represents how a child of the royal family is attended to. In Arnolfini Wedding, the first step to setting up a family is taking place. This wedding is performed in the privacy of a chamber, and is witnessed by very few people. Having become married, the couple can start their family, as the bride seems to be pregnant. The elegantly dressed persons in the portrait are symbolic of the royal families in the renaissance period. Part Two Humanism in art refers to a cul tural movement that was characteristic of 14th to 16th century art. The focus of works in this period was on humans. This is what set it apart from the earlier centuries that were dominated by Christianity. Humanism offered a different perspective to life. Humanism was a movement that praised humans for their achievements rather than owing it all to divine grace (Gardner, Kleiner and Mamiya). The subjects of painting in this period shifted from religious symbols, to humans and

Social Media on the Internet Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Social Media on the Internet - Essay Example One of the most notable features of social media is that it has grown exponentially across the world within a very short duration compared to other business and communication tools in human history. To illustrate this phenomenon, Lee (2010) points out that while it took 13 years for television to attract over 50 million viewers and 38 years for radio to attract about 50 million listeners, it took 4 years only for internet to attract 50 million participants. He further points out that it took social media platform, Facebook, one and a half years to attract the same number of participants. There has been raging debate on whether the availability and use of social media on the internet is useful to businesses in regard to providing them with new and different useful information. This paper will discuss how the availability and use of social media on the internet really provide businesses with new and different useful information. Historically, technology has been injected and adopted in to the society as well as the business world and it has often required that there be a radical shift in business and cultural processes and practices (Lincoln, 2009). Social media is one such kind of technology in the business world. Unlike other types of technologies, social media technology greatly reflects the social behavior of people. Social media is also unique in the sense that it allows anybody to produce media content and deliver it by interactive communication. Qualman (2010) notes that the available statistics show that social media has established itself as the media of choice around the world over the last 4 years, with over a quarter of the world population using one type of social media or another. The growth of social media has been so tremendous such that social media platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter have grown rapidly and have gradually relegated other forms of advertising such as print advertisements, and threatened them with extinction (Nair, 2011 ). The popularity of the use of social media on the internet can be attributed to four reasons. To start with, users can get the latest information on virtually anything they want. Secondly, it satisfies the desires of the users of expressing themselves. Users are also able to see how individuals and groups that they are interested in are doing therefore getting more satisfaction. Finally, it helps people to escape from their day-to-day routine by providing alternative ways of using time (Lee, 2010). The fact that social media has experienced exponential growth over the years cannot be disputed. However, there has been debate on whether the availability and use of social media on the internet really provides businesses with new and different useful information. The response to this question has been two-fold: on one side, there are those who believe that it does provide businesses with new and different useful information, while on the other side there are those who believe that it does not (Nair, 2011). While the later side has its reasons for taking that position, there is a greater consensus among those engaged in this debate that, indeed, the availability and use of social media on the internet provides businesses with new and different useful information (Hinchcliffe et al., 2012). So, how does the use of social

Is metaphor necessary in technical writing Essay

Is metaphor necessary in technical writing - Essay Example This is because humans are trying to do everything they can to control nature. Man cannot put up with indifferences that nature provide thus he is trying to press nature through science to do according to his will. Science that is required to manipulate nature is too much high and requires a lot of resourcefulness. It is unfortunate that what people think of science is not science but practical science; people often confuse the thought of science and what science can do (Laibichler & Chew, 2003). The constituent part that can speed up this is by the build up of a huge and an incredible credible machine that can only be controlled and interpreted by the physicists alone. The major question is that whether people will be able and are willing to bear the cost of these machines and whether they are willing to leave nature on the hands of physicists. This is because physicists use mysterious and secretive language that can only be interpreted by them and they are only going to be part of the complications of nature. People hope that physicist can come up with advanced and more simplified formulae that will be able to solve the world’s differences. It is at this point that people hope for a final formula that will explain the trends of nature thus make people understand God thinking (Baake, 2003). Suggestions and ideas of this kind from a prominent person are deemed as foolish and misleading. This is because they mislead people to think that the world has a meaning. Such characters mislead people by suggesting that the world has meaning because there is progress in our daily activities. Progress helps people to get closer to something and finally to uncover knowledge, just like the mathematical formulae tries to get close to infinity but it has never gotten there. The world has no meaning because somebody or something would have emerged and asked why there is something instead of nothing (Banville, 2011). Things and situations are perceived