Art definitions, artistic roles, and visual thinking/Artistic categories

Visual arts are generally divided into categories that make distinctions based on the context of the work. For example, Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa does not fall into the same category as, say, a poster for a rock concert. Some artworks can be placed in more than one category.

Fine art
This category includes drawings, paintings, sculptures, photographs, and, in the last decade, new media that are in museum collections and sold through commercial art galleries. Fine art has a distinction of being some of the finest examples of our human artistic heritage. Here is where you will find the, and ancient sculpture, such as the Gandhara figure from India (see the following image), and stunning ceramics from different cultures and time periods.

Popular culture
This category contains the many products and images we are exposed to every day. In the industrialized world, this includes posters, graffiti, advertising, popular music, television and digital imagery, magazines, books, and movies (as distinguished from film, which we'll examine in a different context later in the course). Also included are cars, celebrity status, and all the ideas and attitudes that help define the contemporary period of a particular culture.



Handbills posted on telephone poles or the sides of buildings are graphic, colourful, and informative, but they also provide a street level texture to the urban environment most of us live in. Public murals serve this same function. They put an aesthetic stamp on an otherwise bland and industrialized landscape.

Decorative arts, or crafts
Sometimes called crafts, this is a category of art that shows a high degree of skilled workmanship in its production. Crafts are normally associated with utilitarian purposes but can be aesthetic works in themselves, often highly decorated. This Mexican ceramic vessel is an example. Handmade furniture and glassware, fine metalworking, and leather goods are examples of crafts.