In this 21st century, information era that we live in, the most popular and demanding art medium is in the form of visual television series. During the ancient Greek period where sculptures and paintings were the popular mediums to display artistic images, the shift can be seen in the financial backing of the art work. The nobles paid thousands of dollars on art through sculptures and statues. Today the entertainment industry, the likes of fox and ABC, finance television series up to hundreds of millions dollars per episode.
There comes a point in time where an art form becomes groundbreaking and dramatically alters the way any art preceding it would look like. During the 480's BC that revolutionary piece of art came through the beautiful marble sculpture of “Kritios boy”. With the Kritios Boy the Greek artist has mastered a complete understanding of how the different parts of the body act as a system. This stance, known as contrapposto, forces a chain of anatomical events: as the pelvis is pushed diagonally upwards on the left side, the right buttock relaxes, the spine acquires an "S" curve, and the shoulder line dips on the left to counteract the action of the pelvis. During this period the artists were able to fully depict all of the shapes, curves and stance of a human, nearly close to perfection; Thus, becoming the major driving force behind the Hellenistic era.
Typical to human behavior, once you’re able to draw a perfect human, for some strange reason, we tend to draw a superhuman that is far from a realistic human being. As seen in the popular art pieces of the Hellenistic era the sculptures are of non-realistic humans.
“They quickly realized it was boring, that they had to do something interesting with the image, distort it in specific ways, not randomly distort it, but lawfully distort it, in order to exaggerate the brains aesthetic responses.”
Modern pop culture is also leading toward that same behavior. One of the most successful shows on T.V today, which depicts the behavior and direction of our society, would have to be ABC hit show Modern Family. What makes Modern Family different from most shows on television is the diversity of the characters, the unique family dynamics, and the unbelievable daily situations that viewers can relate to. However, while the show’s name and distinctive family structure imply progressive character portrayal, the show still maintains traditional family roles. In most household the average amount of electronic devices that are capable of accessing the internet is 5-10, the show does a very good job of intergrading that reality. Nearly every scene is refracted through a digital funhouse: an iPad screen, a cellphone camera, a baby monitor, a YouTube video. Unfortunately, with all of those good wholesome qualities that modern family shows, it still doesn’t get nearly as much attention as MTV's reality show,
The show has a great ability of displaying a wide variety of human behavior that come about when surrounded by friends (while mostly intoxicated); drugs, lies, sex, cheating and fights. A lot of critics speak very badly of the show, disgusted with the images and stereotypes that are displayed in the show. The men are made out to look tan, built, dumb Italians that get laid a lot. The women all wear pounds of make-up, have some sort of plastic surgery operated on them, and consistently pounce around showing their “goodies” without any moral regard.
Human behavior from all walks of life, are similar in a scene that they can clearly distinguish the difference between realistic and non-realistic images. For some apparent reason people are more fascinated with the fictional, over exaggerated, artificial art; compared to pieces of art that hold believable, obtainable, realistic values they hold in dear to their heart. We tend to gravitate toward the more juice drama or entertainment and that aspect is not going to change starting from prehistory time, 'til modern times, all that probably won’t stop until the end of mankind.
By, Jonathan Asfaw
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