Notes, summaries, assignments, exams, and problems for Arts and Humanities

Rafael Alberti: Themes and Style

Rafael Alberti's unique form of communication conveys vital experiences. Nostalgia allows him to evoke a lost paradise, primarily the sea of Cadiz and, subsequently, Spain. The anguish caused by these losses, coupled with a concern for social issues, led him to address contemporary Spanish reality. His work is characterized by its musicality and varied poetic meter.

Poetic Guidelines

• Neopopularismo: Based on resources and forms of traditional poetry.
• Baroque and Vanguard: Influence and significance of Gongora and the avant-garde.
• Surrealist Poetry: Evident in Sobre los ángeles (1929) and Sermones y moradas (1930).
• Social Poetry: A shift towards social concerns, highlighting the role of the poet in a society in exile.

Avant-Garde Literature: Defining Characteristics

It is often difficult to distinguish between Modernism and Novecentismo. Avant-garde is defined as an art movement characterized by a radical reaction against prior artistic traditions.

Key Features of Avant-Garde Art

• Internationalism: A reaction against the nationalism and social concerns of earlier literature.
• Antitraditionalism: A complete dismissal of inherited artistic conventions.
• Disclaiming any illusion of reality.
• Movements often rely on shock value and do not aspire to permanence.
• A relentless search for originality and the opening of new artistic paths.
• It is an intellectual art form that often neglects or suppresses emotions.
• It is considered a true art of its time.
• Often described as ugly,

Core Linguistic Concepts

Semantic Relationships

• Polysemy: The variety of meanings that a single word possesses (e.g., menu).
• Homonymy: The relationship between signs that share the same form (signifier) but have different meanings.
• Synonymy: The relationship between two or more words belonging to the same grammatical category that have identical or similar meanings.
• Antonymy: The relationship where a word expresses the denial or opposite of another term (e.g., high / low).
• Semantic Field: A set of words that share a common conceptual content or theme (e.g., hours, days, months related to time).

Word Formation and Origin

• Lexicon: The complete set of words that speakers of a language use to communicate.
• Heritage Words (Palabras Patrimoniales): Words transmitted

Baroque Style: Origins and Characteristics

Context: The Baroque style emerged at the end of the sixteenth century and extended into the 18th century. It originated in Italy and from there it spread throughout Europe. It is a bright, flashy, and often lavish art form, the result of a time of crisis. Baroque expresses the power of great monarchs and the flowing, rich, prosperous states of Catholicism.

Variety and Types of Baroque

The variety of socio-economic, political, and religious situations gave rise to several types of Baroque. These include:

1. Italian Baroque: courteous, more classical and Catholic; in the European courts it is sensuous, monumental and decorative.
2. Classicist Baroque: rigorous in style, developed by the French court and placed

Signs, Symbols, and Sacraments

Understanding Their Meaning

Signs, symbols, and sacraments act as indicators, pointing towards deeper realities. For instance, visible symptoms like those in the images above suggest the presence of an underlying illness. The sign mediates communication between the observer and the sickness.

Types of Signs

Many signs are human-made and conventional, such as traffic lights. These require learned interpretation and are not inherently effective; their power lies in the willingness of individuals to obey them.

Other signs are natural and understood through experience. Smoke signifies fire, dark clouds indicate a storm, and laughter symbolizes joy. These signs arise spontaneously from the emotions they represent.

Some... Continue reading "Understanding Signs, Symbols, and Sacraments" »

Artistic Revolutions: 1870-1914

Around 1870, an artistic current called Impressionism emerged, marking the first in a series of movements that profoundly renewed art between 1870 and 1914.

Impressionism: Capturing Fleeting Moments

• Key Artists: Claude Monet (1840-1920), Édouard Manet (1830-1883), Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), and Edgar Degas.
• Core Philosophy: Impressionists were not interested in depicting objective reality, believing that photography could fulfill that role. Instead, they aimed to capture the elusive quality of light in a fleeting moment, such as a sunrise.
• Subject Matter: For Impressionists, the subject matter was often secondary; any scene was deemed worthy of painting. However, they frequently depicted landscapes and scenes

Playwright

A playwright writes the play, presenting the action through dialogue and stage directions.

Dialogue

Verbal exchange between characters, either in verse or prose.

Monologue

The words uttered by a single character on stage, often addressed to themselves.

Aside

A message spoken by a character that is heard by the audience but not by other characters on stage. It's a technique used to advance the plot, maintain audience interest, and sometimes provide humor.

Stage Directions

Indications from the playwright detailing aspects of the representation (performance). They inform the reader and are typically presented in a different font and enclosed in brackets.

Rule of Three Unities

A dramatic rule requiring a single action that occurs within one day... Continue reading "Key Theatre Terms Defined" »

Context and Subject Matter

In this painting, we find a rural landscape where houses and vegetation are the most distinctive features. This work belongs to a series of landscapes painted by Braque in L'Estaque, on the Mediterranean coast between Marseille and Les Martigues.

Artistic Elements and Techniques

• Braque uses a broad and distinct brushwork that creates levels of color next to the line, resulting in a fairly smooth texture, although some areas show a more grassy brushwork.
• The color palette is restrained, dominated by cool colors such as gray, blue, and green. However, there are some warm colors like browns and oranges, strategically placed in specific areas. The colors refer to the nature of objects but are not intended to reproduce them

The Transformation of Spanish Television

The mass media experienced significant changes, particularly marked by the high growth of television. The introduction of television coincided with the infrastructure decade of the sixties. Infrastructure now allowed the signal to reach much of the territory, and the sale of receivers reached important figures.

The TVE monopoly lasted until the establishment of autonomous television channels. Current political changes necessitated the creation of these autonomous channels. In Spain, two open broadcast channels (Antena 3 and Tele 5) and one pay-TV channel (Canal+) were established.

Since then, the privatization process has been accentuated by the creation of media platforms and pay-per-view services. These... Continue reading "Spain's Media Revolution: TV, Internet, and Postal Liberalization" »

Architecture (Juan de Alava, Juan Guas, Diego de Siloé, and Diego de Riaño)

There is continuity between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. Only in recent times did it approach Italian forms, known as "purism."

Key Features of Spanish Renaissance Architecture:

• Constructive elements:
  • Cruciform pillar: Replaced the column, a fact that flourished in the "purist" period.
  • Tires: Monumental domes and ribbed vaults were built.
  • Arches: A return to the half-point or simple lintel.
• Decoration: More profuse in the Plateresque style.

Three distinct periods are identified:

• Plateresque
• Purist
• Herreriano

Sculpture (Alonso Berruguete and Juan de Juni)

Renaissance sculpture in Spain developed during the 16th century. Some artists traveled to Italy, and Italian and French... Continue reading "Spanish Renaissance Art: Architecture, Sculpture, and Painting" »