Change is one of the most difficult challenges we face as a species and that is due to the inconstancy of velocity, volume, and consequence. When things begin to change, we have no idea if the manifestation of the shift is to be positive or negative. All we can do is bare the burden of the result. And whether that burden is that of the progress of society or a setback is not up to us. Yet, artist and other creative outlets have utilized this inconstancy of evolution to express individuality and push the boundaries of what we knew as expression: expression of faith, obedience, love, loss, humanity, and soul.
Walking through Le Musée Louvre today, the evolution of expression was more than apparent. The collection of art from the ancient civilizations of North Africa, Ancient Greek and Byzantine Sculptures, Sacred Portraits, and the many french and Italian Paintings represented both the static control that societies had over presented art and also the avant-gardism of the time. And in this contrast one is able to pick out the individualities, originalities, and abnormalism that could have been scrutinized during it's time of creation. For example, one of the easiest and most famous examples of this is the Mona Lisa. The Mona Lisa, painted by Leonardo de Vinci in around 1503-1506 (although studies show that additions could have been made up until 1513). This painting, today worth $800 million, was very contraversal due to the untraditional fanaticism used to create the back drop and the unknown and unclear identity of the sitter. The women in very earthy, natural colors was believed to be the wife of Francesco del Giocondo whose name was Lisa Gherardini , but there have been four other identification made that say it could be otherwise. In addition, most women of wealthy families, such as the possible Lisa, were beautified (think of it as an old-fashioned and more tedious version of photoshop). Their figures were squeezed, lighting was altered to show of jewels and features, skin was toned, and cheeks were rouged. However, this painting did almost non of these things. Consequently, at the time, this painting wasn't thought of as a master work, but as a simple painting to be owned by a private household of one of the members of the family and yet today we see this painting as one of the frontiers in the inclusion of persecutive, fantasy, and awareness in artwork. This is the exact kind of evolution that all art experiences, a process very similar to the one of the believed evolutions of mankind called "Darwinism".
"The Survival of the Fittest" is a term that, if you have taken 6th grade life science, humans are all too familiar with. The best of the best survive while the lower tear species die off and as a species ages, they adapt to fit their surrounding and ever-changing world. However, art, unlike many other things on this earth, has utilized Darwinism against itself. What I mean is that in competition with the art that was the best of the best for its time, some of the most famous paintings, sculptures, and drawings of today were considered unfit to hang in galleries or be displayed to the public. By finding what was the fittest and straying from these ideas, the birth of avant-gardism, artist are able to find a better and more intrapersonal definition of individuality. And this has been the key to the evolution of art.
So if I were to describe the relationship of Art to Darwinism, it would be more or a less a love hate relationship; many divorces and marriages throughout the centuries. My visit to the overwhelming Louvre today, was able to show me that when it comes to creation, the ones that survive and become icons of art history are the ones that don't fit, the unfit. And in my studies abroad thus far, the buildings, the leaders and followers, and the art that strayed from the norm are those whose names continue to ring in history today. I am not going to argue that a purposeful stray from the flow of society will get you fame and fortune, but I will say that there is no greater and more powerful character trait the individuality.
