Art in its Era: Appreciating Art Against Its Historical Context Teaching “Established Convention and Aesthetic Charm” in Senior Secondary Art Appreciation
This paper addresses the current situation in senior secondary art appreciation teaching where students experience alienation and detachment from traditional Chinese artistic concepts such as established convention and aesthetic charm (程式和意韵, cheng shi he yi yun). It proposes adopting “Art in its Era” as the core pedagogical principle. The thesis contends that only by situating artworks within their specific historical, social, and intellectual-cultural contexts can their form, content, and spiritual essence be thoroughly comprehended. Taking established convention and aesthetic charm, a core category of traditional Chinese art, as its pedagogical case study, this paper systematically constructs a teaching framework centred on “historical context” spanning the Wei-Jin to Ming-Qing periods. It meticulously analyses how established convention emerged and evolved within distinct historical eras, and how they served the expression of specific aesthetic charm. The paper further explores the dual value of this pedagogical approach: not only does it enable students to gain profound insights into tradition, but it also guides them in reflecting upon contemporary visual culture. This enhances their humanistic literacy and critical thinking abilities, thereby elevating art appreciation courses from mere knowledge transmission to the cultivation of cultural understanding and value construction.
Keywords: art in its era; established convention; aesthetic charm; senior secondary art appreciation; Chinese painting; cultural identity.
