Wildlife Art in the Ancient World (Classical art)
History is considered to have started on the date when writing was invented. The oldest examples of ancient art come from Egypt and Mesopotamia.
The great artistic traditions have their origins in the art of one of the six great ancient "classical" civilizations: Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome, India or China. Each of these great civilizations developed their own unique art styles.
Animals were widely depicted in Chinese art, including some examples from the 4th century, depicting stylized mythological creatures, and as such, are a departure from pure wildlife art. Ming dynasty Chinese art features pure wildlife art such as ducks, swans, sparrows, tigers and other animals and birds, with increased realism and detail.
In the 7th century, in Ellora, India, elephants, monkeys and other animals were depicted with stone carvings. These carvings were religious in nature, but depicted real animals rather than mythological creatures.
Ancient Egyptian art includes many animals that were used within the symbolic and highly religious nature of Egyptian art at that time, but with significant anatomical knowledge and attention to detail. Animal symbols were used in the famous Egyptian hieroglyphic symbolic language.
Early South American art often depicts representations of a divine jaguar.
The Minoans, the greatest civilization of the Bronze Age, created naturalistic designs that included fish, squid and birds in their middle ages. By the late Minoan period, wildlife was still the most characteristic subject of their arts, with increasing species diversity.
The art of the nomadic people of the Mongolian steppes is primarily animal art such as golden deer and is typically small to suit their travel lifestyle.
Aristotle (384-322 BC) proposed the concept of photography, but this was not put into practice until 1826.
Medieval period, 200 AD - 1430
This period includes early Christian and Byzantine art, as well as Romanesque and Gothic art (1200-1430). Much of the art that survives from this period is religious rather than realistic in nature. During this period, animals in art were used as symbols rather than representing anything in the real world. It can be said that there was very little wildlife art in this period.
Renaissance wildlife art, 1300-1602.
This art movement started from ideas that originally emerged in Florence. After the religious domination of art for centuries, Renaissance artists began to depict more ancient mystical themes and the world around them entirely away from Christian subjects. New perspectives, such as the use of perspective and realistic depiction of textures and lighting, as well as new techniques such as oil painting and portable paintings, led to major changes in artistic expression.
The two major schools of Renaissance art were the Italian school, heavily influenced by ancient Greek and Roman art, and northern Europeans ... Flemish, Dutch, and Germans, who were generally more realistic and less idealized in their work. Renaissance art reflects revolutions in ideas and science that occurred during this Reformation.
There are artists such as Botticelli and Donatello during the early Renaissance. Animals are now used symbolically and in mythological context, for example "Pegasus" by Jacopo de'Barbari.
The best-known artist of the High Renaissance is Leonardo-Da-Vinci. Although many of his works depict humans and technology, the occasional swan in "Leda and the swan" and the animals and "cat movements and positions" depicted in the "ermine woman".
Durer is considered the greatest artist of the Northern European Renaissance. Albrecht Durer was known for wildlife art, including paintings of hare, rhinoceros, bullfinch, little owl, squirrel, blue reel wing, monkey and blue crow.
