We have seen many works of what we would call “art” that are very different in their use, function, and meaning from anything we call “art” today.

We have seen many works of what we would call “art” that are very different in their use, function, and meaning from anything we call “art” today. We’ve seen images created for magic, for ritual, believed to share a soul with the person depicted or capable of giving the person eternal life, objects meant to be seen by gods or the dead rather than the living. Most of it, at least before the Classical Greeks (and much of it after), was unsigned and anonymous, used for collective or community purposes rather than the individual expression modern art is supposedly based on. Given all the differences in work we have looked at, do you think they all can be classified as “art”? Or, is “art” as a modern concept so different from ancient and medieval “art” as to be something else completely? Is there a universal human creative activity reflected in both ancient and modern works, or are they all very different activities? There is no definitive answer to this question, but whatever your position, you need to back it up with logical arguments and evidence.