“VIOLENCE” AS AN AESTHETIC AFFIRMATION IN ART

Abstract

Because of the high number of the artist in art history who adopted violence concept as a focus of study, the present study aims to approach the topic by means of three important work of three important artists in art history. These works include Picasso’s Guernica, Goya’s The Third of May 1808 and Kathe Kollwitz’s The End. Because of the wide content of the topic, the study is confined to these three works all of which might be categorized as the most influential works. These works were selected as the focus of the study because of their, by an aesthetic affirmation, depiction of the social violence taken from the real life as the subject, their stand against the traditional and artistic values of their age, their transformation of the real events into artistic language, and their reflection of the topic of violence by their individual and critical attitudes without disregarding artists’ ideological and plastic structure. These three works are of due importance in terms of presenting example of the artistic way of effective expression of the active and witnessing role of the artist in the social life the attitude of art and artist which is one of the aims of art. ın these three works, the, in their creation process, present how the attitude of art and artist and how it should be to the present day artists. This is because, in the present day art, the engagement of the artists in affirming the topic in their works in aesthetic means is still arguable. The present article aims to provide contribution to the clarity of this argument.