Power Of The Body- The Use Of Body Element In Artistic Creation

People’s comprehension of the body have a process from absolutely spiritual to focus on the body itself, and Plato and Descartes are the representative of the traditional Western philosophers who believe body is vulgar, greed, short-term. On the contrary, consciousness, the spirit and the soul are senior, divine, immortal and supreme. However, from the 17th century, philosophy and science gradually replaced theology, national gradually repel church, rational began to repel the faith, and the body begins to get rid of repression. Nietzsche and Foucault, who are treat as the representative of the "body" faction, promote the body liberation, and start to overthrow the spiritual philosophy of rule. In art creation, the body is no longer just a matter of the body, but also become the world’s expression of desire or the language symbols of artist when explored artistic on social issues. Body symbols or body elements could appear in a variety of forms, which makes art powerful.The first and second part of this thesis are a brief description and analysis of the understanding of the body problem in two different periods, mainly including the contrast of the traditional spiritual and "body" faction represented by Nietzsche and Foucault.The third parts is an analysis of the body element in two different forms of arts, including the application of body elements in painting and performance art, and analyze works of the famous artists, such as Tehching Hsieh, He Yunchang, etc.The fourth and fifth parts of the paper introduced the using of body element in my own art creation and exploration process, including performance art, oil paintings and installations. Through the creation process, the author get rid of confuse and become sober-minded.The author hopes that through the depth of self-analysis to achieve a deeper self-awareness, only self-review after self-recognition which makes a way to a more real world.