You’ve seen the drawing of human evolution showing a procession of monkey, ape, primitive and modern man? Well, somewhere along that line early man could be shown holding a paint brush and a chisel. Mankind has been making art for at least 100,000 years. Why was the earliest art made? What might it have once meant? This tutorial focuses on what we do and do not know about one of the earliest representations of the human body, The Venus of Willendorf.

Was writing invented to record poetry or great literature? Nope. Writing was invented to help keep track of beer and other goods and services! The ancient Sumerians were nothing if not practical. Ancient cultures established the first cities and large scale architecture. From the Gates of the City of Ancient Babylon, to the ancient code of laws instituted by King Hammurabi, the Ancient Near East is strangely distant but also remarkably familiar.

Woody Allen famously said, “I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it through not dying.” The ancient Egyptians on the other hand, confronted death head-on. In fact, the art of the ancient Egyptians was (for the most part) never meant to be seen by the eyes of the living—it was meant to benefit the dead in the afterlife. Throughout human history, art has been recognized for its ability to outlive us and has been used as a receptacle for our fears and hopes about our own mortality.

The ancient Greeks kept busy. They produced painting and sculpture that was copied by the ancient Romans, by Renaissance and Baroque masters, and by the royal academies up until the 19th century. We still copy ancient Greek architecture, refer to their philosophy, use their geometry, perform their theatre, hold olympic games, and redefine their democracy.

The Romans weren’t very original (they borrowed the Greek’s and Egyptian’s gods, architecture, etc.), but they sure knew the political value of art and they were brilliant engineers and administrators. This tutorial traces Roman art and architecture from the Republic through the collapse of the Empire and the rise Christianity. Fly over a reconstruction of the ancient city of Rome. Understand how the Colosseum was built to appease a population angry at the excesses of the former Emperor Nero, and uncover the secret initiation rites buried by the ash of Mount Vesuvius.

Buddhism began when Siddhārtha renounced his princely life and succeeded in attaining enlightenment. As the philosophy and practice of Buddhism traveled, it was shaped and reshaped first across Northern India, Pakistan and Afghanistan and later in China, Japan and South East Asia. Learn how we trace the history of Buddhism through the representation of the historical Buddha and the many other buddhas that are still widely venerated today.