idealization
(Antiquity- )
The theory that art not only reproduces nature, but perfects and improves upon it.
Since Aristotle (384-322 BC) and Plato (c.427-c.347 BC) there have been accounts of artists who reveal beauty in nature through their own work.
The neo-Platonists revived Plato's Theory of Ideas, in which objects are imperfect copies which relate to a doctrine of Ideas and Forms. The 17th-century Italian theorist BELLORI characterized the artist as the key to the revelation of beauty to the spectator, citing as an example the French painter NICOLAS POUSSIN (1594-1665).
In neo-classicism, idealization can be understood as following a canon of perfection.
Also see: neo-Platonism
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