When you look at art, you see the message an artist was trying to convey. Sometimes the artist tries to evoke emotions that he himself felt. Sometimes they try to show the beauty they see in the world. Sometimes the artist tries to tell a story or history so that it can be documented for the present and the future. In Egyptian and Greek art, artists used their art to make life more beautiful, as both cultures appreciated beautiful things, but they also used their art to tell their story. Today we can look at the art of ancient Egypt and ancient Greece and see what they saw, what they wanted to see, and what they wanted to show us. For the ancient Egyptians and Greeks, art was about telling the story, showing their ideals, expressing their values, and, as propaganda for religion and rulers, giving us insight into their life and their culture. Early Egyptian art involved painting small figures on the ground. cave walls and pottery. These images told stories that depicted historical events that they deemed important enough to document. The fundamental principles of Egyptian art have remained virtually the same throughout history. Ancient Egyptian art evokes pyramids, temples and mummies. However, Egyptian art included much more than that. Egyptian art shows us how the Egyptians lived, but also how they died. “Egyptian art was concerned above all with ensuring the continuity of the universe, the gods, the king and the people. Artists therefore represented things not as they saw them, but as idealized symbols intended to be more meaningful and enduring than would otherwise be possible in the real world” (Andrews 2010). Ancient Egyptian artists were more concerned with depicting a message or story than ...... middle of paper ...... Athens. " Arion Spring 1998: 48-78. JSTOR. Web. December 1, 2010. Ostrow, Ann Olga and Claire L. Lyons. Naked Truths: Women, Sexuality and Gender in Classical Art and Archeology London: Routledge, 1997. Print.Powell, Benjamin and the Three Daughters of Cecrops, by Benjamin Powell.. . New York: The Macmillan Company, 1906. Print.Robins, Gay and Ann S. Fowler Proportion and Style in Ancient Egyptian Art Austin: University. of Texas Press, 1994. Smith, William Stevenson and William Kelly Simpson. The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt, Revised and Illustrated Edition, New York: Penguin Books, 1981. Stelai.com, nd Web. .Trigger, Bruce G. Ancient Egypt: A Cambridge Social History [Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1983. Print..