In the course of human evolution, art and evolving cognition were bound together. Leonardo da Vinci called art a cosa mentale. The book will emphasize that what made a difference to the explosion of art after the Middle Ages, in addition to perspective, paint, paper and canvas, was the use of scenes that could be interpreted without the words of the artist, as well as the expansion of commerce. The study of the evolution of art requires us to acknowledge several elements. This chapter introduces the object that is recognized as art, as well as the idea that in addition to that object we, you the reader and me the writer, have to acknowledge that there is a process of production that involves the artist, the subject of the art, the stories that the artist tells about it, as well as the seers of the art. The chapter goes on to emphasize the importance of the context within which people get to experience and comment on the process that results in art. It is in this context that some refer to an object as art, while others see the same object and call it scribbles. The chapter finishes with a discussion of the way the processes of art are intertwined with the complex sets of relationships among people. The Essay at the end of the chapter discusses two paintings called Las Meninas, that by Velázquez and one of the series, inspired by the Velázquez painting, by Picasso. I use the Velázquez painting to set out the sort of things that I include in an art-system, setting the painting and its subject into some of the context of its time, but also the context in which I got to know it in the 1970s.