Painting can be described as all of the following:
- Art – aesthetic expression for presentation or performance, and the work produced from this activity. The word "art" is therefore both a verb and a noun, as is the word "painting".
- Work of art – aesthetic physical item or artistic creation. A painting is a work of art expressed in paint.
- One of the arts – as an art form, painting is an outlet of human expression, that is usually influenced by culture and which in turn helps to change culture. Painting is a physical manifestation of the internal human creative impulse.
- Fine art – in Western European academic traditions, fine art is art developed primarily for aesthetics, distinguishing it from applied art that also has to serve some practical function. The word "fine" here does not so much denote the quality of the artwork in question, but the purity of the discipline according to traditional Western European canons.
- One of the visual arts – visual arts is a class of art forms, including painting, sculpture, photography, printmaking and others, that focus on the creation of works which are primarily visual in nature.