I'd argue that it's a scale and every piece of art falls somewhere on that scale. Further, I'd argue that because we don't fully understand the political clima

I'd argue that it's a scale and every piece of art falls somewhere on that scale. Further, I'd argue that because we don't fully understand the political climate for many ancient works of art that we cannot, in fact, fully appreciate that art within its ancient political context. As an example, lets say some ancient work, e.g. stone henge, was in fact built either in support of or in protest of the practice of human sacrifice - wouldn't that knowledge enhance the work and our understanding of it? The timelessness of the artistic beauty is still just a piece of the work as a whole.