th
Chapter 33
AP Art History
Mr. English

• Marcel Duchamp,
Fountain, 1950,
Ready-made glazed sanitary china with black paint.
• Refused from a nonjuried show.
• Urinal rotated and signed by made up artist name.
• Ready-made sculpture

VIDEOS

• Hannah Höch, Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada through the Last
Weimar Beer Belly
Cultural Epoch of
Germany, 1919-20, photomontage, 3’9”x
2’11”.
• Photomontage – collage of photographic images.
• Comments on women’s social roles in Germany.
• Combines German leaders’ heads with women dancers’ bodies.

Dada
(1916-25)
• So what is Dada?
– A movement against art, challenging the idea of what can be considered art.
– Protest against the ongoing war, industrialization and conventional art.
– Often absurd, whimsical, satirical or just plain nonsense.
– Ready-made, collage & photomontage were popular mediums
– Conceptual – about the idea not the technique.
– Inspires future movements in minimalism and surrealism

• Many Americans are still painting realist and representational images in the early 20 th c. while the European art scene is going through abstraction.
• The Armory Show (1913) showcases over 1600 artworks in
New York of European and American artists – cross exposure.

• Marcel Duchamp, Nude
Descending a Staircase, No. 2,
1912, oil on canvas, 4’10”x
2’11”.
• What style does this appear to be done in?
• Monochromatic color scheme
• Shows movement and time like a motion film.
• Controversial – “an explosion in a shingles factory” – subject of newspaper cartoons.

• Alfred Stieglitz, The
Steerage, 1907, photograph.
• Opened Gallery 291 to showcase contemporary art
& photo from US & Europe.
• Founded Photo-Secession group – curated traveling photo shows across the country.
• Believed in raw images for viewers to relive as he saw it.
• Focused on strong formal photography, design principals & composition.
• Depicts poor passengers who were rejected entrance to the US.

• Edward Weston,
Nude, 1925, platinum print.
• Explored abstraction in photography.
• How has Weston abstracted the figure?
How does this relate to what’s going on in painting?

Stuart Davis, Lucky Strike, 1921, oil on canvas.
Aaron Douglas, Noah’s Ark, 1927, oil on masonite.

• Charles Demuth, My
Egypt, 1927, oil on board, 3’ x 2’6”.
• Inspired by machines, cubists and futurists.
• Depicts grain elevators with structural lines broken up with cubist like shapes/lines.

• Georgia O’Keefe, New
York, Night, 1929, oil on canvas, 3’4”x 1’7”.
• Moves to NYC and meets Stieglitz – more involved - influenced her art.
• Depicts the complexity of the city in a rhythm of precise planes and shapes.