Artforms Chapter 22 Notes
modernism
- rejection of conventions- commitment to radical innovation
- experimentation and discovery
- avante garde – from the French military term for “front ranks”
Artists and their work which stand in the forefront of a movement or of new ideas, often
in opposition to established ideas and traditions; art that's ahead of its time, innovative,
and experimental
- tremendous aesthetic diversity- with several broad tendencies:
1. abstraction, either partial or totally nonrepresentational= communicates through line, shape,
color, texture, etc. alone
- architecture gets more abstract- simple geometric forms and undecorated surfaces
2. emphasis on physical artmaking processes- visible brushstrokes, chisel marks, etc.
3. question the nature of art- new techniques, new materials, break down distinctions between
art and everyday life
Sample artwork:
Matisse, Harmony in Red, (Red Room), oil, 6’ x 8’, 1908-9
Fauves
- aka “wild beasts” by critic- led by Matisse and Andre Derain- first exhibited in Autumn Salon of Paris in
1905
- simplified design
- rich surface textures
- shocking color- connected to their emotional capabilities- had seen van Gogh and Gauguin in Paris
retrospectives- but further liberated color from its descriptive function and used it for both expressive
and structural ends
- totally independent of official Salon
- a loose association of artists that disintegrated soon after they started – lasted about 5 years
Sample artwork:
André Derain. London Bridge. 1906. oil.26" x 39".
German Expressionism
Die Brucke (The Bridge) and Die Blaue Reiter (the Blue Rider)
- primitivism= simple, direct- inspiration from so-called primitive art of Oceania, children, folk
art, “naïve” artist, mentally ill
- bold stylization as an alternative to the illusionism of tradition
- more authentic state of being, uncorrupted
- harsh colors, aggressively brushed paint, distorted forms
- express feelings of injustice of society
Sample artwork:
Wassily Kandinsky. Composition IV. 1911. 62 13/16" x 98 5/8".
Picasso and Modernism
Sample artwork:
Picasso, Les Demoiselles d’ Avignon, oil, 8’ x 8’, 1907
Cubism
- formed by Picasso and Braque in 1908
- radical
- it created a new kind of pictorial space, replacing tradition as far back as the Renaissance
- ***new conception of painting as an arrangement of form and color on a 2D surface
- a dismissal of the pictorial illusionism that had dominated Western art over the years- aggressive
avante garde critique of convention
- also seen on a larger scale as part of anarchism, revolution and disdain for tradition- an attack on
society’s complacency and status quo
- rejection of naturalism- preference for abstracted shapes and forms
- pushed Cezanne’s analysis further- broke apart life’s optical spread, then recomposed it using new
logic of design
- original and trailblazing!
Sample artwork:
Georges Braque, The Portuguese, oil, 4’ x 3’, 1910