1920s New

Attempting to express the individual, modern experience

Major Artists

Artists such as:•Pablo Picasso•Georges Braque •Paul Klee•Wassily Kandinsky

•Were inspired to create new art

• Artists rebelled against earlier realistic styles of painting. They wanted to depict the inner world of emotion and imagination rather than show realistic representations of objects.

• World War I had been so grotesque and horrific that artists wanted to escape the real world for the world of the imagination.

• Emphasized painterly qualities and strong color over the representational or realistic values retained by Impressionism

Les Fauves Le Paris

kandinsky moscow 1

• “Analyzed" natural forms and reduced the forms into basic geometric parts on the two-dimensional picture plane

• Monochromatic color

• A pushing of several objects together

• Use of mixed media

Still Life with Fruit Dish and Mandolin, Juan Gris

Georges BRAQUE

Georges BRAQUE Houses at L'Estaque

• concentrated its anti war politics through a rejection of the prevailing standards in art through anti-art cultural works

Cut with the Dada Kitchen Knife through the Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch in Germany, Hannah Höch

Marcel Duchamp, the ‘Bicycle Wheel”

Raoul Hausmann

Art Deco• The economic and social pressures

that immediately followed the First World War brought with them a new mood for a rigorous and clean-cut look.

• Art Deco was an innovative design style popular in the 1920s and 1930s. Its sleek, streamlined forms conveyed elegance and sophistication

• Feature the element of surprise, unexpected juxtapositions and non sequitur.

The Persistence of Memory, Salvador Dali

False Mirror

Surrealism…• An art movement that sought to

link the world of dreams to real life

Alice in Wonderland Assignment • Imagine that a youngster from

another planet has just dropped through a hole of sort and plops onto the floor of the main office in our school.

• You are going to create a sketch that shows people and activities in your school which would seem frightening, bizarre, or silly to such an adventurer.

• Remember the goal is to distort people and activities for comic effect, dream like presence, and an element of surprise

New Revolutions in Science

Exploring the unimaginable

Sigmund FreudSigmund Freud

• Psychoanalyst• Freud’s theory:

– Unconscious and Subconscious mind

– Oedipus complex– Id, Ego, Superego– “Freudian slips”

• Freud’s ideas weakened faith in reason

Unconscious and Subconscious mindOnly in dreams….

• Freud believed that many people "repress" painful memories deep into their unconscious mind.

• This leads to neuroses that the individual may not understand their origin.

• Freud also argued that the act of repression did not take place within a person's consciousness.

• Thus, people are unaware of the fact that they have buried memories or traumatic experiences.

Oedipus complexOedipus complex• Unconscious

(dynamically repressed) ideas and feelings between the ages of three and five, which center around the desire to possess the parent of the opposite sex and eliminate the parent of the same sex

IdId Ego Ego Superego Superego

• Id is known as the child-like portion of the psyche (that is very impulsive and only takes into account what it wants and disregards all consequences.)

• Super-ego is the moral code of the psyche (that solely follow right and wrong and takes into account no special circumstances in which the morally right thing may not be right for that situation.)

• Ego is the balance between the two. It is the part of the psyche (that is, usually, portrayed in the person's action, and after the super-ego and id are balanced, the ego acts in a way that takes both impulses and morality into consideration)

“Freudian Slip”

Mmm… that was the breast – er, I mean, BEST meal I’ve had

in a long time!

What did you think of the chicken?

Albert EinsteinAlbert Einstein

Einstein’s other theories….Einstein’s other theories….“Put your hand on a stove for a minute and

it seems like an hour. Sit with that special girl for an hour and it seems like a minute. That's relativity.”

“Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.”

“I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”

The Lost The Lost GenerationGeneration

Literature in the Post-War world

The Lost Generation• The brutality of WWI caused writers to

question accepted ideas about reason, progress, religion, anxieties about the future, and fear of the future

• Expatriates of the United States (Americans who left to live in Europe)

• Mostly writers, musicians, and painters• Often settled in Paris, but often moving

from city to city trying to find:

the meaning of life

Gertrude SteinGertrude Stein

Tender Buttons: objects, food, roomsConsisting of word clusters chosen for their

prosody, juxtaposed for the purpose of subverting commonplace dictionary meanings which Stein believed had largely lost their expressive force and ability to communicate. The words were re-defined using both their etymology and analysis of syllables by themselves.

“A Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose."

is probably her most famous quote, often interpreted as meaning "things are what they are," a statement of the law of identity,

Term coined by writer Gertrude Stein

“America is my country, but Paris is my hometown”

Ernest Hemingway• American author, whose

distinctive writing style is characterized by economy and understatement

• Protagonists are typically stoic men who exhibit an ideal described as

"grace under pressure."

• Most famous works:– The Sun Also Rises– A Farewell to Arms– For Whom the Bell

Tolls– The Old Man and the

Sea

F. Scott Fitzgerald• American author whose works are

evocative of the Jazz Age, a term he coined himself.

• Wrote four novels, left a fifth unfinished, and wrote dozens of short stories that treat themes of youth and promise, and despair and age.

• Most famous for writing The Great Gatsby– Nick Carraway, a young

Midwesterner now living on Long Island, finds himself fascinated by the mysterious past and lavish lifestyle of his neighbor, the nouveau riche Jay Gatsby. He is drawn into Gatsby's circle, becoming a witness to obsession and tragedy.

ExistentialismExistentialism• There is no universal meaning to

life. Each person creates his or her own meaning in life through actions and choices taken.

AKA: Curly’s Law

Curly: You know what the secret of life is?Mitch: No, what?Curly: This.Mitch: Your finger?Curly: One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that and everything else don't mean s***.Mitch: That's great, but what's the one thing?Curly: That's what you've got to figure out.

Existentialism – What It Is and Isn’t• What It Is • Existentialism takes into consideration the

underlying concepts: • Human free will • Human nature is chosen through life

choices • A person is best when struggling against

their individual nature, fighting for life • Decisions are not without stress and

consequences • There are things that are not rational • Personal responsibility and discipline is

crucial • Society is unnatural and its traditional

religious and secular rules are arbitrary • Worldly desire is futile

What it is not…• Existentialism is broadly defined in a

variety of concepts and there can be no one answer as to what it is, yet it does not support any of the following:

• wealth, pleasure, or honor make the good life • social values and structure control the

individual • accept what is and that is enough in life • science can and will make everything better • people are basically good but ruined by

society or external forces • “I want my way, now!” or “It is not my fault!”

mentality

Nietzsche• Believed that

Western ideas such as reason, democracy, and progress had stifled people’s creativity and actions.

• He urged a return to the ancient heroic values of pride assertiveness, and strength.

The MetamorphosisThe Metamorphosis – Franz Kafka – Franz Kafka“As Gregor Samsa

awake one morning from a troubled dream, he found himself changed in his bed to some monstrous kind of vermin”

“Just look at this, it’s dead! It’s lying here dead and done for!”

“Dead?”“I should say so”“Well, now thanks be to

God,” said Mr. Samsa

The New The New MoralityMorality

• Ideals of the loving family and personal satisfaction increased the importance of love and friendship within a marriage.

• The rise of young, single women in the workforce brought a new perspective on how women participate in society – as laborers and consumers.

• The rise of women attending college altered views of the intellectual status of women and increased their independence.

• The automobile allowed young people a chance to escape the confines of their parents’ home and gain their independence with increased private socializing opportunities.

Eyeglasses

No Kissing/Making Out Bank’s Closed

Sinker

Speakeasy

Doughnut

Bee’s Knees The Ultimate

Egg Cheaters

Clam Ducky

Bell Bottom

Flivver Model T

DollarVery Good

Illicit Bar

A Person Who Lives the Big Life

A Sailor

Tomato Female

The Charleston

Welcome to Welcome to Hollywood!Hollywood!

America is mesmerized by the silver screen

Hunks and HamsHunks and HamsRudolph Valentino Charlie Chaplin

Glittering StarletsGlittering Starlets

Clara Bow

ProhibitionProhibitionAmerica goes dry

18th Amendment

18th Amendment

• Added to the Constitution in 1919

• Made the production, sale, and transportation of alcoholic beverages illegal

Goals of Prohibition

• Reduce Crime

• Reduce Poverty

• Lower Death Rates

• Improve the Quality of Life

Prohibition

• Speakeasies (hidden saloons, nightclubs) become fashionable

• People built their own stills to distill liquor (Bathtub Gin)

• Bootleggers - smuggled alcohol from surrounding countries

Speakeasies

• Prohibition contributed to organized crime in major cities- Wanted to make money off illegal liquor

• Underground gangs battled for control of the booze racket

• 1923 – Al Capone emerged as leader of organized crime

• Controlled Chicago liquor business by killing competitors

Problems Caused by Prohibition

• Instead of lowering the crime rate prohibition actually lead to an increase in crime.

•Large amounts of money could be made from illegal bootlegging.

The End of Prohibition

•The 21st Amendment ended prohibition in 1933

The Harlem The Harlem RenaissanceRenaissanceBringing African American

culture into the forefront

LiteratureLiterature

Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore-- And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over-- like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

Claude McKay

If we must die, let it not be like hogsHunted and penned in an inglorious spot,While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs,Making their mock at our accursed lot.If we must die, O let us nobly die,So that our precious blood may not be shedIn vain; then even the monsters we defyShall be constrained to honor us though dead!O kinsmen we must meet the common foe!Though far outnumbered let us show us brave,And for their thousand blows deal one deathblow!What though before us lies the open grave?Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack,Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!

Zora Neale Hurston

• Their Eyes Were Watching God

• Celebrated the courage of African Americans in the South

MusicMusicBessie Smith – Empty Bed

Blues

I woke up this morning with a awful aching headI woke up this morning with a awful aching headMy new man had left me, just a room and a empty bed

Bought me a coffee grinder that's the best one I could findBought me a coffee grinder that's the best one I could findOh, he could grind my coffee, 'cause he had a brand new grind

Big Mama Thornton

You ain't nothin but a hound dog, been snooping round my doorYou ain't nothin but a hound dog, been snooping round my doorYou can wag your tail but Lord I ain't gonna feed you no more

You told me you were high class, but I can see through thatYou told me you were high class, but I can see through thatAnd daddy I know you ain't no real cool cat

Louis Armstrong – “Satchmo”

Cotton Club and the ApolloCotton Club and the Apollo

Strange FruitSouthern trees bear strange fruit,

Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Pastoral scene of the gallant south,The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here is fruit for the crows to pluck,For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,Here is a strange and bitter crop.