Chapter 32

The Modernist Assault

Ezra Pound:

“Make it new.”

Modernist ArtCubism

Futurism

The fauvism

Abstract sculpture

Nonobjective art

Constructivism

FeaturesRevolt against the tyranny of representation

Aimed to evoke rather than describe experience

Marked by primitivism, abstraction, and experimentation

CubismPablo Picasso (1881-1973)

His credo: “Art must be subversive.”

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, Picasso, 1907

Cubism(1) Analytical cubism: a multiplicity of viewpoints replaced one-point perspective

(2) Synthetic cubism: emerged around 1912. A combination of painting and sculpture by means of collage.

Still Life with Chair-Caning, 1911-12, Picasso

Guitar, 1912-13, Picasso

FuturismFilippo Tommaso Marinetti (Italian)

Futurist Manifesto (1909): “We declare . . . that there can be no modern painting except from the starting point of an absolutely modern sensation . . . . A roaring motorcar is more beautiful than the winged Victory of Samothrace.” (Fiero 827)

FuturismFuturist Manifesto (1909): “The gesture that we would reproduce on canvas shall no longer be a fixed moment in universal dynamism. It shall simply be the dynamic sensation itself.” (Fiero 827)

FuturismFuturist painters multiplied the image, attempting to communicate the dynamic energy and the power associated with machines, using these as metaphors for modern life. http://personal.cityu.edu.hk/~entim/Professional/Courses/EN3524/Modernism/Modernist_design.html

Boccioni, Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, 1913

Bella, Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash, 1912

Giacomo Balla. Speeding Automobile. 1912

Duchamp, Nude Descending a Staircase (No. 2), 1912.

Duchamp Descendinga Staircase, Life Magazine 284,

1952.

Russian ConstructivismRevealed the tendency towards abstraction and the quest for new methods of artistic representation characteristic of the early 20th century in Russia.

First introduced by Tatlin in 1915, it began with a focus on abstraction through "real materials" in "real space."

The 3rd International Tower, 1919-1920, Vladimir Tatlin

Spatial Force Construction (1920-21),Liubov Popova

Aeroplane Flying, 1915, Kasimir Malevich

Black Square and Red Square, 1915, Kasimir Malevich

Red Square: Painterly Realism of a PeasantWoman in Two Dimensions, 1915, Malevich

Suprematist Composition,1915, Malevich

AbstractionNonobjective art

Wassily Kandinsky

SuprematismKasimir Malevich

De Stijl (The Style)Piet Mondrian

Wassily KandinskyOne of the most original and influential artists of the twentieth-century.

His "inner necessity" to express his emotional perceptions led to the development of an abstract art.

Kandinsky's compositions were the culmination of his efforts to create a "pure painting" that would provide the same emotional power as a musical composition. http://www.glyphs.com/art/kandinsky/

Beginnings: "Mother Moscow" 1866-1896

Metamorphosis: Munich 1896-1911.

Breakthrough to the Abstract: The Blue Rider, 1911-1914

Russian Intermezzo 1914-1921.

Point and Line to Plane: The Bauhaus 1922-1933

Biomorphic Abstraction: Paris 1934-1944.

Wassily Kandinsky

Composition IV, 1911

Composition V, 1911 (The Deluge)

Composition VII, 1913 (The Resurrection, the Last Judgment, the Deluge, the Garden of Love)

Composition VIII, 1923

Composition X, 1939

Panel for Edwin Campbell #1, 1914

De stijl: Neo-plasticism

Dutch art movement begining c.1916-17

centered mainly around artist Piet Mondrian

often referred to as De Stijl after a magazine published by the group http://users.senet.com.au/~dsmith/constructivism.htm

De stijl: Neo-plasticism

emphasized the geometrical, ordered, simplified and precise qualities of art and design as opposed to organic forms. Saw line and primary colors as important

began as a pictorial based style like Cubism but became increasingly non-objective http://users.senet.com.au/~dsmith/constructivism.htm

Piet Mondrian at home

Red Tree, 1908, Piet Mondrian

Gray Tree, 1911, Piet Mondrian

Trees, 1912, Piet Mondrian

Composition II, Line and Color, 1911, Piet Mondrian

Composition with Color Planes and Gray, Lines 1, 1918

Composition A: Composition with Black, Red, Gray, Yellow, and Blue,1920, Piet Mondrian

Composition with Red, Yellow, and Blue (1921)

Red, Blue Chair, 1918, Gerrit Rietveld

Red/blue Table, 1923, Gerrit Rietveld

Schroder House, Gerrit Rietveld, at Utrecht, The Netherlands, 1924 to 1925.

The End