Postwar Culture

ScienceRadioactivity

• Scientists in the early 1900’s began to experiment with atoms in a process called radioactivity.

• Scientists found elements adams such as radium and uranium spontaneously released charged particles.

• Atoms could also be changed, they were not solid. They could be divided.

• Marie Curie and her husband won Nobel prizes for their research in radioactivity but Marie died of from radiation poisoning from constantly burning her fingers.

Relativity• Albert Einstein advanced his

ideas of relativity.• He felt that space and time

measurements are not absolute but are determine buy factors that are unknown.

• This hurt the Newtonian ideas that the universe had absolute laws.

• People in the post war years didn’t understand and it was an example of the uncertainly sweeping Europe and the US.

Freud• Pushed peoples comfort

zones with the idea that the unconscious mind drives much of human behavior.

• He felt society because it was civilized helped people repress their urges but there was always a tension between repressed urges and social training.

• He pioneered the idea of psychoanalysis – the treatment and study of the human mind.

Literature

• Lots of war stories and memoirs were printed.

• Most reflected disgust with the war and reflected the disillusionment felt across Europe.

• Many portrayed Europeans unhappy with the war and what came out of it.

• The Lost Generation came from this time period.

Modern Art and ArchitectureCubism

• Picasso and Braque before the war invented style of painting – Cubism.

• Three dimensional objects were broken and fragmented. New angles were explored.

• After the war this became a favorite way of showing the unhappiness and disillusionment of the people.

• It led to Dada and SurrealismViolin and Guitar

Picasso

Picasso

Braque

Klee

Kandinsky

Dada and Surrealism• Popular in Europe before

and after the war. • It was seen as a revolt

against civilization.“ give the bourgeois a

whiff of the chaos of Europe”

“ Dada is life without discipline of morality and we spit on humanity.”

ConfigurationArp

Dali

Painted right after WWI, what do you think it represents?

Architecture• Classical styles

were rejected and new styles were created with new lines and angles to match the industrial urban world.

Falling WaterFrank Lloyd Wright

Popular Culture and a Changing Society

People were looking for an escape.

• Movies became popular and Charlie Chapin became known across the US and Europe.

• Radios were turned on and tuned to jazz.

• New inventions such as the automobile and household appliances made life easier. Charlie Chaplin

Jazz

• Rebellious young people were also breaking the rules and visiting nightclubs, smoking, drinking and seeking adventure.

• They came to be known as the “ lost generation”