Major Trends Artistic & intellectual innovations of pre-WWI yrs became more widespread and accepted...
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Transcript of Major Trends Artistic & intellectual innovations of pre-WWI yrs became more widespread and accepted...
Major Trends
Artistic & intellectual innovations of pre-WWI yrs became more widespread and accepted
Why? Political insecurities Economic insecurities Social insecurities
Art
“Modernism in art and music meant
constant experimentation and a search for
new kinds of expression.”
McKay, A History of Western Society
Artistic Response to the Contemporary World
What shapes and colors do you see?
What words or phrases describe the tone of this
piece?
How is this a response to the time period in which the
artist lived?
Leger’s Le Petite Dejeuner
Fauvism
1898-1908
color & simplified lines
“How do you see these trees? They are yellow. So, put in yellow; this shadow, rather blue, paint it with pure ultramarine; these red
leaves? Put in vermillion.” -Paul Gaugin, 1888
Cubism
1909-1914
multiple viewpoints simultaneously
fragmented, geometric forms
“The cubist is not interested in usual representational
standards.” -Perry, Western Civilization
Georges Braque
(1882-1963)
Woman With a Guitar, 1913 Violin and Candlestick, 1910
Pablo Picasso
(1881-1973)
Portrait of Dora Maar Seated, 1937
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon, 1907
Expressionism
Indebted to Freud Art tries to penetrate the
façade of bourgeois superficiality and probe the psyche—that which lurks beneath an individual’s calm and artificial posture
Expressionism
Subliminal anxiety Dissonance in color and
perspective Pictorial violence—manifest*
and latent** *Manifest (adj) readily perceived by the
eye or the understanding; evident; obvious; plain
**Latent (adj) present or potential but not visible, apparent, or realized
The Age of The Age of UncertaintyUncertainty“Age of Anxiety”
“The Great Break”What did doubt and searching mean for western thought, art
and culture?
The Age of The Age of UncertaintyUncertaintyThe postwar period was one of loss and uncertainty but also
one of invention, and new ideas.
Dada Movement
Cultural movement (art, literature, theater)
Peak 1916-1920 – France, Switzerland, Germany (international in scope)
Reaction to WWI, struggle with modern world
Rejection of laws of beauty & social organization
“anti-art”, absurd
Artist George Grosz described Dada as "the organized
use of insanity to express
contempt for a bankrupt world."
-S. Stamberg
Marcel Duchamp
George Grosz (ca. 1919)
Extra editions fly high! PeaceExtra editions fly high! PeaceIn the grenades rain downIn the grenades rain downAnd hacked-up soldiersAnd hacked-up soldiersMuch champagne is drunk in the Mascotte Much champagne is drunk in the Mascotte
PavillionPavillionLittle Lisa dances secretly at the Art Club—Little Lisa dances secretly at the Art Club—INTENSIFIED TURBULENCE OF THE WORLDINTENSIFIED TURBULENCE OF THE WORLDtalk and countertalktalk and countertalk!! COURAGE: to AFFIRM the absurdity of !! COURAGE: to AFFIRM the absurdity of
existence!existence!!! The GIGANTIC nonsense of the universe!!!! The GIGANTIC nonsense of the universe!!Accomplished by the rear- end of the world!Accomplished by the rear- end of the world!
SurrealismSurrealism
Movement in visual art and literature
Grew out of Dada movement
Founded in 1924 in Paris - Interwar period
Influenced by Freud Unconscious as
source of inspirationIndefinite Divisibility
Yves Tanguy, 1942
Surrealism
Explores the dream world, a world without logic, reason, or meaning
Fascination with mystery, the strange encounters between objects, and incongruity
Subjects are often indecipherable in their strangeness
The beautiful is the quality of chance association
Illogical and fantastical
Dalí in the 1960s wearing the mustache style he popularized.
The Philadelphia Museum of Art for the 2005 Salvador Dalí exhibition
Architecture
Functionalism—Buildings should be “functional” or useful, fulfilling the purpose for which they constructed
Art & engineering were to be unified All unnecessary ornamentation was
to be stripped away. Believed that art had a social
function
Architecture
Chicago School Louis Sullivan Frank Lloyd Wright
Bauhaus School Walter Gropius Tried to blend fine arts (painting &
sculpture) with applied arts (printing, weaving, & furniture making)
Wanted to unify arts and crafts to create buildings and objects of the future
Music
Igor Stravinsky Sought a new understanding of irrational
forces in his music Inaugurated a modern musical
movement The Firebird (1910), Petrushka (1911),
and The Rite of Spring (1913) Arnold Schönberg
Experimented with atonal music (tonality is abandoned)
Literature
Interest in the Unconscious Stream-of-Consiousness: author
relates the innermost thoughts of each character James Joyce—Ulysses (1922) Virginia Woolf—Mrs. Dalloway Hermann Hesse—Steppenwolf
Focused on spiritual lonliness & psychological confusion of modern people in a mechanized and urban society
Psychology
Carl Jung Challenged Freud’s ideas▪ Said his theories were too narrow
2-Part Unconscious▪ Personal Unconscious▪ Collective Unconscious▪ Place where memories of all human beings reside
and includes mental forms, archetypes, & images from dreams▪ Archetypes are common to all people and help
create myths, religions, etc.▪ Archetypes would bring the collective mind of all
of humanity to the fore in individual human minds
Physics
7 subatomic particles had been distinguished by 1940s Laid the groundwork for the atomic bomb
Werner Heisenberg Uncertainty principle—humans can’t predict
phenomena because the very act of observing an electron with light, for instance, affected its location
Signified a new worldview—uncertainty, not predictability, lay at the heart of all physical laws
Mass Culture
Revolution in mass communication Radio
2.2 million radios in Britain in 1926, 9 million in 1930s Movies
Increased size of audiences and their ability to give audiences a shared experience
Growth of mass leisure Sports
World Cup begun in 1930 1920s and 30s era of stadium-building
Tourism Air travel, trains, buses, and cars made excursions
more popular and affordable