Twentieth Century Art

• 20th-century art is almost indefinable, and ironically we can consider that as its definition. This makes sense, as we live in a world that is in a constant state of flux.

• The story of painting now loses its way temporarily: it enters upon an encounter with the unknown and the uncertain. Only the passage of time can reveal which artists in our contemporary world will last, and which will not.

Twentieth Century Art

• Between 1901 and 1906, several comprehensive exhibitions were held in Paris, making the work of Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, and Paul Cézanne widely accessible for the first time.

• For the painters who saw the achievements of these great artists, the effect was one of liberation and they began to experiment with radical new styles. Fauvism was the first movement of this modern period, in which color ruled supreme.

Twentieth Century Art

• They greatly admired van Gogh, who said of his own work: ``Instead of trying to render what I see before me, I use color in a completely arbitrary way to express myself powerfully''.

• The Fauvists carried this idea further, translating their feelings into color with a rough, almost clumsy style.

Twentieth Century Art

• The art of our century has been dominated by two men: Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso.

• They are artists of classical greatness, and their visionary forays into new art have changed our understanding of the world. Matisse was the elder of the two, but he was a slower and more methodical man by temperament and it was Picasso who initially made the greater splash.

Twentieth Century Art

• Matisse's art has an astonishing force and lives by innate right in a paradise world into which Matisse draws all his viewers.

• He gravitated to the beautiful and produced some of the most powerful beauty ever painted.

Twentieth Century Art

• Notre-Dame, une fin d'après-midi (A Glimpse of Notre Dame in the Late Afternoon) 1902 (130 Kb); Oil on paper mounted on canvas, 72.5 x 54.5 cm (28 1/2 x 21 1/2 in); Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY

Twentieth Century Art

• Mme Matisse: Madras Rouge (The Red Madras Headress) Summer 1907 (120 Kb); Oil on canvas, 99.4 x 80.5 cm (39 1/8 x 31 3/4 in); Barnes Foundation, Merion, P

Twentieth Century Art

• La Musique 1939 (180 Kb); Oil on canvas, 115.2 x 115.2 cm (45 3/8 x 45 3/8 in); Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY

Twentieth Century Art

• Picasso and Cubism • After Cubism, the world never looked the same

again: it was one of the most influential and revolutionary movements in art.

• The Spaniard Pablo Picasso and the Frenchman Georges Braque splintered the visual world not wantonly, but sensuously and beautifully with their new art.

Twentieth Century Art

• The Cubist movement in painting was developed by Picasso and Braque around 1907 and became a major influence on Western art.

• The artists chose to break down the subjects they were painting into a number of facets, showing several different aspects of one object simultaneously.

Twentieth Century Art

• “Self Portrait with a Palette.” 1906

Twentieth Century Art

• Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907)

Twentieth Century Art

• Woman with a Mandolin (1909)

Twentieth Century Art

• The Guitar Player (1910)

Twentieth Century Art

• Synthetic Cubism • In 1912, Picasso took the conceptual

representation of Cubism to its logical conclusion by pasting an actual piece of oilcloth onto the canvas. This was a key watershed in Modern Art.

• By incorporating the “real world” into the canvas, Picasso and Braque opened up a century's worth of exploration in the meaning of Art.

Twentieth Century Art

• Guitar and Violin ,   Circa 1912 Picasso, Pablo

Twentieth Century Art

Surrealism: Pure psychic automatism by which one expresses verbally or in writing or by any other method “the true functioning of the mind”.

Dictation occurs in the absence of any control exercised by reason, and beyond any aesthetic, moral preoccupation, or law based in reality.

Twentieth Century Art

The Surrealists felt free to find their own routes of expression - whether they chose abstract forms, fantastic imagery, or disquieting depictions of everyday life, the choice was an individual one.

They believed that art should reflect its time. Therefore, since society was being lead by “madmen”, art should reflect that madness.

Twentieth Century Art

Rhythmic Personages, 1934Artist: Joan Miro (1893-1983)

Twentieth Century Art

• Naturalistic Surrealism • Fast Facts • Artists within this category of Surrealism preferred

the unsettling effects from juxtaposing unexpected, dissociated but identifiable elements. Images were chosen from free association and dreams.

• Events in the artists' subconscious mind were revealed through the process of automatism.

• Freud's theories about free association and dream recall were also used.

Twentieth Century Art

• The Menaced Assassin, 1926

• Artist: Rene Magritte (1898-1967) • © Artchive

Twentieth Century Art

• Golconde, 1953•

• Artist: Rene Magritte (1898-1967) • © Artchive

Twentieth Century Art

• Persistence of Memory, 1931•

• Artist: Salvador Dali (1904-1989) • © Artchive

Twentieth Century Art

• Every morning when I wake up, I experience an exquisite joy - the joy of being Salvador Dalí - and I ask myself in rapture: What wonderful things this Salvador Dalí is going to accomplish today?" –

• Salvador Felipe Jacinto Dalí

Twentieth Century Art• Old age, Adolescense, Infancy (The Three Ages)

(1940)Oil on canvas

19 5/8 x 25 5/8 inches "Old Age, Adolescence, Infancy (The Three Ages)" was completed in 1940, near the time when Dali and Gala fled from France in anticipation of the coming Nazi invasion. It was during this

time that Dali was being primed by Gala to move away from his surrealistic roots and towards more common and traditional themes. Although this painting is officially considered a Surreal work, it is an

excellent example of the transformation that the artist was undergoing at the time.

Twentieth Century Art

Artist: Gustav KlimtArtist's Lifespan: 1862-1918Title: The KissDate: 1907-08Location of Origin: AustriaMedium: Oil on canvasStyle: Symbolism (Symbolist Movement)Genre: Lovers

Twentieth Century Art

• Rene Magritte, The Human Condition I (Surrealist: 1933): a painting of a painting in a window

Twentieth Century Art

• Jackson Pollack• Lavender Mist Number 1. (1950)

Twentieth Century Art

• Andy Warhol• Soup Cans• 1964