Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 1 Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements Learning outcomes On completion of this module you should have developed: ● an appreciation and understanding of the times which produced some of the most revolutionary artwork ● an ability to research, find and interpret a vast number of writings and articles. Learning resources Textbook: Harrison, C & Wood, P (eds) 2003, Art in theory 1900–2000: an anthology of changing ideas, rev. edn, Blackwell Publishers, Malden, MA. 1.1 Styles of the early twentieth century Reading activities Textbook: The aim of this course is to develop an understanding of 20th century art history, but also an ability to be able to research and develop an understanding of various modes of writings. For each art movement, students are asked to read the brief synopsis of each topic and then find a reading within the Art in theory 1900 – 2000: an anthology of changing ideas. Every student then must write a brief overview from their understanding of the article they have chosen. An article must be found and reviewed for EVERY TOPIC. By the end of the course you will be able to begin differentiating between various writings developing a more comprehensive understanding of 20th century and current contemporary art theory. 1.1.1 Shaping the scene The period between 1905 and 1914 which saw the birth of the Modern movement was one of increasing political tension. In 1905 Russia had suffered an humiliating defeat in its war with Japan which had erupted the year before, and this resulted in a general strike. The aggressive Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany visited Tangiers, and this created an international incident. In 1906 the United States of America invaded and occupied Cuba. In 1908 Austria seized Bosnia and Herzegovina. In Turkey the Sultan Abdul Hamid II was deposed in 1909 by a new nationalist movement, the Young Turks. In 1910 the Portuguese monarchy was overthrown and replaced by a republican government. In 1911 in Germany Wilhelm II made a dramatic speech that was correctly interpreted as a challenge to the older and more © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 2 established colonial powers; the Russian prime minister, Peter Stolypin, was assassinated, and the Manchu Dynasty which had been in power in China since 1644, fell. Italy went to war with Turkey and seized Tripoli and Cyrenaica. In 1912 Montenegro declared war on Turkey, a conflict that soon involved Bulgaria and Serbia. The king of Greece, George I was assassinated, and war broke out again in the Balkans with the result that Bulgaria, Turkey, Albania, Serbia, Russia, and Greece all became involved in the turmoil. Thus, the outbreak of a world-wide war in 1914 seemed an inevitable result of all the on-going machinations in international affairs (Lucie-Smith 1992, p. 447). Philosophically, the thinking in the early part of the twentieth century was dominated by ideas formulated in the nineteenth century. Marx and Freud did not really hit their stride until after the First World War. The occult which had so fascinated the Symbolists, continued to intrigue the avant-garde. Theosophy became a popular creed through the writings of Madame Blavatsky (1831–91), mixing as it did western occult traditions with ideas from eastern religions, and mid nineteenth century American spiritualism. Friedrich Nietzsche (1844– 1900) with his concept of the ‘superman’ also found interest and support amongst the avantgarde. The philosopher who did exert an impact on Modernist thought was Henri Bergson (1859–1941), mostly through his book, Creative evolution, which was published in 1907. His concept of time involving the accumulation of memory which preserved the past, and the non-existence of the future, which by its very nature, existed outside time evoked a sense of creative continuum. His catchphrase, ‘elan vital’, meaning the original energy of the life force, was seen as a focus of the creative spirit given even more encouragement by Bergson’s emphasis on intuition rather than on reason (Lucie-Smith 1992, p. 449). Art movements In the area of the visual arts, the transition period from the nineteenth to the twentieth century was exciting, colourful, explorative, and one that was underlined by a nervous energy that reflected the political instability across Europe. The story of Modern art which developed from this time can be told in a series of smaller movements that gathered around the two main thrusts of visualisation: Abstraction and Expressionism. Abstraction meant the absence of recogizable objects, an art in which the traditional European concept of art as the imitation of nature was abandoned. The Russian artist, Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944) is credited with producing the first completely nonrepresentational painting in c.1910. The three tendencies in abstraction include the reduction of natural appearances to simplified form as in the sculpture of Constantin Brancusi (1876– 1957), or the Neo-Plasticism painting of Piet Mondrian (1872–1944), and the construction of art objects from non-representational basic forms as in the polychrome relief carvings by Jan (Hans) Arp (1887–1966), and the later relief work of Ben Nicholson (1894–1982). The third manifestation of Abstraction was the spontaneous ‘free’ expression of the Action painting in America in the 1950’s epitomized by the drip, splash, and pour technique used by Jackson Pollock (1912–56), (Chilvers 1990, p. 2). Expressionism could be said to have its antecedents as far back in time as the little fetish figure known as ‘The Woman of Willendorf’, from c.30.000–25.000 BC, through to the emotional exaggerations of Mathis Grunewald (c.1470/80–1528), and El Greco (1541–1614), and thence to the expressive use of colour and line by Van Gogh (1853–90). The term Expressionism, while denoting an exaggerated use of distortion as a means of conveying an emotional effect, can, in its broadest sense, be applied to any art that suggests that the © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 3 interpretation of subjective feeling reflecting the state of mind of the artist, is paramount to objective observation (Chilvers 1990, p. 152). Aspects of both Abstraction and Expressionism united to become Abstract Expressionism, a movement that developed in New York in the 1940’s and was characterized by a spirit of revolt against tradition, and a demand for a spontaneous expression of freedom. The movement had various interpretations that included the Action painting of Jackson Pollock, the figurative abstractions of Willem de Kooning (1904–98), and Adolph Gottlieb (1903–74), the gestural statements of Franz Kline (1910–62), and the colour blends of Mark Rothko (1903–70), (Chilvers 1990, p. 2). 1.1.2 Fauvism Fauvism was a style of painting that used bright colours in a non-naturalistic way. The name, meaning ‘wild beast’, was taken from a derogatory comment made by the art critic, Louis Vauxcelles at the exhibition at the Salon d’Automne in 1905. He saw a quattrocento-like sculpture in the middle of the gallery and said: ‘Donatello among the wild beasts!’ The artists, who included Henri Matisse (1869–1954), Andre Derain (1880–1954), Albert Marquet (1875–1947), Georges Rouault, (1871–1958), and Maurice de Vlaminck (1876– 1958), were delighted. The movement was short-lived, with only Matise continuing to pursue expression through the use of vivid colour, however, it did have considerable influence in the development of German Expressionism. Reading activity 1 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Fauvism or an artist associated with the movement. 1.1.3 German Expressionism German Expressionism was a narrow and focused aspect of the broader trend of Expressionism and, as such, was an important force in German art from 1905 to 1930. The key interpretations were ‘Die Brucke’, (The Bridge), foundered in around 1905 by a group of artists headed by Ernst Kirchner (1880–1938), and ‘Die Blaue Reiter’, (The Blue Rider), which took its name from a painting by member, Wassily Kandinsky. The ‘Bridge’ group railed against tradition and the older order of things while renewing an interest in wood cuts. The ‘Blue Rider’ group sought to express spiritual values in their work. Kandinsky, who with the artist Mondrian, has been called a father of the Abstraction Movement, is particularly worth noting because of his belief in the link between tonality of colour and the tonality in music and the expressive quality of both. He would exhort people to listen to his canvasses. (Refer to pages 595–6 of your textbook for a little more about the musical counterparts of German Expressionism). Oskar Kokoschka (1886–1980), explored Expressionist ideals through portraiture and became known for his ‘psychological portraits’ in which he maintained that he laid bare the soul of his sitter. A particularly innovative development in German Expressionism occurred in 1919 with the release of Robert Wiene’s film, ‘The Cabinet of Dr.Caligari’. Lighting effects were created by painting light and dark areas directly onto the walls and floors of the set. Pictorial © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 4 Expressionism was applied to cinema with the exaggerated use of line, form, shape, and tonality to imply the emotional state of the characters. Reading activity 2 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on German Expressionism or an artist associated with the movement. 1.1.4 Cubism When Gertrude Stein (1874–1946), the writer, eccentric, art collector, friend and patron of artists such as Cezanne, Matisse, and Picasso wrote a biographical study of Picasso in 1938, she said in the preface: ‘Painting in the nineteenth century was only done in France and by Frenchmen, apart from that, painting did not exist, in the twentieth century it was done in France but by Spaniards’ (Mellow 1974, p. 429). The Spaniard who indeed changed the face of visual perception was Picasso (1881–1973), working in Paris with French artist Georges Braque (1882–1963), and another Spanish artist, Juan Gris (1887–1927). The new ‘ism’ they were responsible for introducing was ‘Cubism’. Cubism was the most radical re-working of pictorial space since the Renaissance where studies in perspective (by Brunellesci, Masaccio, and Alberti) had introduced the ‘Renaissance window’ effect in which the sequential progression of diminishing size and the softening and blurring of distant detail gave the illusion of depth in the space that was really a flat, two-dimensional picture plane. With Cubism there was a re-invention of pictorial space in which objects were seen in fragments, and then angles of these fragments, all of which were seen simultaneously but from many viewpoints. It is generally considered that the Cubist paintings of Picasso and Braque were done without reference to models. Although much has been written to suggest that Cubism sprung half-resolved from the work of Cezanne, it must be remembered that Cezanne, in his theory about the underlying structure in nature, referred to those units with curved surfaces: the cylinder, the cone, the sphere, no mention was made of a cube. More importantly, Cezanne painted his subjects unambiguously, he gave careful consideration to their actual existence and to the relative spaces between them. Cubism, on the other hand re-created objects from a multi-faceted view, the object seen from above, below, inside, outside, and around. The Cubists considered that pictorial space, as it existed on the two-dimensional surface of a picture plane, was unique and separate from natural space. This shallow depiction of space, with only a hint of depth, could be manipulated to give an ambiguous reading while still remaining true to the physical two-dimensional property of a picture (Lynton 1989, p. 57). This type of analysis of the object and its surrounding space was referred to as ‘Analytical Cubism’. Aspects of Cezanne’s way of seeing, however, certainly offered a point of departure for many artists, as well as Picasso and Braque. In 1907, the year after Cezanne’s death, there was a retrospective exhibition of his work in Paris. In the same year, there was also an exhibition of pre-Roman Iberian sculpture, and another exhibition of sculpture and masks from Africa. These exhibitions had a profoundly stimulating effect on the artists of the day, such as Amedeo Modigliani (1884–1920), much as the exhibitions of Japanese woodcuts and wood block prints had intrigued and influenced the Impressionists. © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 5 Picasso absorbed influences from all these, as well as from the works of El Greco and Goya. Through the creative process of filtering shape and imagery, form and colour, Picasso produced a painting which would come to mark a pivotal point in the history of art, and a benchmark in the development of the modern art movement. The painting was ‘Les Demoiselles d’Avignon’, 1907. The painting began life as an allegory of venereal disease which Picasso originally called the ‘The Avignon Brothel’ or ‘The Wages of Sin’, and it seems he was never really at ease with its subsequent title. The influence of the African sculpture can be seen in the mask-like faces, but there is also a certain visual homage to Cezanne’s work, ‘Les Grandes Baignesses I’, (The Great Bathers), 1894–1905. It is flat and confrontational, with a sense of depth only being alluded to by the fragments of recessional blue to indicate some slightly extended spatial edges. The work caused some consternation amongst Picasso’s colleagues. When Braque saw the work he said (Penrose 1966, p. 125): ‘You may give all the explanations you like, but your painting makes me feel as if you were trying to make us eat cotton waste and wash it down kerosene’. Analytical Cubism gave way to Synthetic Cubism, using a process of ‘papier colle’, in which actual materials such as cloth, rope, wood, and paper were collaged or glued onto the canvas. Picasso’s ‘Still Life with Chair Caning’, 1912, framed with actual rope, was a focal point. However, Braque, and in particular, Gris, became exponents of this style which elevated an old folk art tradition to the status of fine art. The incorporation of collaged assemblages and papiér collé, was used by the German artists Hannah Höch (1889–1978) and Kurt Schwitters (1887–1948) a decade or so later with great ingenuity. Collage and assemblage work have remained a consistently popular medium of expression ever since. Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968) combined aspects of Analytical Cubism with imagery based on the analysis of movement as captured by the photographer Etienne Jules Marey (1830– 1904) in a series of sequential images of a nude figure to create his famous ‘Nude Descending a Staircase’, 1912, a work which caused much criticism when shown at the Amory Show in New York in 1913. Reading activity 3 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Cubism or an artist associated with the movement. 1.1.5 Futurism The depiction of movement combined with a celebration of dynamism and power associated with modern technology motivated the Italian response to French Cubism. This movement was known as Futurism and was foundered in 1909 by the poet and illustrator, Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876–1944). Although originally a literary movement it also incorporated sculpture, architecture, music, and cinema. The dominant figures, however, were painters. Giacomo Balla (1871–1958), remembered for his whimsical ‘Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash’, 1912, taught Umberto Boccioni (1882–1916), and Gino Severini (1883– 1966) in Rome. Boccioni was the only sculptor of the movement although he is also remembered for his dynamic painting. He embraced the two prime concerns of Futurism: the production of emotionally expressive works and the representation of time and movement. Boccioni wanted sculpture released from the confining outer surfaces so that the work could © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 6 ‘fuse’ with its surrounding space. The release of energy he attempted to show as flame-like shapes leaping from the muscular limbs which can be seen to such effect in his sculpture, ‘Unique Forms of Continuity in Space’, 1913. Reading activity 4 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Futurism or an artist associated with the movement. 1.1.6 Dada Into this sense of weary disillusionment came an art movement that challenged the institutions, thumbed its collective nose at any sort of perceived established order, and blew metaphorical raspberries at the hypocritical and the pompous posturing of society. This nihilistic movement was called Dada, the word in French means ‘hobby horse’, although it is said that the word was chosen at random. The artist Marcel Janco said with reference to Dada (Richter 1966, p. 22): Dada was not a school of artists, but an alarm signal against declining values, routine and speculative, a desperate appeal on behalf of all forms of art, for a creative basis on which to build a new and universal consciousness of art. Dadaism was an aggressive reaction by a group of writers and artists who maintained that humankind had shown that it was without reason. Therefore it was pointless to find any sense of order and meaning in a corrupt world whose so-called traditional, rational values had produced such destruction and chaos. It was a radical art form which sought to rework readymade objects in such a way as to shock people out of their automatic conformity and acceptance of cultural values. Marcel Duchamp bought a porcelain urinal, signed it ‘R. Mutt’, and exhibited it as an art work titled, ‘Fountain’. He went on to do similar things with hat stands, bicycle wheels, saucepan racks and snow shovels. By re-contextualizing the object he dignified it as art by its mere placement in a gallery, an ironic comment on the pretentiousness of the gallery system and the regard in which fine art is held. Duchamp bought a mass produced print of the ‘Mona Lisa’, one of the world’s most famous, and recognized paintings, to which he added a beard, a moustache, and the irreverent title, ‘L.H.O.O.Q.’ (1919). Dada artists in Germany included Hannah Höch, and Kurt Schwitters who used collage, and photomontage in which parts of photographs were incorporated into their works. Collage was an appropriate extension of Dada, using as it often did photo-reproduced images from newspapers and magazines. As Robert Hughes (Hughes 1991, p. 71) has said: Taken directly from the ‘reckless everyday psyche’ of the press, stuck next to and on top of one another in ways that resembled the laps and dissolves of film editing-images which could combine the grip of a dream with the documentary ‘truth of photography’. Of all the movements of arts, Dada, and perhaps more particularly, Surrealism, have had a profound and lingering effect on how people view events. © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 7 In the 1913 edition of the French Larousse Dictionary ‘Dada’ was referred as: ‘a noun, masculine, funny or childish term, used it to describe a horse’. By the 1924 edition, after the last Dada manifesto, Dada enters the dictionary as: ‘noun, masculine. A name voluntarily devoid of meaning, adopted by a literary and artistic school around 1917, whose platform, entirely negative, tends to make extremely arbitrary, if not suppress completely, any connection between thought and expression’. It did indeed create a new language, as well as marking the beginning of a totally new direction in art. While Dada offered new and exciting directions, it is also true to say that its historical debts were numerous. Futurism, Cubism, Expressionism, and aspects of Symbolism provided fertile sources for Dada, both stylistically and ideologically. Often Dada is linked to Surrealism because it precedes it historically, however, while Dada does acknowledge influences in a ‘back to the future’ sort of context, it does represent a discreet movement which preserves its own historical and ideological contours and artistic identity. The ideological and historical spectrum of Dada can be understood more clearly because of its close connections with World War I, and the immediate post-war years. The Dadaist’s manifestos, demonstrations, happenings, and publications were reactions to that catastrophe. It is not surprising then that the movement was founded by German, Romanian, and French war refugees in neutral Switzerland. The principal members of the Zürich Movement included theatre director Hugo Ball (1886–1927), the artists Hans (Jan) Arp (1887–1966), and Sophie Taeuber (1889–1943), poet Richard Huelsenbeck (1882–1970?), and the Romanian artist and writer Tristan Tzara (1896–1963). Their contribution has been described in this way (Foster & Kuenzli 1979, p. 6): In the face of raging Nationalism in most European countries, this nucleus of artists and writers formed an international avant-garde that combined and transformed the major directions of contemporary art and poetry. Tristan Tzara, brought to Dada an interest and admiration for Futurism. Arp had been in the forefront of the modern movement in France and was acquainted with the Cubist collages of Picasso and Braque. Huelsenbeck and Ball had moved in the Expressionist literary circles in Berlin, and Kandinsky’s Blue Rider Group in Munich. Their shared view of the war, and their rejection of anything associated with it, had made radical changes to their belief systems. The optimism of Futurism, the ecstasy of Expressionism, and the rigour of Cubism were replaced with irony, anarchism and cynicism. Dadaism challenged polite society and the establishment. It poked fun at the bourgeoisie, their complacency, and their respectability. It protested against all the prevailing styles in art, and it denied all traditional values and moral truths. Hugo Ball founded the movement in a little bar in Zürich called ‘Cabaret Voltaire’ which became the scene for miniature variety shows, an aspect of the Dadaist concept of art as ‘a happening’. These ‘happenings’, included recitations of nonsense poems set to nonsense music using gongs, rattles, and sundry percussive noisemakers. African chants, dancers wearing African masks, readings of medieval mystical texts, and contemporary French and German poetry, presented an incongruous juxtaposition set to a constant and insidious drum beat. Arp called it ‘total pandemonium’, a pandemonium designed to shock and outrage an uncomprehending public. The Dadaist purpose was to ridicule the human situation, to scuttle social pretensions, and thus force audience self-awareness by attacking their principles and assumptions (Foster & Kuenzli, 1979, p. 59). They certainly succeeded in generating a public response as they leapt from one excess to another, but the energy and the shock tactics were somewhat short-lived and, as their works became repetitive, they actually began to alienate even their supporters. © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 8 In 1917, the second phase of the Zürich Dada occurred at the Galerie Dada, where the atmosphere was sedate in comparison to the chaos that had been the Cabaret Voltaire. Tzara and Ball gave lectures, there were guided tours, and evening performances of music, dance and poetry. Aspects of Dada were taken by various artists throughout Europe. Max Ernst (1891–1976), the collagist, frottage expert, and initiator of fantastic, contrived landscape imagery derived from surface mark making and manipulation, was based in Cologne. Rene Magritte (1898– 1967), of the obsessive incongruous imagery and baffling titles worked in Belgium. George Grosz (1893–1959), painter, printmaker, and political satirist was part of the Berlin Dada push. Hannah Hoch (1889–1978), and Kurt Schwitters (1887–1948) maintained the movement in Hanover. Dada crossed the Atlantic to New York in the hands of Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968), and Francis Picabia (1879–1953), a painter whose influence was felt more in the journals he helped to produce and which disseminated information to the avantgarde. Reading activity 5 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Dada or an artist associated with the movement. 1.1.7 Surrealism The fantasy images of artists such as Paul Klee (1879–1940), who gave up a career as a concert violinist to be an artist, and Marc Chagall (1887–1985) provided inspiration for both the Dadaists and the Surrealists while remaining independent of any particular group. Chagall’s work, lyrical and dreamy, drew on a rich Russian folk art heritage which emphasised a poetic, often romantic quality, dreams rather than nightmares, or the illusionary ambiguities of de Chirico (1888–1978). Metaphysical painter Giorgio de Chirico (1888–1978), was another artist of particular significance to the Surrealist movement. Metaphysical painting, invented by de Chirico and subscribed to by Carlo Carra (1881–1966) and, for a time, Giorgio Morandi (1890–1964), was characterized by images of mystery and hallucinaton. De Chirico’s early work had a stillness, an all-pervading emptiness in which the silence seemed to echo. Tailor’s mannequins and sculptures replaced human figures. The architectural details, the arcades, gave the illusion of deep space. The subject matter was both familiar and mysterious, often a juxtaposition of the improbable with the ordinary and commonplace. They offered studies in time and space suggested by the philosophical inquiries of Henri Bergson. De Chirico’s manipulation of linear perspective through the use of different vanishing points, eerie shadows of unseen sculpture, and mysterious dream-scape imagery were all ingredients taken up and extended by the Surrealists. They believed in the superiority of the dream world, of fantasy, and of the subconscious. The writings of Sigmund Freud (1856–1939), especially his interpretation of dreams and his theories relating to sexuality, as well as and the works by Carl Jung (1875–1961) were important influences, making Surrealism not so much a style in art but an attitude to life and society. © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 9 Surrealism was launched in Paris in 1924 with a manifesto written by the poet and painter, Andre Breton (1896–1966), who defined the movement’s purpose (Passeron, p. 30) as: ‘the future resolution of those two states, dream and reality, which are seemingly so contradictory, into a kind of absolute reality, a surreality, if one may so speak’. Later in the manifesto (Passeron 1988, p. 16), Breton defined Surrealism as: pure psychic automatism, by means of which one sets out to express, verbally, in writing, or in any other manner, the real functioning of thought without any control by reason or any aesthetic or moral preoccupation. The concept of ‘psychic automatism’ was basically a technique which allowed the artist’s hand to move spontaneously and randomly, the resulting lines were impulsive improvisations rather than logically reasoned drawings. Paul Klee and Joan Miro (1893–1983) were two artists who attempted to make art of pure imagination that existed outside logic or reason. Miro never really joined the Surrealists and he did not sign their manifesto, however, they instead courted him. They related to the implied simplicity of his child-like images, the sense of freshness, spontaneity and freedom mixed with eroticism, humour, grotesque absurdity, and a folk-story charm which complemented their own vision of the world. Miro’s work contained three of the ingredients most favoured by the Surrealists: aspects of children’s art, the art of the insane, and primitive, or naive art. Miro was interested in space, particularly empty spaces, empty horizons, empty plains – a different interpretation of space from that of De Chiro with his empty architectural spaces. In explaining the framework of Surrealism, Breton also drew on the imagery in the words of the nineteenth century poet, Lautréamont (Hughes, p. 221), who said: ‘beautiful as the accidental meeting of a sewing machine with an umbrella on an operating table’ a favourite quote of the Surrealists and one which Breton maintained summed up the Surrealist ideal of beauty. Surrealism tended to reject established traditions, and criticise to some extent, the ‘isms’ that formed the development of modern art as being merely artificial pursuits without relevance to human experience. The aim of the Surrealists was to use the arts to counteract the order and restriction of civilization by exploring the super-reality of fantasy, dream, and imagination which they claimed to be the true habitat of human kind. The origin of the term ‘Surrealism’ is somewhat vague. However, it is attributed to the writer and critic Guillaume Apollinaire (1880–1918), who used it to describe the ‘sur-reality’ of the dream fantasies, memory images, visual paradoxes, and incongruities in the work of the Italian metaphysical painter, Giorgio de Chirico. It was De Chirico’s work particularly which had an effect on the artist Salvador Dali (1904–1989). De Chirico painted with a studied, academic smoothness of technique, something which appealed to Dali, and which he was later to use to such startling effect himself. Another artist associated with Surrealistic imagery was Belgian artist, René Magritte (1898– 1967), whose paintings were visual puzzles in which the world seemed to be a construct of the mind. He continually painted ordinary objects such as an apple, a comb, a cloud, a hat, a window – yet he altered the scale to evoke a feeling of dread, a fear of the unknown, or of the unexpected, often lashed with a goodly dose of refreshing humour. There were numerous women Surrealist artists, but two particularly come to mind. Meret Oppenheim (1913–1985) made Surrealist objects from fur and leather. They were usually everyday utensils such as cups, spoons, and platters. Her ‘Luncheon in Fur’, 1936, a fur covered cup, saucer, and spoon has, according to Robert Hughes (Hughes 1991, p. 243), led a long and secret life as a sexual emblem. Dorothea Tanning (1912–1999) depicted nubile © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 10 young girls with floating, meticulously painted drapery and flying hair exploring vast, empty rooms, often in the company of predatory flowers. The artist who seems to be consistently associated with Surrealism is, of course, Salvador Dali. To quote from Hughes again (Hughes 1991, p. 237), he has said that Dali is one of the most famous painters, and ‘as a bodily trademark his waxed moustache was the only rival to Van Gogh’s ear and Picasso’s testicles’. His smooth, carefully detailed, and polished technique and draughtsmanship, make his distorted, bizarre and irrational images appear super-real. Dali himself referred to his work as ‘hand painted photographs’. Dramatic happenings, theatrical entrances and his zany celebrity status probably did more harm than good to Dali’s reputation as a serious artist during his lifetime, yet the legacy he has left is one of readily recognizable style, provocative imagery, showmanship and the concept of the role of art as a commodity in the marketplace. In 1929 Dali joined fellow Spaniard, film Director Luis Buñel to produce the short Surreal film, Un Chien Andalou. Dali saw the film as a means to lash out at contemporary bourgeois society and its love of abstract art. Dali said: The film produced the effect I wanted, and it plunged like a dagger into the heart of Paris as I had foretold. Our film ruined in a single evening ten years of pseudo-intellectual postwar advance – guardism – that foul thing which is figuratively called abstract art fell at our feet, wounded to the death, never to rise again. (Chevalier 1966, p. 212) Un Chien Andalou is loaded with grotesque and preposterous imagery: a woman’s underarm hair transplants itself on a man’s face; the protagonist tows an ungainly collection of items, including two priests and two grand pianos loaded with dead donkeys, while attempting to pursue a woman; and ants emerge from a hole in a human hand. With scenes like these, along with the film’s most famous moment, which, through the artifice of editing, a man (Buñel himself) slits open a woman’s eyeball with a razor to begin the film, Un Chien Andalou still has the power to shock and repel uninitiated audiences. Alfred Hitchcock commissioned Dali to design the dream sequence in the film, ‘Spellbound’, 1945, starring Ingrid Bergman and Gregory Peck. The dream, a sequence in four parts, included a scene in which a series of painted eyes is cut with a pair of scissors – reminiscent of the eye-slashing scene in Un Chien Andalou. Reading activity 6 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Surrealism or an artist associated with the movement. 1.1.8 Suprematism An abstract art movement that developed in Russia was called Suprematism and was launched by Kasimir Malevich (1878–1935), in 1915. Malevich and Mondrian were both involved in geometric abstraction, the paring away of extraneous detail to a bare, essential form. Malevich initially painted rural scenes and characters in the tubular forms favoured by © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 11 Fernand Leger (1881–1955). (Refer to your textbook on page 602 for a painting by Leger). However, Malevich soon dispensed with representative imagery to concentrate on the geometric simplicity of squares, rectangles, crosses, and triangles combined with a limited colour range. His ultimate work was a series of white squares on a white ground. These ‘White on White’ paintings were precursors to the Minimalist works of Ad Reinhardt (1913– 67) of the 1950’s in America. Reading activity 7 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Suprematism or an artist associated with the movement. 1.1.9 De Stijl De Stijl group was a revolutionary modern art movement formed in Leiden, the Netherlands in 1917. The group was named ‘De Stijl’ after the journal which became its mouthpiece. The main painters of the movement were Piet Mondrian, bart van der Leck, Vilmos Huszar and Theo van Doesburg. Strongly influenced by the Cubists, the group were united in their total abandonment of naturalistic representation in favour of a purely abstract art, dominated by the use of straight lines, right angles, primary colour plus black, grey and white. These principles became widely embodied in the architecture of J.J.P Oud and Gerrit Rietvald who were considered the most influential architects in the group. The group broke up is 1931 after the death of Theo van Doesburg, however the group considerably influenced the Bauhaus, architect le Corbusier and the development of abstract art, architecture and furniture design. De Stijl’s aesthetic theories have evolved the nature and theoretical discourse of abstraction and thus influenced generation after generation of artists and practitioners across a broad field of disciplines. Reading activity 8 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on De Stijl or an artist associated with the movement. 1.1.10 Constructivism Another abstract art movement in Russia, Constructivism was foundered by Vladimir Tatlin (1885–1953) in about 1913. Constructivism rejected the notion that art should serve any useful social function and concentrated on utilizing the products of modern technology developed for industrial use such as plastic and glass. Tatlin was joined by Naum Gabo (1890–1977) who also believed that art should be ‘constructed’. Alexander Rodchenko (1891–1956), a painter, sculptor, industrial designer, photographer, and typographer was also part of this movement. He applied some of the non-objective qualities of Malevich’s Suprematism to three dimensional constructions created under the influence of Tatlin. Reading activity 9 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Constructivism or an artist associated with the movement. © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 12 1.1.11 The masters of abstraction and expressionism While Kandinsky had taken Expressionism to a pure non-objective abstraction while retaining an emotional intensity in line and colour dispersion, Mondrian pursued the Absolute in his rigourous geometrical grids, an abstract painting style which he termed ‘NeoPlasticism’. He limited himself to the three primary colours with the addition of the neutrals, black, white and grey. He banished representation and dispensed with the illusion of the three dimensional picture plane as well as any hint of a sensuous curved line or luscious surface texture. Mondrian saw this paring away of any interfering detail as a quest for the purest means to express fundamental truth, through line and colour that was freed from the restrictions of subject and allowed, through the energy of horizontal and vertical lines, to emphasize the expressive qualities of form and rectilinear shape. It is however, reassuring to know that this rather grim man pursuing his cause of a purity in art that could reflect a universal order and a fundamental harmony in the cosmos, was a jazz buff who loved to dance the boogie woogie, and was fascinated by the syncopated rhythms of the street lights of Manhattan, and the neon lights of Broadway, in New York where he lived the last few years of his life. Mondrian’s preference for a starkly simple geometrical framework is reflected in the architecture of the International Style whose exponents demanded clean, uncluttered lines, a sense of function and form that was without decoration. Both Mondrian and Kandinsky had absorbed something of the Bauhaus ethic as both had worked there. The Bauhaus was a technical school of design which had originally been set up at Weimar in Germany in 1919, by the architect, Walter Gropius (1883–1969). Its brief was to promote the link between craft and functional design, which it did with great success. The list of staff is impressive as it includes such luminaries as Paul Klee, Kandinsky, Mondrian, Josef Albers, Mies van der Rohe, and Johannes Itten. The emerging National Socialists considered the school a hot bed of subversive thought and anti-government feeling. The Bauhaus moved to Dessau in 1925, and in 1931 the National Socialists planted student spies to report on any anti-German activities. The school was closed in 1933 because of growing Nazi pressure. Politics and persecution played a significant part in the creation of what is arguably one of the most profound Expressionist statements in art: ‘Guernica’, by Pablo Picasso. Picasso began the work only days after the event in 1937 when an undefended Basque town, Guernica, was bombed out of existence by an experimental German bombing raid. The completed painting was shown at the Spanish Pavilion at World’s Fair in Paris in 1937. An impressive document of social realism, this painting combines many of the techniques perfected by Picasso, and much of the iconographic imagery that bears his distinctive signature. It is also a tragically appropriate and moving expression of the time. Reading activity 10 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on the Bauhuas and discuss two artists associated with the movement. © University of Southern Queensland Module 1 – Early 20th century art movements 13 Assessment activity 1.1: Research/Resource journal Refer to the requirements for assignment 3 in your introductory materials. Please note that the assessment Activities are the assessable items for Assignment 3. Thus you only need to hand in your assessment Activity answers. When answering the questions you can utilize images. If you are using images they need to be in colour and they need to be referenced with the name of the artist, name of the artwork and year. Also when writing your answers you need to have the question on the top of the page and then your answer under it. 1. Choose two artists from two art movements from above and discuss the similarities and differences in their methodologies. 2. Read Fernard Leger ‘The origins of painting and its representational value’ and Kasimir Malevich ‘Non-objective art and Suprematism’. Discuss the similarities and differences in their ideas. References and suggested further reading Chilvers, I 1990, (ed.) The Oxford dictionary of art and artists, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Fleming, W & Marien, M 2005, Fleming’s arts and ideas, 10th edn, Thomson & Wadsworth, Sydney. Gersheim, H & Gersheim, A 1965, A concise history of photography, Thames & Hudson, London. Janson, HW 1997, History of art, 5th edn, Thames & Hudson, London. Kissick, J 1996, Art context and criticism, 2nd edn, McGraw Hill, Boston. Lucie-Smith, E 1992, Art and civilization, Prentice Hall, Inc., New Jersey. Lynton, N 1989, The story of modern art, 2nd edn, Phaidon, London. Mellow, J 1974, Charmed circle: Gertrude Stein and company, Phaidon, Oxford. Penrose, R 1966, Picasso: his life and work, Schochenbourg, New York. Richard, L 1986, Expressionism, Omega Books, Hertfordshire. © University of Southern Queensland Module 2 – Mid 20th century movements 1 Module 2 – Mid 20th century movements Learning outcomes On completion of this module you should have developed: ● an appreciation and understanding of the times which produced some of the most revolutionary artwork ● an ability to research, find and interpret a vast number of writings and articles. Learning resources Textbook: Harrison, C & Wood, P (eds) 2003, Art in theory 1900–2000: an anthology of changing ideas, rev. edn, Blackwell Publishers, Malden, MA. Introduction The political climate of Europe in the late 1930’s curtailed artistic freedom, even in a practical consideration through the lack of materials. There was an exodus of artists to America, and, for a time, New York replaced Paris as the centre of artistic activity. This influx of artists marked a great ingestion of energy and exploration to the American art scene, and to painting in particular. It also enabled a development of artistic practices across a vast array of visual responses. 2.1 Abstract Expressionism The Depression of the 1930’s and World War II made artists rethink the relationship between art, life, and experience. The movement which grew out of this questioning and exploration of non-representational images was Abstract Expressionism. The Abstract Expressionists felt that they faced a crisis in subject matter. The socialist, nationalist, and Utopian ideologies, and the styles of social realism, regionalism, and geometric abstraction, had lost a certain credibility. The Abstract Expressionists looked inwards to their own personal visions and insights in a search for new values and meanings that reflected their own experience, yet offered a new and innovative way of seeing. Their rejection of the realist and the geometric styles combined with an attraction to Surrealist imagery, and the technique of automatism gave them a shared aesthetic but distinctive approaches that soon indicated different tendencies of expression. By 1949 two main trends had developed: gesture painting and colour-field painting (Sandler 1970, p. 3). © University of Southern Queensland Module 2 – Mid 20th century movements 2 Jackson Pollock’s (1912–56) spontaneous drip paintings, dubbed Action paintings, with their fine balance between the planned motion of the hand and the element of chance were gesture paintings that ironically created a field of broken colour. Franz Kline (1911–62) worked in a more dramatic gestural manner and produced large, bold, calligraphic statements. Willem De Kooning (1911–98) painted at the edge of the figurative tradition but with violently aggressive painterly gestures that seemed to perform an act of desecration upon the subject. Joan Mitchell (b.1926) was one of the pioneering women artists of the post war American scene. Her paintings showed a crisp, defined gestural style. Helen Frankenthaler’s (b. 1928) painting show softly lyrical gestures of colour, the hazy, floating quality achieved by the staining of the colour washed over unprimed canvas. Reading activity 1 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Abstract Expressionism or an artist associated with the movement. 2.2 Colour field painting The Colour field painters unified the picture plane in eloquent harmonies of great sweeps of saturated colour. Mark Rothko (1903–70) painted vertical bands of colour which seemed to hover and vibrate. The sense of spirituality and wonder that emanates from his canvases is truly remarkable. Barnett Newman (1905–70) believed that art should carry something of human consciousness and a sense of renewal. His ‘Vir Heroicus Sublimus’, 1950–51, was initially about the relationship of the surface, the flat, even spread of saturated red, to the edges of the canvas which are emphasized by what Newman termed ‘zips’, the thin vertical lines that are placed parallel to those edges. Newman saw these ‘zips’ functioning on two levels – as a formal device to reaffirm the existence of the edge, and as a metaphor for the body. The ‘zips’ and the surface become symbols of the interaction between humanity and the world. Newman’s rather pompous title is a deliberate reminder of the deeper significance attached to what, at first, appears to be merely a formal colour exercise (Kissick 1996, p. 444). Morris Louis (1919–62) seemed to float veils of colour across his canvases, while Paul Jenkins (b.1923) made the thin skins of colour that he used look like toffee. While painting seemed to take centre stage in the exploration of the new abstraction, sculptor, David Smith (1906–65), used an adaptation of the technique of collage applied to stainless steel, welding rather than gluing the forms together, and changing the surfaces by grinding, painting, and polishing to create his boldly gestural ‘Cubi’ series. Reading activity 2 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Colour field painting or an artist associated with the movement. © University of Southern Queensland Module 2 – Mid 20th century movements 3 2.3 Geometric and monochromatic abstraction Geometric and monochromatic abstraction is a diverse and evolving method of art making which was significantly developed from post-war American art. Heavily influenced by the radical geometric abstraction of De Stijl and Russian Constructivist artists Piet Mondrian and Alexander Rodchenko (just two examples amongst many), the American Abstract artist group of the 1930s and 1940s, and the geometric side of Abstract Expressionism, geometric and monochromatic abstraction has had a profound and controversial effect since it first came to America in the mid-1940s. The role of this form of artwork involves a vast range of philosophical and painterly approaches to the classical components of the geometric and abstract image, and subsequent the practitioners involved within this form of work is diverse. Reading activity 3 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on either geometric and monochromatic abstraction, or an artist associated with either movement. 2.4 Kinetic art Kinetic art involves movement. However not all art that involves forms of movement or motion is kinetic. From earliest times artists have been attempting to represent movement within their work e.g. movement of people, animals, machines etc. Where these artists are interested in the representation of movement kinetic artists are interested more interested in movement itself (movement as an integral part of the work). Where the Futurists were interested in depicting movement, kinetic artists and kinetic art is about the actual object physically moving. Another part of Kinetic art is the way the audience or viewer interacts with the work. Many kinetic artworks are designed for the viewer to be a participant in the creation of the work. The viewer is asked to use the object to make it move, thus creating the artwork. Reading activity 4 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Kinetic art or an artist associated with the movement. 2.5 Pop art The 1960’s resounded with the colourful, slick, in-your-face imagery of Pop art. Pop art grew as a response to popular culture – the ‘low’ art of the ‘High’ art, ‘Low’ art dichotomy. Influenced by advertising art, consumerism, print media, comic books, television, and popular music, the Pop artists, like the Dadaists before them, challenged cultural assumptions and the banality of popular taste. © University of Southern Queensland Module 2 – Mid 20th century movements 4 Bridging the distance between Abstract expressionism and Pop art was the work of Robert Rauschenberg (b.1925) who incorporated the assemblage of random objects, junk, newspaper photographs, painting, and screen printing to create ‘combines’ which took objects outside the frame. These collaged combines, using as they did, a clever juxtaposition of the cast-off impedimenta of society, were statements about life and the human condition couched in familiar urban garb. Jasper Johns (b. 1930), who shared a studio space with Rauschenberg for a time, used the graphic imagery of flags, targets, numbers, and maps–these symbols have an Abstract Expressionist power in their size and scale, yet because of the ordinariness of the subjects, they have an every-day reality as well. As with the readymades of the Dadaists, Jasper Johns’ familiar subjects become objects of social comment. This was also the time of John Cage’s experimental music and the dance theatre of Merce Cunningham and Martha Graham, for whom Rauschenberg designed sets. Pop art covered a wide range of different art activities which shared a reliance on mass-media images and sometimes, processes. The movement appealed to the media also, as it was brash, entertaining, and slightly shocking. The most blatant appeals to mass imagery were those of Roy Lichtenstein (1923–2000), and Andy Warhol (1928–1987). Lichtenstein borrowed wholesale the visual language, subjects, and techniques of the comic strip, while Warhol borrowed the ubiquity and drumming repetitiveness of advertising (Lynton 1989, p. 293). Reading activity 5 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Pop art or an artist associated with the movement. 2.6 Photo-realism Allied to Pop art through its dependence upon the photograph for image and method, Photorealism accurately depicted a scene or object, usually in inflated scale. The scrupulous attention to detail and finish, especially of glass and metals, was impressive while the ‘hand’ of the artist manifested itself in the choice of image and the selective cropping. Exponents of this style include Americans, Richard Estes (b. 1936) and Don Eddy (n.d.), and the London born Malcolm Morley (b.1931) (Lynton 1989, p. 302). Reading activity 6 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Photo-realism or an artist associated with the movement. © University of Southern Queensland Module 2 – Mid 20th century movements 5 2.7 Op art The term optical or retinal is applied to two and three-dimensional works which explore the interaction of the eye with the artwork. All Op art is generally abstract, utilising elements of the formal (geometry) and was developed out of art movements such as Constructivism. Op art and the work produced within the movement e.g. Bridget Riley, creates perceptual responses. It possesses the dynamic quality of producing illusionary images and sensations in the spectator. The term Op art is applied thus, to a type of illusion where normal processes of seeing are brought into doubt, mainly through the optical phenomena of the work. Reading activity 7 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Op art or an artist associated with the movement. 2.8 Minimalism Paralleling Pop and Op and the Colour field abstract expressionists were the Minimalists. They admired the unified, instant simultaneity in the work of Pollack and Rothko, but sought to develop forms that gave a total impression, an instant Gestalt! To do this, they reduced their imagery to the most basic and fundamental properties. This paring down of detail to bare essential shape can be traced back to the work of the Russian Suprematist painter, Kasimir Malevich and to the Neo-Plasticism of Mondrian. The American Minimalists did away with emotion and personal involvement, the paintings became objects rather than being about objects. While the content was minimal, the actual scale was large, creating environments rather than pictures. In sculpture, the works were again impersonal, geometric, and non-sensual. In fact, sculptor Tony Smith (1912–80) removed himself completely for one piece. He telephoned a foundry and ordered a steel cube to be made for him. This static, enigmatic object, ‘Die’, 1962/3, thus manufactured had impressive presence. As primarily a sculptural movement, Minimalism put much emphasis on a sense of structural unity, the synthesis of parts, and absolute intelligibility (Kissick, p. 45). Carl Andre (b.1935) constructed a controversial sculpture, ‘Lever’, 1966, which consisted of 137 unconnected commercial firebricks assembled across the floor of a gallery. His work challenged the definition of art and questioned the validity of technique and craft, confronting the viewer with the concept of art as visual phenomena. Frank Stella combined aspects of Op and Minimalism with his construction of shaped canvases that abandoned the idea of artworks being a ‘window on the world’. The surfaces consisted of fine lines of mechanical accuracy on a coloured ground. The polymer emulsion that he used often contained powdered metal, emphasizing a hard, almost industrial treatment, a complete denial of the handmade. Reading activity 8 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on minimalism or an artist associated with the movement. © University of Southern Queensland Module 2 – Mid 20th century movements 6 Assessment activity 2.1: Research/Resource journal Refer to the requirements for assignment 3 in your introductory materials. Please note that the assessments Activities are the assessable items for Assignment 3. Thus you only need to hand in your assessment Activity answers. When answering the questions you can utilize images. If you are using images they need to be in colour and they need to be referenced with the name of the artist, name of the artwork and year. Also when writing your answers you need to have the question on the top of the page and then your answer under it. 1. Explain the methodologies of two Abstract Expressionist artists? Discuss the possible differences and links within their work. 2. Explain the methodologies of two Minimalist artists? Discuss the possible differences and links within their work. References and suggested further reading Chilvers I (ed.) 1990, The concise Oxford dictionary of art and artists, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Fleming, W & Marien, M 2005, Fleming’s arts and ideas, 10th edn, Thomson & Wadsworth, Sydney. Hughes, R 1991, The shock of the new, Thames & Hudson, London. Kissick, J 1996, Art: context and criticism, 2nd edn, McGraw-Hill, Boston. Lucie-Smith, E 1992, Art and civilization, Prentice Hall, Inc., New Jersey. Lynton, N 1989, The story of modern art, 2nd edn, Phaidon, London. Rosenblum, R 1975, Modern painting and the northern romantic tradition, Thames & Hudson, London. Sandler, I 1970, The triumph of American painting, Harper & Row, New York. © University of Southern Queensland Module 3 – Late 20th century movements 1 Module 3 – Late 20th century movements Learning outcomes On completion of this module you should have developed: ● an appreciation and understanding of the times which produced some of the most revolutionary artwork ● an ability to research, find and interpret a vast number of writings and articles. Learning resources Textbook: Harrison, C & Wood, P (eds) 2003, Art in theory 1900–2000: an anthology of changing ideas, rev. edn, Blackwell Publishers, Malden, MA. Introduction The word ‘postmodernism’ is bandied about rather freely these days, and to different people it means different things. To some it means curiously new, old architectural detail in retro deco styles, such as the Portland Public Service Building, or buildings that wear their plumbing on the outside such as the Centre Georges Pompidou, the national arts and cultural centre in Paris. To others it is the seemingly incomprehensible words of French intellectuals such as Michel Foucault (1926–84), or Jacques Derrida (b. 1930) who sadly lose something of their subtlety in translation. To some it is anything that is weird, high-tech, or trendy – that ugly little superficial word that smacks of taste without flavour. Still others equate it with the impossible idea that all values and beliefs are equal. Postmodernisms began to draw the attention of the culture-watchers in the early 1970’s. By the 1980’s and 1990’s more people became aware of some form of postmodernism, either through academia, or through popular culture. Currently postmodern thought, or perhaps it should be postmodern, thinking, is entering a new phase linked to the information and communications technologies, the global mass-media super highways, and the ever increasing determination of many men and women to reconstruct traditional ideas about sex and gender. Postmodernisms will change, disappear, and re-group, postmodernity – the postmodern condition – will remain. It reflects a major transition in human history, and as such plays its part in the restructuring and the re-building of the very foundations of civilization, and the world will no doubt, be occupied with it for some time, until a new term is used often enough to be accepted as the new ‘ism’. Already there are a few candidates vying for position, such as Post-colonialism. As the peoples of the world move away from the security of their tribes, traditions, religions, and worldviews towards a global civilization that is overwhelmingly pluralistic, they are surrounded by many truths, many postmodernisms, which demand a revision of truth itself – as the philosopher, Richard Rorty (b. 1931) has said, truth is made not found (Anderson, pp. 7, 8). © University of Southern Queensland Module 3 – Late 20th century movements 2 Painting The Postmodern theorist, Frederic Jameson said (Kissick 1996, p. 469): ‘We are unable to focus our attention on the present, as though we have become unable to, or incapable of achieving aesthetic representations of our current experience’. In the light of this quote it is useful to distinguish what is new about postmodernism from what is a reaction against modernism. The reaction against modernism involves the return to traditional genres such as landscape and history painting, areas which had been rejected by the modernists because of their own commitment to abstraction, and a turning away from the experimental formats of Performance Art and Installation. The use of appropriation, the borrowing of existing ideas and imagery from another context such as art history, advertising, or the media to be re-worked and incorporated into a new art work was a deliberate comment on the Modernist respect for originality. The distinctly new aspect of postmodernism was the breakdown of traditional categories. The divisions between art, popular culture, and the media have resulted in hybrid art forms, while the distinctions between art criticism, sociology, anthropology, and journalism have become non-existent in the work of such postmodern theorists such as Michel Foucault and Frederic Jameson. The re-visiting of earlier styles may be seen in the work of Lucien Freud (b. 1922) in England, Philip Pearlstein (b. 1924), in the United States, and Jean Rustin (1928) in France – all three draw on Classical traditions but maintain a personal figurative expression. Expressionism re-visited becomes Neo-Expressionism. In Germany this trend has two exponents, Georg Baselitz (b.1938) and Anselm Kiefer (b. 1948). Baselitz’s distinctive style in which his figures are depicted upside down, is a deliberate break with pictorial tradition. Kiefer’s ‘burnt landscapes’ and looming interiors of straw and emulsion layered over photographs, have historical references and are, for him an exorcism of German guilt. In the United States, Julian Schnabel (b. 1951) uses boldly gestural line as well as heavily encrusted surfaces built up with layers of broken crockery, old wood, and animal skins which give the impression of some ancient midden. 3.1 Conceptual art If Minimal art pushed back the limits, the next movement went even further in its efforts of reduction. Conceptual Art removed the physical presence altogether and replaced the object with the idea. As a reaction to the Pop Movement, Conceptual art owed much to Marcel Duchamp, that great ideas man who gave up art for chess. Joseph Kosuth (b.1945) was an early Conceptualist. He was upset at the materialism of the art market and the way in which Pop art, ostensibly a social comment on consumerism, had in fact, become pop commercialism. In 1965 Kosuth produced a work called ‘One and Three Chairs – a Wooden Chair’. It consisted of a wooden chair, a photograph of the wooden chair, and a photographic enlargement of a dictionary definition of the word ‘chair’. Another Conceptualist, Rafael Ferrer (n. d.) made an assemblage in 1969 consisting of ice blocks and autumn leaves which he placed at the entrance to the Whitney Museum. When people complained about the ephemeral quality of his work, he suggested the account from the ice factory be kept as a ‘drawing’ and documentation of the event. © University of Southern Queensland Module 3 – Late 20th century movements 3 Reading activity 1 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on conceptual or an artist associated with the movement. 3.2 Appropriation The work of David Salle (b. 1952) has been called (Kissick 1996, p. 474) ‘much ado about nothing’ as he brings together an array of images from video clips, magazines, reference texts, and advertising material in an obscure inventory of images and pictorial codes that tend to cancel each other’s messages. Jeff Koons (b. 1955) has extended the Pop style into a banal exploitation of the trite. His cute imagery drawn from mass produced kitsch such as china animals, and children plays with concepts of high and low culture, popular taste, and the role of art in society. Reading activity 2 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Appropriation or an artist associated with the movement. 3.3 Installation art The meaning of installation as the arrangement of objects in an exhibition takes on a different interpretation when considered as an art form. In this sense it is a site-specific artwork, and as such, offers a particular reading of the space. Labour intensive, exhibited for a limited time, with only the documentation remaining as a record of its existence, the installation is usually unsaleable – all of which made it a difficult proposition in the market driven 1980’s. One of the most consistent practitioners in America is Bruce Nauman (b. 1941), while Ann Hamilton (b. 1956) meticulously researches her ambitiously scaled work which usually has elements that appeal to the senses of sound and smell. Laurie Anderson (b. 1947), a Performance artist, uses her body, and her electronically modified voice combined with video, music, and a quick, repartee dialogue to create a fleeting installation of sound, light, and image in which she performs as her own art work. The man who was a respected artist in this field, but who also combined Installation with Performance art was the German artist, Joseph Beuys (1921–86). His work was usually semibiographical as his war-time experiences had a profound bearing on his life and his art. A self-styled shaman figure, who thought that art could redeem the world, Beuys had a tremendous following among the young artists of the 1970s in Germany. Rebecca Horn (b. 1944), in Germany and Annette Messager (b. 1943) in France use objects to define and question specific spaces as sites of encounter and memory. © University of Southern Queensland Module 3 – Late 20th century movements 4 Reading activity 3 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Installation or an artist associated with the movement. 3.4 Feminist art The first flowering of feminist art was symbolized by the work of Judy Chicago (b.1939). Her impressive installation ‘The Dinner Party’, 1973–9, reflected some of the characteristics that are associated with this first wave of Feminism. Domestic art and craft skills such as china painting, stitching, and weaving, were combined with the use of the female body, especially the genitalia, often depicted as furled or opening flowers. The second generation of feminism informed by the critical writing of Rozsika Parker and Griselda Pollock through their book, ‘Old Mistresses: Women, Art, and Ideology’, 1981, began to re-assess the old model. By deconstructing the traditional assumptions they exposed its ingrained sexism. Several women artists followed this approach, including Cindy Sherman (b. 1954) who deals with issues of representation using herself as creator and subject in her manipulated photographic self-portraits. Barbara Kruger (b. 1945) uses graphic design to create short, succinct slogans against snap shot images to confront the viewer, and nudge their complacency. Jenny Holzer (b. 1951) uses the strategies of mass media to present her ‘truisms’– lines of text that offer semi humorous words of advice. The third wave of feminism which has been referred to as Post feminism, seeks to destabilise the fixed gender definitions. It also questions the struggle for equality with men which found support with theorists such as Julia Kristeva, and the writer, Helene Cixous, who argue in support of difference, maintaining that the feminine subject differs fundamentally from the masculine subject. They also emphasize the fluctuating and flexible nature of that subjectivity. Although the post feminists are often labelled ‘anti-feminist’, they characterize themselves as the precursors of a shift in the aims and objectives of feminism (Gamble 1949, p. 298). Two artists on different sides of the notion of the ‘beauty myth’, another hotly debated issue on the (post) feminist agenda, are the French performance artist Orlan (b. 1947), and young British artist, Jenny Saville (b. 1970). Orlan’s intervention and participation in cosmetic surgery might be seen as the ultimate form of postmodern gender performance, in which she alters her identity via the fabric of her body. She sets out to give herself the ‘perfect’ face by using computer generated images from the paintings by the old masters such as Leonardo’s ‘Mona Lisa’, and Botticelli’s ‘Venus’. Jenny Saville paints large nudes showing the body as a mountain of flesh sometimes with a tracery of lines creating patterns that map the geography of the corporeal territory. Reading activity 4 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Feminist art or an artist associated with the movement. © University of Southern Queensland Module 3 – Late 20th century movements 5 3.5 Land art, earthwork and site specific installations Conceptual art extended to site-specific sculpture where the work of art was created on the site for which it was designed, the location determining the composition, material, scale and even content. Site works often involved sculptural materials constructed to complement or interact with the landscape in which they were situated. ‘The Lightning Field’ was a site-specific sculpture in New Mexico created by Walter De Maria, 1971–77, in an area where electrical storms appear regularly. The four hundred stainless steel rods, some twenty feet high and with sharpened tips, formed an enormous bed of nails over an area of 1 mile × 1 km. The rods acted as lightning conductors and their reflective surfaces were accented by the light of the sun, the moon, and lightning. It was a work which was conceptual as well as minimal. Yet another variation is Earthwork, or Earth art, using earth, rocks, and vegetation, to merge with, and complement the landscape. Robert Smithson (1938–73) was one of the founders of Earthworks. His ‘Spiral Jetty’, 1970, at Great Salt Lake, Utah, was almost invisible for a number of years because the water level had risen, but more recently it has re-surfaced and is now undergoing some conservation. Other environmental artists such as Christo Javacheff (b.1935) and his collaborator, wife, and manager, Jeanne-Claude, (n. d.) generate sponsorship for temporary installations requiring many helpers and many metres of material, as well as comprehensive organization. Every facet of the project is meticulously documented and accompanied by detailed drawings and collages incorporating the materials used in the project. Christo has wrapped all sorts of objects from prams, motor cycles, cars, and bridges, to Little Bay south of Sydney, and the foyer of the New South Wales Gallery for a retrospective exhibition. He has also floated fabric around islands, over pyramids, across canyons, and sent a fence of billowing fabric running across Sonoma County in California to ocean. Reading activity 5 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on land art, earthwork or site specific installation or an artist associated with the movement. 3.6 Performance and happenings Performances and happenings are works which the artist constructs using living performers, but dispensing the logical structure of drama. Both art forms endeavour to directly develop and appeal to unconscious impulses. These forms of work can be considered a form of ‘total art’ where artwork / performer and viewer are situated within the same space participating in an event which happens for a select period of time and censes to exist. This form of art making became popular in America in the 1960s with participating artists such as Allan Kaprow, Jim Dine, Meret Oppenheim and Ed Kienholz. © University of Southern Queensland Module 3 – Late 20th century movements 6 Reading activity 6 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on performance or happenings or an artist associated with the movement. 3.7 Post-minimalism In visual art, Post-minimalism refers specifically to the work of those artists who utilize Minimalism either as an aesthetic or conceptual reference point. The term refers less to a particular movement than an artistic tendency. The artworks usually utilise everyday objects, use simple materials, and sometimes take on a ‘pure’, formalist aesthetic. Some examples of Post-minimalist work are, ‘Water Tower’ by Rachel Whiteread where its interior is cast in clear resin, and it is displayed on the rooftop of a building in New York where the original tower stood. Eva Hesse who utilises ‘grids’ and ‘seriality’ (themes often found in minimalism), but is also usually hand-made, introducing a human element into the art. Anish Kapoor’s pieces seek to evoke the sublime through monochromatic forms, simple beauty, tactile surfaces, and/or voluminous size. Reading activity 7 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Post-minimalism or an artist associated with the movement. 3.8 Post-conceptualism Post-conceptual practice and subsequent work is informed by the original Conceptual art of the 1960’s. It seeks to distinguish contemporary art as an authentic reflection of the theories posited by the original conceptualists however they are now positioned with a contemporary debate. Some theorists believe that Post-conceptualism must address the essential theories of Conceptual art as a validated art movement and continue its impact within the historicity of art. Because Post-conceptualism replicates or ‘re-presents’ Conceptual art’s in doing so it is argued that it has no true style or methodology. In many ways everything and anything could be considered ‘Post-conceptual’. Where Conceptual art’s intellectual discourse sought to reinvest the activity of art with a social use value, post-conceptualism is adopted purely as a style of art making. Reading activity 8 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Post-conceptualism or an artist associated with the movement. © University of Southern Queensland Module 3 – Late 20th century movements 7 3.9 Neo-expressionism Neo-expressionism was a style of modern painting that emerged in the late 1970s and became a major art movement in the 1980s. Related to closely to Amercian ‘Lyrical abstraction’ it developed in Europe (in particular Germany) as a reaction against the Conceptual and Minimalist art movements which had dominated art making in the mid 20th Century. Neoexpressionists returned to portraying recognizable objects, such as the human form in both literal and abstract representation. They used rough and violently emotional techniques of applying vivid colours and banal colour harmonies. Some artists positioned within this method of art making were Georg Baselitz, Anselm Kiefer and Jörg Immendorff (Germans), Jean-Michel Basquiat, Eric Fischl, David Salle and Julian Schnabel (Americans) and (Italian) Francesco Clemente. Reading activity 9 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Neo expressionism or an artist associated with the movement. 3.10 Neo geo Much like and ‘Post’ movement, Neo geo (New geometry) was not actually an art movement but a term given to individuals who found a new interest in geometric abstraction in the 1980s. These individuals were primarily concerned and influenced by movements such as Suprematism, Constructivism, De Stijl, Geometric and Monochromatic Abstraction. However where these movements were about the pure quality of art making (e.g. line, colour, shape) new Geo artists were also influenced by the urban environment utilising it as a tool to make work from e.g. Peter Halley’s geometric paintings of electrical grids. Architecture, design, historical periods of art making, theoretical interpretations of the construction of space all became integral to the creation of this work. However an important point regarding neo geo was that most artists who were called neo Geo Artists did not actually have any interest in the term as they more concerned with their own individualised methodologies. Reading activity 10 Textbook: Find a reading and review it on Neo geo or an artist associated with the movement. © University of Southern Queensland Module 3 – Late 20th century movements 8 Assessment activity 3.1: Research/Resource journal Refer to the requirements for assignment 3 in your introductory materials. Please note that the assessments Activities are the assessable items for Assignment 3. Thus you only need to hand in your assessment Activity answers. When answering the questions you can utilize images. If you are using images they need to be in colour and they need to be referenced with the name of the artist, name of the artwork and year. Also when writing your answers you need to have the question on the top of the page and then your answer under it. 1. Discuss three types of installation art, and in your analysis choose one artist to discuss for each type of installation art (e.g. three artists in total). 2. Choose two artists that have made work between 1970 to 1990, and you need to discuss in detail how they are different or similar in their approaches to their own art making. The two people need to be chosen from the Art in theory 1900–2000 text book. This will allow you to utilize information and referencing from the book in developing initial ideas for your discussion. © University of Southern Queensland
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