European Modernist Art Was First Exhibited in the United States at

The Early 20th Century

The early 20th century was marked by rapid industrial, economical, social, and cultural change, which influenced the worldview of many and set the stage for new artistic movements.

Learning Objectives

Identify how industrial, economic, social, and cultural alter set the phase for the art movements of the early on 20th century

Key Takeaways

Cardinal Points

• The first two decades of the 20th century were marked by enormous industrial, economic, social, and cultural developments.
• International trade brought with information technology increasing growth and prosperity, along with a rise in poverty and slums in major cities. Urbanization, advances in science and technology, and the spread of goods and information were markers of the times.
• With the outbreak of World War I in 1914, art became heavily influenced by the want to abstract life and escape the horrific possibilities of the human condition. Artists began to question and play effectually with themes of reality, perspective, space, and time.

Central Terms

• urbanization: The alter in a country or region when its population migrates from rural to urban areas.

The first two decades of the 20th century were marked by enormous industrial, economic, social and cultural alter. International merchandise brought with it increasing growth and prosperity, along with a ascension in poverty and slums in major cities. Urbanization, architectural advances, increases in technology, and the spread of goods and information were markers of the times. Competition between nations was reflected in attempts to show off advances in technology, concern, and architecture, amongst other things. Prominent scientific advancements of the fourth dimension included Einstein's Theory of Relativity and Freud's development of modern psychology.

Subsequently the relative peace of most of the 19th century, rivalry betwixt European powers erupted in 1914 with the outbreak of the showtime Earth War. Over 60 1000000 European soldiers were mobilized from 1914–1918 as countries effectually the world were called into the conflict. With the widespread expiry and devastation of the greatest war the world had always seen, art increasingly became a ways for escapism, a mode to abstract life and escape the difficulties of the human being status.

A ration party of the Imperial Irish gaelic Rifles in a communication trench during the Battle of the Somme, July 1916: The expiry and destruction of World State of war I contributed to the desire of artists to abstruse life.

The economic and social changes of the early 20th century greatly influenced the Due north American and European worldview which, in turn, shaped the development of new styles of fine art. Artists began to question and experiment with themes of reality, perspective, space and time, and representation. Einstein's Theory of Relativity contributed to the evolution of cubism, and developments in psychology greatly influenced the subject matter of a number of creative schools of thought. The rapid rising of engineering science impacted artists both direct and indirectly, from the invention of new artistic materials to subject area matter and themes.

Fauvism

The Fauves were a grouping of early 20th century Modern artists based in Paris whose works challenged Impressionist values.

Learning Objectives

Contrast the characteristics of Fauvism, as establish in the work of Matisse and Derain, from those of its predecessor Impressionism

Key Takeaways

Key Points

• The Fauvist motility, led by Henri Matisse and Andre Derain, officially lasted for but 4 years: 1904–1908.
• Vivid colour, simplification, abstraction, and unusual brush strokes are hallmarks of the Fauvist style. Fauvist influences and references include Van Gogh's Postal service- Impressionism and the Neo-Impressionist technique of Pointillism.
• Gustave Moreau, a controversial professor at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, mentored several of the Fauves, including Matisse, and greatly influenced their work.

Primal Terms

• Post-Impressionism: (Art) a genre of painting that rejected the naturalism of impressionism, using color and course in more expressive manners.
• pointillism: In art, the utilise of pocket-size areas of colour to construct an image.
• Fauvism: An artistic motion of the last part of the 19th century that emphasized spontaneity and the utilise of extremely bright colors.

Fauvism is the style of les Fauves (French for "the wild beasts"), a short-lived and loose group of early 20th century Modernistic artists whose works emphasized painterly qualities and potent color over the representational or realistic values retained by Impressionism. While Fauvism as a manner began around 1900 and continued beyond 1910, the movement every bit such lasted merely a few years, 1904–1908, and had three exhibitions. The leaders of the move were Henri Matisse and André Derain.

Charing Cantankerous Span, London by André Derain, 1906: The vibrant, surprising utilize of color in this work is characteristic of the Fauvist fashion.

Autonomously from Matisse and Derain, other artists included Albert Marquet, Charles Camoin, Louis Valtat, the Belgian painter Henri Evenepoel, Maurice Marinot, Jean Puy, Maurice de Vlaminck, Henri Manguin, Raoul Dufy, Othon Friesz, Georges Rouault, the Dutch painter Kees van Dongen, the Swiss painter Alice Bailly, and Georges Braque (subsequently Picasso's partner in Cubism).

The paintings of the Fauves were characterized by seemingly wild brush work and strident colors, while their field of study matter had a high degree of simplification and abstraction. Fauvism can be classified as an extreme development of Van Gogh'due south Postal service-Impressionism fused with the pointillism of Seurat and other Neo-Impressionist painters, in particular Paul Signac. Other key influences were Paul Cézanne and Paul Gauguin, whose employment of areas of saturated color—notably in paintings from Tahiti—strongly influenced Derain's work.

Gustave Moreau, a controversial professor at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris and a Symbolist painter, was the movement's inspirational teacher. Moreau taught Matisse, Marquet, Manguin, Rouault, and Camoin during the 1890s, and was viewed by critics equally the group'southward philosophical leader until Matisse was recognized as such in 1904. Moreau'south broad-mindedness, originality, and affidavit of the expressive potency of pure colour was inspirational for his students.

Derain and Matisse worked together through the summer of 1905 in the Mediterranean village of Collioure, and after that year displayed their highly innovative paintings at the Salon d'Automne. The vivid, unnatural colors led the critic Louis Vauxcelles to derisively dub their works every bit les Fauves, or "the wild beasts," which the artists so appropriated as the title for their movement. The painting that was singled out for special condemnation, Matisse'south Woman with a Chapeau, was subsequently bought past the major patrons of the avant-garde scene in Paris, Gertrude and Leo Stein.

Woman with a Hat by Henri Matisse, 1905.: This painting was rejected by critics when initially exhibited, only was soon acquired by advanced collectors Leo and Gertrude Stein.

Primitivism and Cubism

As one of the most influential artists of the 20^th century, Pablo Picasso is widely known for his involvement in Cubism and Primitivism.

Learning Objectives

Identify Picasso's unique importance to the development of both Primitivism and Cubism in the early 20th century

Primal Takeaways

Primal Points

• 1906–1909 is referred to as Picasso's African period, during which he produced Les Demoiselles d'Avignon and several other paintings incorporating primitivist elements.
• Picasso was inspired by African artifacts besides every bit the work of Post-Impressionist artist Paul Gauguin.
• The formal elements of Les Desmoiselles d'Avignon bridged Picasso'southward African Period and subsequent Cubist piece of work.
• Picasso and Georges Braque co-founded the Cubist movement, i of the most influential movements in Modern Fine art.
• Cubism stressed basic abstruse geometric forms that presented the subject from many angles simultaneously.

Fundamental Terms

• primitivism: Primitivism is a Western fine art motility that borrows visual forms from non-Western or prehistoric peoples, a practice that was primal to the development of modernistic art.

African Period and Primitivism (1906–1910)

During the tardily 19th and early on 20th centuries, the European cultural aristocracy were discovering African, Micronesian, and Native American fine art. African artifacts were being brought back to Paris museums following the expansion of the French empire into Africa. The press was abuzz with exaggerated stories of cannibalism and exotic tales most the African kingdom of Dahomey. The mistreatment of Africans in the Belgian Congo was exposed in Joseph Conrad'southward popular book, Heart of Darkness.

Artists such equally Paul Gauguin, Henri Matisse, and Picasso were intrigued and inspired by the stark power and simplicity of styles of "primitive" cultures. Around 1906, Picasso, Matisse, Derain, and other Paris-based artists had acquired an interest in Primitivism, Iberian sculpture, African fine art, and tribal masks, in part due to the works of Paul Gauguin that had recently achieved recognition in Paris's advanced circles. Gauguin's powerful posthumous retrospective exhibitions at the Salon d'Automne in Paris in 1903 and 1906 had a powerful influence on Picasso's paintings.

The Moon and the Earth past Paul Gauguin, 1893: Picasso was greatly influenced past Gauguin's African inspired works like The Moon and The Globe.

In 1907, Picasso experienced a "revelation" while viewing African fine art at the ethnographic museum at Palais du Trocadéro. African fine art influenced Picasso'due south painting Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907), especially in its treatment of the two figures on the correct side of the limerick. This painting is also considered a protocubist work bridging Picasso's African and Cubist periods. Other works of Picasso's African Catamenia include Bust of a Woman (1907, in the National Gallery, Prague); Mother and Child (Summertime 1907, in the Musée Picasso, Paris); Nude with Raised Arms (1907, in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid, Kingdom of spain); and 3 Women (Summertime 1908, in the Hermitage Museum, Saint petersburg).

Les Desmoiselles d'Avignon past Pablo Picasso, 1907: This piece of work is influenced by primitivism and is considered to be 1 of the earliest examples of Cubist painting.

Cubism (1909–1912)

Cubism, established by Picasso and his colleague Georges Bracque, was marked by a revolutionary departure from representational art. In Cubist artwork, objects were analyzed, cleaved up, and reassembled in an abstracted grade instead of being depicted from one viewpoint. Picasso, Braque, and other Cubists depicted subjects from a multitude of viewpoints to create a greater telescopic of context. Cubism has been considered the virtually influential art movement of the 20th century.

Violin and Candlestick by Georges Braque, 1910: Georges Braque, with Picasso, was one of the founders of Cubism.

Cubism had a global reach as a motion, influencing similar schools of thought in literature, music, and compages. Particular offshoots beyond France included the movements of Futurism, Suprematism, Dada, Constructivism, and De Stijl, which all developed in response to Cubism. Early Futurist paintings have some commonalities with Cubism: the fusing of the past and the present and the representation of different views of the subject pictured at the same fourth dimension, also chosen multiple perspective, simultaneity or multiplicity. Constructivism was influenced by Picasso'south technique of constructing sculpture from split up elements. Other common threads between these disparate movements include the faceting or simplification of geometric forms, and the clan of mechanization and mod life.

Cubist Sculpture

Just as in painting, Cubist sculpture is rooted in Paul Cézanne's reduction of painted objects into component planes and geometric solids (cubes, spheres, cylinders, and cones). And just as in painting, information technology became a pervasive influence and contributed fundamentally to Constructivism and Futurism.

Cubist sculpture developed in parallel to Cubist painting. During the autumn of 1909 Picasso sculpted Head of a Adult female (Fernande) with positive features depicted by negative space and vice versa. Marcel Duchamp was responsible for another extreme evolution inspired past Cubism. The ready-made arose from a joint consideration that the work itself is considered an object (just as a painting), and that information technology uses the material detritus of the world (as collage and paper mache in the Cubist construction and Assemblage). The next logical step, for Duchamp, was to present an ordinary object every bit a cocky-sufficient work of art representing simply itself. In 1913 he attached a bicycle wheel to a kitchen stool and in 1914 selected a bottle-drying rack as a sculpture in its own correct.

Other Forms of Cubism

Futurism and Constructivism developed from Cubism in Italia and Russia respectively.

Learning Objectives

Differentiate the creative styles of Futurism and Constructivism from their Cubist origins

Key Takeaways

Central Points

• Cubist work represents an artistic subject from multiple perspectives simultaneously.
• Italian Futurism and Russian Constructivism are two movements that were greatly influenced past Cubism.
• Divisionism, a technique in which colour and low-cal are deconstructed, is an important aspect of Futurist and Cubist work.
• Gertrude Stein, Wallace Stevens, Pierre Reverdy, and William Faulkner all applied Cubist principles to written work.
• Cubist poets and writers besides influenced Dada and Surrealism.

Fundamental Terms

• futurism: An early 20th century avant-garde fine art move focused on speed, the mechanical, and the modern, which took a deeply antagonistic attitude to traditional artistic conventions; (originated by F.T. Marinetti, among others).
• divisionism: In fine art, the utilize of small areas of color to construct an paradigm.
• constructivism: A Russian motility in modern art characterized by the cosmos of nonrepresentational geometric objects using industrial materials.

Cubism

Cubism was an avant-garde art motion of the early 20th century pioneered past Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso, and after joined by Juan Gris, Jean Metzinger, Albert Gleizes, Robert Delaunay, Henri Le Fauconnier, and Fernand Léger. The movement revolutionized European painting and sculpture and inspired related movements in music, literature, and architecture. Cubism has been considered the near influential fine art move of the 20th century.

Violin and Candlestick by Georges Braque, 1910: Georges Braque, with Picasso, was 1 of the founders of Cubism.

In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up, and reassembled in an bathetic form. Instead of depicting objects from one viewpoint, the artist depicts the subject from a multitude of viewpoints to represent the subject field in a greater context.

Constructivism

Constructivism was an artistic and architectural philosophy that originated in Russian federation in 1919. It entailed a rejection of the thought of autonomous fine art and was in favor of fine art equally a practice for social purposes. Constructivism had a great impact on modern fine art movements of the 20th century, influencing major trends such as Bauhaus and the De Stijl move. It is difficult to isolate a particular aesthetic mutual to the Constructivist philosophy as it is and so broad, but it tin can be roughly distinguished past its apply of vivid, bold color and geometric designs, especially in graphic design.

The Showtime Working Group of Constructivists (including Liubov Popova, Alexander Vesnin, Rodchenko, Varvara Stepanova, and the theorists Aleksei Gan, Boris Arvatov, and Osip Brik) developed a definition of Constructivism as the combination of faktura: the particular material properties of an object, and tektonika, its spatial presence. Initially the Constructivists worked on three-dimensional constructions as a means of participating in industry. Later the definition would exist extended to designs for two-dimensional works such equally books and posters.

Proun Vrashchenia by El Lissitzky c. 1919: The geometric forms and vivid colors in this painting are characteristic of the Constructivist aesthetic.

Futurism

Futurism was an Italian movement that emphasized and glorified themes associated with contemporary concepts of the hereafter such every bit speed, applied science, youth, and violence, too as objects such as the automobile, the airplane, and the industrial metropolis. In 1910 and 1911 futurist painters made use of the technique of divisionism, which entails breaking low-cal and color down into a field of stippled dots and stripes. Severini was the starting time to come into contact with Cubism. Following a visit to Paris in 1911, the Futurist painters adopted the methods of the Cubists. Cubism offered them a means of analyzing energy in paintings and visually expressing their desired focus on dynamism, motion, and speed. The adoption of Cubism adamant the fashion of much subsequent Futurist painting.

Abstract Speed + Audio, by Giacomo Balla 1913–1914: This is a seminal work from the Futurist movement which was influenced past Cubism.

German Expressionism

High german Expressionism refers to a number of related creative movements beginning before WWI and peaking in Berlin during the 1920s.

Learning Objectives

Discuss the importance of the group Dice Brücke and artists such as Kirchner, Kollwitze, Schiele, and Modersohn-Becker in the development of German Expressionism

Key Takeaways

Fundamental Points

• Kathe Kollwitz, Egon Schiele, and Paula Modersohn-Becker are among the contained German Expressionists who were unaffiliated with other Expressionist groups just withal successful.
• Kollwitz is best remembered for her compassionate series, The Weavers.
• Many of Egon Schiele's contemporaries found the explicit sexual themes of his piece of work disturbing.
• Paula Modersohn-Becker is among the start recognized female artists to create nude self-portraits.

Key Terms

• Weimar Republic: The democratic regime of Frg from 1919 to the assumption of power past Adolf Hitler in 1933.
• expressionism: A move in the arts in which the artist does not depict objective reality, merely rather a subjective expression of inner experience.
• Fauvism: An artistic movement of the terminal part of the 19th century that emphasized spontaneity and the utilize of extremely bright colors.

Expressionism

Expressionism was a modernist move, outset with poetry and painting, that originated in Germany at the start of the 20th century. It emphasized subjective experience, manipulating perspective for emotional effect in order to evoke moods or ideas. Expressionist artists sought to express meaning or emotional feel rather than concrete reality.

Expressionism was developed as an avant-garde style before the Outset World War and remained popular during the Weimar Commonwealth, particularly in Berlin. The fashion extended to a wide range of the arts, including painting, literature, theatre, trip the light fantastic toe, film, compages, and music.

Expressionist painters had many influences, among them Edvard Munch, Vincent van Gogh, and several African artists. They were too aware of the Fauvist movement in Paris, which influenced Expressionism's trend toward arbitrary colors and jarring compositions.

Die Brücke

In 1905, a group of four German artists, led by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, formed Dice Brücke (the Bridge) in the city of Dresden. Subsequently members were Emil Nolde, Max Pechstein, and Otto Mueller. The grouping aimed to eschew the prevalent traditional academic fashion and find a new fashion of artistic expression, which would class a bridge (hence the name) between the past and the present. They responded both to past artists such equally Albrecht Dürer, Matthias Grünewald, and Lucas Cranach the Elderberry, likewise as contemporary international avant-garde movements. As office of the affirmation of their national heritage, they revived older media, particularly woodcut prints. Die Brücke is considered to be a key group of the German Expressionist movement, though they did not use the give-and-take itself. The grouping is oft compared to both Primitivism and Fauvism due to their use of high-keyed, non-naturalistic color to express extreme emotion similar the Fauvists and a crude drawing technique that eschewed complete abstraction, similar the Primitivists.

Der Blaue Reiter

A few years later, in 1911, a like-minded group of young artists formed Der Blaue Reiter (The Blueish Rider) in Munich. The group was founded past a number of Russian emigrants, including Wassily Kandinsky, Alexej von Jawlensky, Marianne von Werefkin, and native German language artists, such as Franz Marc, August Macke, and Gabriele Münter. Like Die Brücke, Der Blaue Reiter is considered a major feature of the German Expressionist movement.

Within the group, creative approaches and aims varied from artist to artist, even so, there was a shared desire to express spiritual truths through their art. Der Blaue Reiter every bit a grouping believed in the promotion of modern art, the connection between visual fine art and music, the spiritual and symbolic associations of colour, and a spontaneous, intuitive approach to painting. Members were interested in European medieval fine art and Primitivism, as well every bit the contemporary, non-figurative fine art scene in France. As a result of their encounters with Cubist, Fauvist and Rayonist ideas, they moved towards abstract art.

Kathe Kollwitz

Käthe Kollwitz (1867–1945) was a German painter, printmaker, and sculptor whose work offered an eloquent and often searing account of the human condition, and the tragedy of war, in the showtime one-half of the 20th century. Initially her work was grounded in Naturalism, and later took on Expressionistic qualities. Inspired by a performance of Gerhart Hauptmann'south The Weavers, which dramatized the oppression of the Silesian weavers in Langembielau and their failed revolt in 1842, Kollwitz produced a wheel of vi works on the Weavers theme. Rather than a literal illustration of the drama, the works were a gratis and naturalistic expression of the workers' misery, promise, courage, and, somewhen, doom. The Weavers became Kollwitz' most widely acclaimed work.

Mother with her Dead Son past Käthe Kollwitz: This Kollwitz sculpture is a WWII war memorial.

Egon Schiele

Egon Schiele (1890–1918) was an Austrian painter. A protégé of Gustav Klimt, Schiele was a major figurative painter in the early 20th century. His work is noted for its intensity, besides every bit for the many self-portraits he produced. The twisted body shapes and expressive line that narrate Schiele'due south paintings and drawings mark the artist as an early exponent of Expressionism. Schiele was influenced by his mentor, Klimt, likewise equally by Edvard Munch, January Toorop, and Vincent van Gogh. Schiele explored themes not simply of the human form, but also of human sexuality. Many viewed Schiele's piece of work as being grotesque, erotic, pornographic, or disturbing, focusing on sex activity, death, and discovery.

Sitzender weiblicher Akt mit aufgestützen Ellbogen by Egon Schiele: Schiele'south depiction of female nudes scandalized his contemporaries.

Paula Mendersohn-Becker

Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876–1907) was a German painter and i of the most important representatives of early on Expressionism. In a brief career, cutting curt by her death at the age of 31, she created a number of groundbreaking images of great intensity. Modersohn-Becker studied briefly at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris and was influenced by French mail impressionists Paul Cézanne, Vincent van Gogh, and Paul Gauguin. On her last trip to Paris in 1906, she produced a series of paintings about which she felt great excitement and satisfaction. During this period of painting, she produced her initial nude self-portraits—something unprecedented by a female person painter—and portraits of friends such equally Rainer Maria Rilke and Werner Sombart.

Selbstporträt past Paula Modersohn-Becker, 1906: Female nude self-portraits were uncommon subjects in this era.

Abstruse Sculpture

Modernistic abstract sculpture developed alongside other advanced movements of the early 20th century like Cubism and Surrealism.

Learning Objectives

Hash out the development of abstract sculpture through the periods of Cubism and Surrealism, naming the important works of Rodin, Picasso, Duchamp, and Brâncuşi

Cardinal Takeaways

Key Points

• Auguste Rodin is seen every bit the progenitor of modern sculpture.
• Picasso and fellow cubist artists developed new means of amalgam works of fine art using collage, or sculptural assemblage using disparate materials. This is known as Cubist constructionism.
• Surrealism further expanded upon contemporary definitions of sculpture by introducing the concept of the " readymade."
• Constantin Brâncuşi rejected naturalism in sculpture also as any form of representational art. His minimal, abstract artworks attempt to depict the essence of an object.

Key Terms

• abstract art: Art that is not intended to draw objects in the natural world, merely instead uses color and form in a non-representational fashion.
• naturalism: A creative movement that seeks to encapsulate reality or familiar experience in which subjects may receive highly symbolic, idealistic, or fifty-fifty supernatural treatment.
• coulage: Automatic or involuntary sculpture fabricated by pouring a molten cloth (such as metallic, wax, or chocolate) into cold water. As the textile cools information technology takes on what appears to be a random (or aleatoric) form, though the physical properties of the materials involved may pb to a conglomeration of discs or spheres.

Rodin

Auguste Rodin, along with artists similar Edgar Degas and Paul Gauguin, developed a radical new approach to the creation of sculpture in the 19th century. Rodin was a naturalist, less concerned with monumental expression than with character and emotion. Departing from centuries of tradition, he turned abroad from the idealism of the Greeks and the decorative dazzler of the Bizarre and neo-Baroque movements. His sculpture emphasized the private and the concreteness of mankind, suggesting emotion through detailed, textured surfaces, and the interplay of lite and shadow.

The modernistic sculpture movement essentially began during the Rodin showroom at the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1900. At this result, Rodin showed his Burghers of Calais, Balzac and Victor Hugo statues, along with The Thinker. Though all of these are representational works of art, Rodin's approach to course paved the mode for increasingly experimental and abstract art.

The Thinker by Auguste Rodin: Rodin'south experiments with course, visible in The Thinker, launched modernistic abstract sculpture.

Influence of Cubism

Cubist sculpture developed in parallel with Cubist painting, centered in Paris outset effectually 1909 and evolving through the early on 1920s. The way is nigh closely associated with the formal experiments of Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso. Others were quick to follow Braque and Picasso'south lead in Paris, including Raymond Duchamp-Villon, Alexander Archipenko, Joseph Csaky, Jacques Lipchitz, Henri Laurens, and Ossip Zadkine.

During his period of Cubist innovation, Picasso revolutionized the art of sculpture by combining disparate objects and materials into one sculptural piece of work—the sculptural equivalent of collage in ii dimensional art. Just every bit collage was a radical development in two dimensional art, and so was Cubist construction a radical evolution in 3 dimensional sculpture.

Head of a Woman by Picasso, 1909: Picasso was a pioneer in early 20th century Cubist sculpture.

Influence of Surrealism

The advent of Surrealism led to objects being described equally "sculpture" that would not have been termed as such previously. Surrealist sculpture fabricated use of many of the aforementioned techniques every bit other forms of Surrealist fine art, such as games to tap into the unconscious listen such every bit coulage, a kind of automatic or involuntary sculpture made by pouring a molten textile into cold water. As the fabric cools it takes on what appears to be a random form, though the concrete backdrop of the materials involved may atomic number 82 to a conglomeration of discs or spheres. The creative person may use a variety of techniques to impact the outcome. Involuntary sculpture is described by Surrealists equally sculpture created by absent-mindedly manipulating something, such as rolling and unrolling a picture ticket, angle a paper prune, etc.

Duchamp

Marcel Duchamp had a deep impact on the evolution of abstraction in sculpture. He originated the use of the "plant object" or "readymade" with pieces like Fountain (1917), a urinal that was displayed every bit art. Duchamp experimented a great deal with sculpture, creating readymades, assemblages, and kinetic works. His notion that annihilation can be art that an artist names art is an thought that has resonated throughout many historical and gimmicky movements. Though never considered himself to be a Surrealist, he was involved socially with many key members of the motility and his ideas were of influence.

Duchamp participated in the blueprint of the 1938 International Surrealist Exhibition, which was held at the Galerie des Beaux-arts, Paris. The show featured more sixty artists from different countries, including approximately 300 paintings, objects, collages, photographs, and installations. The surrealists wanted to create an exhibition which in itself would be a artistic human action, and André Breton named Duchamp, Wolfgang Paalen, Man Ray, Salvador Dali, and Max Ernst to assist do so.

Brâncuşi

The work of Constantin Brâncuşi at the showtime of the century paved the way for later abstract sculpture. In revolt against the naturalism of Rodin and his tardily 19th-century contemporaries, Brâncuşi distilled subjects downwards to their essences as illustrated by his Bird in Space series (1924). These elegantly refined abstract forms became synonymous with 20th century sculpture.

Brâncuşi's impact, with his vocabulary of reduction and abstraction, is seen throughout the 1930s and 1940s, and exemplified past artists including Gaston Lachaise, Sir Jacob Epstein, Henry Moore, Alberto Giacometti, Joan Miró, Ásmundur Sveinsson, Julio González, Pablo Serrano, and Jacques Lipchitz.

Fountain by Marcel Duchamp: Duchamp's appropriation of a urinal as a piece of art challenged the prevailing definition of sculpture.

Dada and Surrealism

Dada and Surrealism were multidisciplinary cultural movements of the European avant-garde that emerged in Zurich and Paris respectively during the time of WWI.

Learning Objectives

Identify the origins, characteristics, and political ideologies of Dada

Key Takeaways

Key Points

• Dada was a political motility opposed to artistic and social conformity every bit well as the backer forces that led to WWI.
• Dada artists worked in non-traditional media including collage, photomontage, and aggregation. Dada creative person Michel Duchamp pioneered the notion of the "readymade;" everyday objects appropriated for artistic purposes.
• Dada spread throughout Europe and North America post-obit WWI; by the early 1920s the middle of Dada action was Paris.
• Dada informed many of the major avant-garde movements of the 20th century century, including Surrealism and Social Realism.
• Surrealism began in the 1920s and had a lot in mutual with Dadaism.
• Surrealist works drew inspiration from intuition, the power of the unconscious mind, and various psychological schools of thought.
• Surrealist artists and writers regarded their piece of work equally an expression of the philosophical movement, with the artwork being an artifact.

Key Terms

• readymade: Everyday objects found or purchased and declared art. The readymades of Marcel Duchamp are ordinary manufactured objects that the creative person selected and modified as an antitoxin to what he called "retinal art." By simply choosing the object (or objects) and repositioning, joining, titling, and signing it, the object became fine art.
• collage: A composite object or collection (abstruse or concrete) created by the aggregation of various media; especially for a work of art like text, film, etc.
• social realism: An artistic motility that depicted social and racial injustice and economic hardship through unvarnished pictures of life's struggles.

Dadaism

Dada was a multi-disciplinary art movement that rejected the prevailing artistic standards by producing "anti-art" cultural works. Dadaism was intensely anti-war, anti-bourgeois, and held stiff political affinities with the radical left. For many participants, the movement was a protest against the conservative nationalist and colonialist interests, which many Dadaists believed were the root cause of the war, and against the cultural and intellectual conformity—in art and more broadly in social club—that corresponded to the war. Many Dadaists believed that the reason and logic of bourgeois capitalist guild had led people into war. They expressed their rejection of that credo in artistic expression that appeared to turn down logic and embrace chaos and irrationality.

The origin of the name Dada is unclear. Some believe that it is a nonsensical word while others maintain that it originates from the Romanian artists Tristan Tzara's and Marcel Janco's frequent use of the words "da, da," meaning "yes, yep" in Romanaian. Another theory posits that the proper name "Dada" came during a meeting of when a pocketknife stuck into a French–German lexicon happened to point to dada, a French word for "hobbyhorse." Probable, the origin of the name Dada is another endeavour to devalue a system of logic, namely that of language.

Dada began in Zurich in 1916. Key figures in the Dada movement included Hugo Brawl, Emmy Hennings, Hans Arp, and Raoul Hausmann, among others. The move influenced later styles like avant-garde, and movements including Surrealism, Nouveau réalisme, pop art and Fluxus.

Plaque commemorating the birth of Dada motility: This plaque is from the Cabaret Voltaire, the first venue where Dada artists showcased their piece of work in 1916.

Dada was an informal international motility with participants in Europe and Northward America that employed all kinds of media but are known especially for collage, writing, photomontage and performance. Dadaists worked in collage, creating compositions by pasting together transportation tickets, maps, plastic wrappers and other artifacts of daily life. Dada artists also worked in photomontage, a variation on collage that utilized bodily or reproductions of photographs printed in the press. In Cologne, Max Ernst used photographs taken from the front during World War I to comment on the war. Another variation on collage used past Dadaists was assemblage, the assembly of everyday objects to produce meaningful or meaningless pieces of work, including war objects and trash.

When World War I ended in 1918, well-nigh of the Zurich Dadaists returned to their domicile countries, while some began Dada activities in other cities.

Dada poster from 1923: This poster for a Dada soiree references the medium of collage.

Like Zurich, New York Metropolis was a refuge for writers and artists from World War I. Frenchmen Marcel Duchamp and Francis Picabia met American artist Human being Ray in New York City in 1915. The trio soon became the center of radical anti-art activities in the United States.

During this time, Duchamp began exhibiting "readymades" (everyday objects found or purchased and declared art) and was agile in the Society of Independent Artists. In 1917, he submitted the at present famous Fountain to the Club of Independent Artists exhibition. Initially an object of scorn within the arts customs, the Fountain has since go nearly canonized by some as one of the most recognizable modernist works of sculpture. The commission presiding over Britain'southward prestigious Turner Prize in 2004, for example, called it "the most influential work of modern art."

Fountain by Marcel Duchamp: Duchamp'southward cribbing of a urinal every bit a piece of art challenged the prevailing definition of sculpture.

By 1921, nigh of the original Dadaists moved to Paris, where Dada experienced its final major incarnation. Inspired by Tristan Tzara, Paris Dada presently issued manifestos, organized demonstrations, staged performances, and a number of journals.

While broad, the Dada movement was unstable. By 1924, artists had gone on to other ideas and movements including surrealism and social realism. Some theorists argue that Dada was the showtime of postmodern fine art.

Surrealism

Surrealism was a cultural move get-go in the 1920s that sprang direct out of Dadaism and overlapped in many senses. Surrealist works drew inspiration from intuition, the power of the unconscious listen, and various psychological schools of idea. The piece of work often features unexpected juxtapositions, non sequiturs, and elements of surprise.

First and foremost, Surrealist artists and writers regarded their work every bit an expression of the philosophical movement, with the artwork being an artifact. Leader André Breton was explicit in his assertion that Surrealism was above all a revolutionary movement. Surrealism developed out of the Dada activities during World War I and the virtually important center of the movement was Paris. From the 1920s onward, the motion spread around the world, eventually affecting the visual arts, literature, film, and music of many countries and languages, likewise as political thought and practice, philosophy, and social theory.

As the Surrealists developed their philosophy, they believed that Surrealism would advocate the idea that ordinary and representative expression was vital and important, only that expression must be fully open to the imagination. Freud'due south work with gratuitous association, dream assay, and the unconscious was of utmost importance to the Surrealists as they developed methods to liberate their imaginations.

Like Dada, Surrealism aimed to revolutionize human experience, in terms of the personal, cultural, social, and political aspects. Surrealists wanted to gratis people from false rationality, and also from restrictive customs and structures. Breton proclaimed that the truthful aim of Surrealism was "long live the social revolution, and it lone!"

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Source: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-arthistory/chapter/european-art-in-the-early-20th-century/

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