20th Century Art

1. 20
th
Century Art

2. Why is it so… weird?
•Think of how much and how quickly the
world has changed in the last 110 years.
•Modern art is a reflection of that
turbulence.
•Cameras make realistic art obsolete.
•Mass production makes art marketable

3. •Like the mannerists who followed
Michelangelo and co., the artists of the
20
th
century valued originality and
innovation over just beauty.
–If you can’t please the public, shock it.
•Realistic doesn’t equal “good” art.
Instead, go back to the 4 questions:
–What do I see?
–What do I know about what I see?
–What was the artist trying to do/say?
–How successful was he/she?

4. The Moderns
1900-1914
Matisse
•Not realistic
–Simple lines & figures
–Bright colors
–Not concerned about
distance /three-
dimensionality
La Danse, 1910

5. Fauves
“Wild Beasts”
•French artists Inspired by African and Oceanic
art
= Modern art that looks primitive
Derain,
Landscape at
Cassis,
1907

6. Pablo Picasso
1881-1973

7. •The master of many styles and mediums
•Early paintings are very realistic
•The most famous and the greatest artist of the
20
th
century
Science and
Charity, 1897

8. •Painted the outcasts
of society; lived in
total poverty.
•Went through periods
of color dominance:
–The Blue Period
–The Rose Period
•With his friend,
Georges Braque,
developed Cubism
Life, 1903

9. Cubism
•Shatter a glass sculpture, pick up the pieces, glue
them on a canvas = Cubism!
•Shows several different perspectives of the same
subject at the same time
•Like a round world sliced up to show all the parts.
(Remember, this is the same time that
Einstein’s coming up with the theory of
relativity/the 4
th
dimension!)
•Background and foreground overlap, the subject
dissolves into pattern.

10. Les Demoiselles d’Avignon
1907

11. Carafe, Jug, and
Fruit Bowl
1909

12. L’Accordeoniste,
1911

14. Guernica
1937
On April 27, 1937, Franco (Spain’s dictator) gave Hitler
permission to test their new air bombs on a village in
northern Spain, Guernica.
When Picasso read
accounts of it in the
newspapers, he
immediately began
the plans for the
286 square-foot
mural, Guernica.

15. Guernica

16. Abstract Art
•Simplifies things – a man = a stick figure,
a squiggle = a wave, red = anger
•It’s about symbolism, capturing the
essence of reality in a few lines and colors
•Think “visual music” (this is when jazz was
developed in America)

17. Wassily Kandinsky
(1866-1944)
Patterns that
are just
beautiful,
even if
they don’t
“mean”
anything
Composition
VII, 1913

18. Piet Mondrain (1872-1944)
Composition with Yellow,
Blue and Red, 1937-1942
Painting at its
most basic
elements:
black lines +
white canvas +
primary colors

19. Henry Moore
1898-1986
“Carved the human body with the epic scale and restless poses of
Michelangelo but with the crude rocks and simple lines of the Primitives.”

20. Expressionism
•WWI left 10 million dead and killed the
optimism and faith in mankind that lead
Europe since the Renaissance.
Postwar Europe = Cynicism and decadence
•Artists “expressed” their disgust by
showing a distorted reality that
emphasized the ugly.
- Lurid colors and simplified figures of the
Fauves, but with a haunted, harsh tone.

21. The Scream,
Edvard Munch,
1893
(during the Post-Impressionist
period, but still a model of
Expressionism)

22. Compare the two versions of terror,
less than 75 years apart.

23. Dada
•Artistic grief became twisted humor
+ resentment of the bourgeoisie/pompous
intellectuals
= Art that is outrageous, offensive, and
meant to give traditional culture the finger.

24. Fountain, Marcel Duchamp, 1917

25. Duchamp
Nude Descending a Stair No. 2
1912

26. Surrealism
•“Beyond realism” – a mixed bag of reality
•A juxtaposition of images that you have to
try to connect.
•If it doesn’t connect, then the artist has still
forced you to think in new ways =
success!
•Sigmund Freud also came along,
introducing the idea of the subconscious
and the importance of dreams.

27. Salvador Dali
(1904-1989)
•Most famous surrealist
•Painted, with amazing realism, “random”
objects to create an emotional punch.

28. Dali,
Dream Caused by the
Flight of a Bee Around a
Pomegranate a Second
Before Awakening,
1944

29. Dali,
Madonna of Port Lligat,
1940

30. Dali, The Persistence of Memory, 1931

31. Rene Magritte
1898-1967
The Son of Man, 1964

32. The Treachery of Images, 1929

34. M.C. Escher
(1898-1972)
Drawing Hands,
1948

35. Relativity,
1953

36. A Blending
Keep in mind that most artists worked in a
variety of styles.
For example…

37. Guernica =
A blend of Surrealism and Cubism

38. Marc Chagall
(1887-1985)
I and the Village,
1911
Cubism +
Fauvism +
Expressionism

39. And then…
World War II
Art = Propaganda

40. Abstract Expressionism
•Expressing emotions using only
color and form
•The act of creation becomes more
important than the final product

41. Jackson Pollock,
The She Wolf, 1943

42. Pollock, Silver over Black, White,
Yellow, and Red, 1948

43. Pop Art
•The consumer = king!
•Art created from “pop”-ular
objects, mocking pop culture by
embracing it.

44. Andy Warhol
(1928-1987)
Campbell’s Soup Cans, 1962 Marilyn Monroe, 1962

45. Ray Lichtenstein (1923-1997)
Drowning Girl, 1963

46. Post-Modernism
1970-present
•Art = big business
•Every object can be artistic, it just
depends on context

47. Installations: An artist takes over an entire
room
Assemblages: Recycle trash into larger
sculptures
Natural Objects: Art from nature’s objects
Conceptual Art: The idea/concept is the key
Deconstruction:Changing the familiar/Put a
familiar object in a new setting
Interaction: Viewer participation
Performance Art: Mixed-media live performance

48. Installation Art
Rachel Whiteread,
Embankment,
2005

49. Assemblages
Raoul Hausmann,
Mechanical Head,
1920

50. Robert Smithson, Spiral Jetty (The
Great Salt Lake), 1970
Natural Art

51. Conceptual Art
Joseph Kosuth,
One and Three
Chairs,
1965

52. Christo and Jean-Claude,
The Gates, 2005
Christo and Jean-Claude,
The Umbrellas, 1991
Deconstruction

54. Christo’s Proposed
“Over the River”
Colorado Project (2013?)

55. Interactive Art
Marina Abramovic

56. Performance Art
Video Clips:
Over the Moon, from the play Rent,
Jonathan Larsen
Paintjam, Dan Dunn
Frozen Grand Central, ImprovEverywhere