Today, we began class by looking at Frida Kahlo’s The Two Fridas. This is not really a surrealist work as it is depicting reality. We know that Frida was in an awful accident and was disabled most of her life as a result. She struggled with miscarriages and repercussions as well. We also know she is a Westerner and indigenous Mexican. In this work, we see a representation of both. On one side, she is dressed in a long skirt. We also see differences in skin tones, her unibrow, and her mustaches, which are accusations of Western culture. This work is similar to religious folk painting and of the Mexican retablo.
Next, we began discussing De Stijl, or the style and Neo-Plasticism. We first looked at Piet Mondrian’s composition en Rogue, Bleu et Jaune. This is a reduction as we only see horizontals and verticals. The colors are primary as well, and the work is asymmetrical. Next, we looked at another aspect of De Stijl: architecture. We looked at Walter Gropius’s Bauhaus. This was an art school and a workshop-like school that embraced modernity. This was also during the machine age; we see a large glass curtain. We then looked at Charles Demuth’s My Egypt. This was an interesting title as he refers to his Egypt as grain elevators. This is basically saying what is more American that grain elevators. These are sort of like big monuments for America, just like the pyramids in Egypt. We then looked at Arshile Gorky’s The Liver is the Cock’s Comb. We know that Gorky immigrated to the States and was a surrealist at first. He was fleeing Europe, and most were members of the communist party. In this work, we see violent shapes and gestural abstraction. It is evident this was not painted calmly. It is also difficult to identify what the subject is. We see possibly an egg? The work has a slightly organic feel, and it resembles an automatic painting. Or letting your pencil simply wander. By 1950, Abstract Expressionism had two tendencies: the action of painting or gestural abstraction and the color field or chromatic abstraction. Mark Rothko’s No 61 (Rust and Blue) is the best example. This work is completely abstract and the figure/ground is irrelevant. It resembles what you feel when you lay in the grass and look at the sky. It sort of sucks you in as it is very large and vibrating.