For our final lecture class, we finished up Post-War art and then discussed Post-Modern era. Starting off with Pop Art, which often included images taken from mass media and slightly altered. Many works, such as Andy Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe series, commented on the fascination with fame. Others, such as Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Cans, commented on mass production and the “American Dream”. Sticking with the theme of minimal artist intervention came Minimalism, which served as a counterpart to abstract expressionism. Moving into the Post-Modern era, art left the notion of progress behind. The belief of deconstruction was important in this period, where there essentially is no fixed meaning of art. There was a multitude of different styles and media.
Author: Flossy Fogarty (Page 1 of 3)
We started this class by discussing Frida Kahlo. While often called a surrealist, Kahlo rejected that title. Stating that she painted her reality, not her dreams. We looked at her painting, The Two Fridas. In this painting, she depicts herself in two different manners, one that conformed to European beauty standards and one that conformed to traditional Mexican beauty standards. However, the hearts of the two Fridas are connected, showing how Frida Kahlo’s two identities fit together. There are also references to the trauma that Kahlo went through.
We moved on to De Stijl, or Neo-Plasticism, which aimed to achieve utopian ideals. Piet Mondrian’s painting, Composition en Rouge, is a stand out example of De Stijl. The painting is reduced to primary colors and horizontal lines. While asymmetrical, the painting is still balanced. Mondrian seeked prefection and harmony through geometric abstraction. The trend of reducing shapes to their most basic form also found its way into architecture. For example, Le Corbusier’s Villa Savoge reduced three dimensional shapes into their basic form. We finished class by talking about Post-War art, mainly abstract expressionism. This took shape in many forms through action painting and gestural abstraction, as well as chromatic abstraction.
For this class, we discussed cubism and art post-World War I. We looked at the two types of Cubism, Analytic and Synthetic. Analytic Cubism was an analysis of form. Forms were broken down into certain shape with a reduction of depth. These properties are evident in Braque’s The Portuguese and Picasso’s Ma Jolie. There was also a philosophical nature that of a simultaneity of experience created by Cubic paintings. Synthetic Cubism focused more on bringing pieces together, often in the form of a “papier collé”. We then looked at Futurism, which focused on avant garde art that was meant to shock the Bourgeoisie. Moving to post-war, we looked at Dada, which was characterized by its nonsensical nature. Influenced by the random destruction of war, Dada examines the mistrust of progress. Surrealism focused more on techniques to get the viewer in touch with the unconscious.
For this class, we discussed Fauvism and Expressionism. Heavily inspired by Post-Impressionism came Fauvism. While never an official movement, Fauvist were inspired by the bright colors of Post-Impressionism. Colors were often arbitrary. One example that we looked at in class was Henri Matisse’s Le Bonheur de vivre. The painting depicts a traditional subject matter, however, the impact of the color is what is most important. Matisse used bright empty spaces to energize the painting. It was a personal expression without the feeling of anxiety found in the works of van Gogh and Gauguin. Expressionism, also inspired by Post-Impressionism, saw colors being assigned to different meanings and emotions. Artist created artwork that brought about a feeling of discomfort and encouraged psychological exploration.
In this class we discussed the Post-Impressionist movement. The two focuses of the movement were form and personal expression, but both emphasized color. Paul Cézanne, who used the former, painted a series of the same landscape from 1885 to 1887. These landscapes, when compared to Impressionist landscapes were focused more on permanence and less on the fleeting nature of life. Despite being an expansive landscape, the painting appears quite flat due to the paint being applied evenly. The shapes are also simplified and there’s the sense of abstraction and reduction. The painterly style also adds to this effect. In a later landscape, about ten years, of the same area, Cézanne increases the sense of reduction by creating objects into shapes. We then looked at Seurat’s Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, the sense of permanence appears again through the rigidity and formality of the figures and setting. Seurat also chose not to blend the colors himself, but rather let the viewer’s eyes blend them. Moving onto van Gogh and Gauguin, who both focused on personal expression. Both artists used color to express emotion.
In this online video lecture we finished discussing Realism and then moved on to Impressionism. We first looked at photography, and spoke about how it developed. As well as the documentary power from the realistic nature of the photographs. Moving on to Impressionism, which was a continuation of Realism that wanted to express the transitory feel of modern life. It was characterized by light and visible brushstrokes. We first spoke about Édouard Manet, who was the hinge between Realism and Impressionism. He notably painted images of a more intellectual contemporary man. He also had more controversial paintings, specifically Olympia, which depicted a prostitute in Paris. This work also calls back to the work of Titian with its scandalous theme. Then we moved on to Claude Monet, who chose to paint with divided brushstrokes, forcing the viewer to blend the image with their eyes, rather than blending with the paintbrush.
For this class we discussed Realism, which is characterized by its focus on reproducing reality and its life like depictions. The first painting we look at was The Sower, by Jean-François Mille. The positioning of the figure and the angle at which he is viewed creates a sense of importance surrounding the figure. Notably his face is obscured, signaling that he is representative of the peasant class as a whole, rather than a specific individual. This painting also draws into focus an important feature of many works of Realism, which is a political message. The painting depicts the importance of the “rural working class.” We also spoke about Gustave Courbet, and looked at his painting, The Stone-Breakers. The painting portrays a father and son preforming backbreaking manual labor. They are dressed in rags and out-dated clothing to highlight their class status. Much like in The Sower, both figures’ faces are obscured. Additionally, the painting serves as a message of the exploitation of the working class.
For this class we went to the Landay room in the museum to look at a selection of Baroque pieces from Colby’s collection that we could use in our take home exam. The painting that stood out to me the most, and that I selected for my exam, was Viviano Codazzi and Michelangelo Cerquozzi’s Ruined Triumphal Arch, with Belisarius Recieving Alms. Codazzi and Cerquozzi’s use of light to draw the viewer’s eyes across the canvas towards the beggar is extremely reflective of the Baroque period. Additionally, by portraying the figures in the painting in motion, Codazzi and Cerquozzi create a scene that appears as a snapshot.
In this lecture, we finished up Neoclassicism and discussed Romanticism. Romanticism saw a shift from the rationality of Neoclassicism to more emotional and raw art pieces. Unlike Neoclassicism, which often taught the viewer a lesson on morality through the piece, Romanticism focused more on capturing the viewer’s attention through the intensity of the art. In some of the pieces we looked at, the influence of Rococo was evident. For example, the painterly blend used by John Constable in Cloud Study: Stormy Sunset, is very reminiscent of the Rococo period.
For this class we discussed Neoclassicism. We started by discussing the enlightenment and how it led to a revival in classical ideas and art, specifically logic and morality. We first looked at Anton Raphael Mengs’ Parnassus, which depicts Apollo at the top of Parnassus surrounded by the Muses. The structure and symmetry of the painting links to a similar one done by Raphael for the Vatican, and shows a shift from Rococo. We then looked at architecture of the period, such as Lord Burlington and William Kent’s Chiswick House. The architecture of the house resembles a 16th century Palladian villa, which was derived from the Pantheon. The house is characterized by it’s use of basic geometric shapes and the familiarity with ancient architecture. While there was a shift away from the style of Rococo, some of its features are still found in examples of Neoclassicism. For example the colors used in Robert Adam’s Library in Kenwood House, or the painterly blend Thomas Gainsborough used in his Portrait of Mrs. Richard Brimley Sheridan.