Art History

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THE SECOND HALF OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY: A Multiplicity of Directions Responding to Art Chapter 19

Transcript of Art History

THE SECOND HALF OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY:

A Multiplicity of Directions

Responding to ArtChapter 19

Neo-dadaism- A style of art that emphasized freedom, non-rational creativity and the breaking down of barriers between art and life Minimalism emerges in the 1950s and 1960s.

- Artists begin to move away from formalism to a more amplified and powerful form of art

- Range and subject matter are expanded

Neo-dadaists- Robert Rauschenberg- Jasper Johns- Allan Kaprow

Historical EventsWorld War IICold War begins in 1946

Between Art & Life: Mixed Media and Happenings• The line between art and life becomes unclear• Minimalist’s reductionism produces impure, messy, expansive, and all-encompassing artwork• No clear distinction between form and subject matter• Confusion about this art as paintings, sculptures, art, Anti-art…just what were they?• New labels for this art was invented (combines, assemblages, mixed media, events, actions, performances, happenings)

New Subjects, Media, and Art Form

Neo-Dadaism in Art Historical Context

• Original Dadaists sought to differentiate daily life from high art

• Marcel Duchamp’s infamous Fountain (a urinal exhibited in an art gallery)

• The entrance of abstract expressionism

• Painterly brushwork, unbounded freedom , individualistic choicesense of open-ended experimentation, action

Critical Responses

• Striving for appreciation and understanding of the difficult works of neo-Dadaism

• Stirred the senses and develops paradoxes that are mentally stimulating

• Questioning societal norms

Johns & Rauschenberg: A Study in Opposites- Both worked closely together and productively together

for a period of time

- Influenced one another but had respect for each other differing personalities and approach

- Their artwork reflective of their differing temperaments and m methods

- Johns – reclusive, meditative, and introverted

- Rauschenberg – amiable, impulsive, and extroverted

- Both at the forefront of “new realism”

Into Real Space & Time: Happenings and KaprowHappeningsA mixed media environmental art form that features theater-like activities in which people and/or objects

interact in improvisational ways.

Kaprow• The oretician of the happenings movement• Saw the happenings as a synthesis of advanced painting, theater, and life• Sophisticated and witty; ritualistic and Zen-like; crude; lyrical; very spontaneous• No plot or obvious philosophy and improvisatory

Robert Rauschenberg(1925 – 2008)

Bed, 1955

Varieties of New RealismPop ArtFigurative art arising in the 1960s whose form and content derive from the imagery of the mass media and the products of consumer society.

• Pop Culture and mass media integrated into art

• Some were major figures in the happenings movement

Pop Artists•Claes Oldenburg•Roy Lichtenstein•Andy Warhol

Historical EventsVietnam War continuesEnd of the Cold WarDigital Revolution begins

Pop ArtClaes Oldenburg

Clothespin, 1976

• Born January 28, 1929, in Stockholm and became an American citizen in December 1953

• Familiar objects made out of plaster, reflecting American society’s celebration of consumption

• His art was disliked by established critics for its bigness, brashness, and vulgarity

•Avant-garde values (independence and criticality) were being surrendered

Andy Warhol• Born in 1928 in Pittsburgh as the son of Slovak immigrants and became a Pop icon

• Started painting daily objects of mass production like Campbell Soup cans and Coke bottles out of an obsession with reproduction and repetition

• He started making silkscreen prints of famous personalities like Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor.

• In May 1994 the Andy Warhol Museum opened in his home town of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania

Andy Warhol, Self-Portrait, 1986

Pop Art in Art Historical Perspective• New roles, previously taboo, now became acceptable

• Artists became: documenters of external reality; “commercial” in subject matter, style, and business goals; media stars

• A break with the old, antiestablishment vanguard

• Media images, mass-market products, commercial and industrial art styles become popular

Lichtenstein• Born into a middle class family on October 27, 1923 in New York City

• Studies were interrupted by a three year stint in the army during World War II

• adopted the Abstract Expressionism style

• He began teaching at Rutgers University in 1960 where he was heavily influenced by Allan Kaprow

• Used oil and Magna paint, thick outlines, bold colors and Benday Dots to represent certain colors, as if created by photographic reproduction Whaam!, 1963

1923 - 1997

From Modernism to Postmodernism• American painting and sculpture reached a dividing line between modern and postmodern art

• Older art critics clearly bemoaned this shift in artistic attitude and direction

• The landscaped was transformed into skyscrapers, billboards, supermarket aisles and television

• Introduction of the “new realists” (Superrealists and Photorealists)

• Though there are was literal or psychological they always emphasized its formal content

Superrealism & Photo-realismSuperrealismA Style of sculpture characterized by extreme realistic detail.

• Duane Hanson• George Segal

PhotorealismA style of realistic painting based on photographs of a person, object or scene. Characterized by extraordinary detail, a tremendously subtle range of values and objective physical accuracy.

• Richard Estes• Chuck Close

Segal: Between Pop Art & Superrealism

Hanson: Superrealism Sculpture

• Represented real people and things, not media images of people or things• Props

- movie marquees- kitchen and bathroom items- counter and cooking equipment from an actual diner

•His work projected human immediacy lacking in the mediated images of pop art

•Used naturalistic colors or a particular monochrome to evoke moodGeorge Segal (1924- 2000)

Tightrope, 1969

• Sculptures are warmer in tone and far more naturalistic• Strives for extreme naturalism in figures and settings• Lifelike quality

• Focused on ordinary people in their ordinary surroundings• Concerned with actual life vs. media versions of it• Championed art representative of dissatisfaction with the world

Duane Hanson(1925 – 1996)

Housepainter, 1988

Close & Estes: Photo-realist Painting

Chuck Close

• Working from photographic prints or slide projections

• Photo-realist meticulously select from and imitate the visual reality that comes to us through the camera

• Illusionistic paintings of commonplace scenes and people

• Received mixed reviews in the early 1970s

•Viewers and reviews judged as more imitation than art

• Critics - looked strangely mechanical, impersonal, and absent of feeling• Photo-realists - paintings as cool, exacting, and revealing as the all-seeing machine eye of the camera• Characterized by immense detail, infinitely subtle values, fleeting reflections, and the lighting of the moment.• More interested in formal than human concerns• Surface and depth, clarity and sparkle, order and balance, and compositional organization•Urban environment, as visual structure, is both the subject and the object of the work

Self-Portrait, 2004-2005

34th Street, Manhattan, Looking East

Richard Estes

- The 1980s usher in the return of figurative (representational) art.

- Abstract art becomes more favored by numerous sculptors, craft artist, architects, paintmakers and painters.

Major Artists*Richard Estes *Sylvia Lark *Bill Reid *Keith Haring *Leon Golub *Friz Scholder *Lucien Freud *May Stevens *Jean-Michael Basquiat*Luis Jimenez *Anslem Kiefer *Eric Fischl *Cheri Samba

The Return of Figurative Art

New Images & Neo-Expressionist Art

The Interrogation II, 1981

Leon Golub ( 1922-2004) with wife and fellow artist Nancy

Spero

Neo-expressionismA revival of expressionism in art characterized by intense colors, dramatic and unusually figural forms, and emotive subject matter.

• Diverse art movement (chiefly of painters)

• Rejection of traditional standards of composition and design

•Ambivalent and often brittle emotional tone

• Reflected contemporary urban life and values

• General lack of concern for pictorial idealization

• Distortion of natural form, space, color, and composition

• Simultaneously tense and playful presentation of objects in a primitivist manner

• Communicated a sense of inner disturbance, tension, alienation, and ambiguity

Multicultural & Intercultural ExpressionsMulticulturalismOf or relating to a social or educational theory that encourages interest in many cultures within a society rather than in only a mainstream culture.

Period Context Greater study and appreciation of cultural diversity and feminist perspectives in art

Veteran artists of diverse cultural backgrounds receive recognition

Intercultural complexities and expressions of heritage

Introduction of unconventional media and material in sculpting

Art becomes morally, psychologically, and socially conscious with a mix of realism and expressionism

Art world becomes more internationalized, multiculturalized, and regionally dispersed.American Contemporary Realist, Painter, and

Sculptor, born in 1948

A Brief History of North Africa, 1985

MEDIAS & METHODSRobert Rauschenberg - Mediums: Acrylic, Aluminum, Assemblage, Ceramic/Porcelain, Collage, Enamel, Gouache, Ink Drawing (Pen and Ink),

Metal, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Oil Paint, Pottery, Printmaking Specialty, Steel, Watercolor - Methods: Illustration, Painting, Palette Knife, Potter/Ceramist, Printmaking/Graphics, Sculpture Jasper Johns - Mediums: Assemblage, Bronze, Charcoal, Collage, Crayon, Encaustic, Graphite/Pencil, Ink Drawing (Pen and Ink),

Metal, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Oil Paint, Printmaking Specialty, Watercolor - Methods: Painting, Palette Knife, Printmaking/Graphics, SculptureAllan Kaprow - Medium: Assemblage, Audio, Collage, Found Objects, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Video/Film Art - Method: Printmaking/GraphicsClaes Oldenburg - Mediums: Aluminum, Assemblage, Bronze, Ceramic/Porcelain, Chalk, Charcoal, Collage, Crayon, Earthworks, Enamel,

Fiberglass, Gouache, Ink Drawing (Pen and Ink), Magic Marker/Felt-Tip Pen, Metal, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, oil Paint, Pastel Painting, Plaster, Pottery, Printmaking Specialty, Resin, Steel, Watercolor, Wire

- Methods: Drawing, Painting, Potter/Ceramist, Printmaking/Graphics, SculptureRoy Lichtenstein - Mediums: Acrylic, Aluminum, Bronze, Ceramic/Porcelain, Collage, Crayon, Enamel, Fresco, Glass/Neon, Light Sculpture,

Graphite/Pencil, Ink Drawing (Pen and Ink), Magic Marker/Felt-Tip Pen, Metal, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Oil Paint, Pastel Painting, Plexiglas, Pottery, Printmaking Specialty, Silver, Steel, Watercolor, Wood

- Methods: Comic Book/Strip Illustration, Illustration, Kinetic Sculpture, Mural Painting, Painting, Palette Knife, Potter/Ceramist, Printmaking/Graphics, SculptureAndy Warhol - Medium: Acrylic, Casein, Chalk, Charcoal, Collage, Enamel, Fiberglass, Gouache, Graphite/Pencil, Ink Drawing (Pen

and Ink), Magic Marker/Felt-Tip Pen, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Oil Paint, Pastel Painting, Printmaking, Specialty, Watercolor, Wood

- Method: Illustration, Painting, Printmaking/Graphics, Sculpture

Duane Hanson - Mediums: Bronze, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Resin, Wood - Methods: SculptureGeorge Segal - Mediums: Bronze, Chalk, charcoal, collage, Ink Drawing (Pen and Ink), Metal, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Pastel Painting,

Plaster, Watercolor - Methods: Installation Sculpture, Painting, Printmaking/Graphics, Sculpture, Sketch ArtistRichard Estes - Mediums: Acrylic, Gouache, Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Oil Paint, Printmaking Specialty, Watercolor - Methods: Advertising/Commercial Art, Commercial Artist, Painting, Printmaking/Graphics,Chuck Close - Mediums: Airbrush, Collage, Graphite/Pencil, Ink Drawing (Pen and Ink), Mixed-Media/Multi-Media, Oil Paint, Pastel Painting, Printmaking Specialty, Silver, Watercolor, - Methods: Painting, Printmaking/Graphics

Works Cited

• Bersson, R. Responding to art: Form, content, and context. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2004.• Steve Reich. “Six Marimbas”. Manhattan Marimba Quartet. Genre: Minimalist. Nonesuch, 1992.• “neo-Expressionism." Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. 2008. Merriam-Webster Online.

11 July 2008 <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/neo-Expressionism>• "multiculturalism." The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. 2003.

Houghton Mifflin Company 11 July 2008 <http://222.thefreedictionary.com/multiculturalism> • “biography”. Eric Fischl. 2008. 13 July 2008 <http://www.ericfischl.com/bio/biography1.html>• “pop art”. SlideShare, Inc. 2008. 12 July 2008 <http://www.slideshare.net/mickpork/computer-generated-

art-part4>• “methods” “mediums”. Ask Art. 2000. 13 July 2008 <http://www.askart.com/AskART/index.aspx>

LaSalle University

Music, PowerPoint, Research, Graphic Design

Captions, Pictures , and Works Cited

by

Pamela McClure&

Shawna Stern

Art 152Patricia Haberstroh

July 2008