Art chapters (21-25)

Readymade

a concept pioneered by Dadaist Marcel Duchamp in which a common manufactured object is signed by an artisit and thereby turned into an artwork

Surrealism

a movement in literature and the visual arts that developed in the mid-1920s, based on revealing the unconscious mind in dream images and the fantastic

Frottage

a technique in which a canvas is laid over a textured surface and rubbed with crayons and pencils

What was a distinctive feature of modern art when it arose in Brazil and Argentina?

cannibalism

Expressionism

refers to an individual and group styles originating in Europe in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, characterized by bold execution and free use of distortion and symbolic or invented color.

Happenings and Performance Art

A genre of art from 1960-present in which the artist presents a "live" happening or performance, often combining sound, music, dance, and ritual. An early example is a happening staged by French artist Yves Klein. Klein covered nude bodies of models with his signature blue paint in a series of works called Anthropometries. The models slid, rolled, and were dragged across large canvases leaving mostly abstract imprints. Most performance works are temporary, with no lasting art objects to sell or to preserve for museum viewing, though performance works are often documented by photography, video, or film.

Futurism

A group movement originating in Italy in 1909 that celebrated both natural and mechanical motion and speed

Feminist Art

A modern and postmodern movement that addresses issues of gender equality, the repression of women, and the place of women in art. Feminist artist Judy Chicago, in her virtuoso collaborative sculptural work The Dinner Party (1974-1979) pays homage to significant social, literary, and artistic contributions of women in society. In the 1980's, feminist artists like the Guerilla Girls created public awareness of women's issues through posters, like one entitled, Do Women Have to be Naked to Get into the Met Museum?

Color Field Painting

A movement that grew out of Abstract Expressionism, in which large stained or painted areas, or "fields," of color evoke aesthetic and emotional responses.

Minimalism

A nonrepresentational style of sculpture and painting that came to prominence in the middle and late 1960s; usually severely restricted in the use of visual elements and often consisting of simple geometric shapes or masses.

Postmodernism

A philosophical, literary, architectural and art movement that began in the 1960's. In art, postmodernism manifested as a rejection of the minimalist aesthetic of the modern era. Postmodernism favors pluralism and diversity of style and subject matter. Postmodern art styles include the following: Neo-Expressionism, Installation Art, Video, Feminist Art, and Digital Art.

Earthwork

A sculptural form made from earth, rocks, or sometimes plants, often on a vast scale and in a remote location.

Abstract Expressionism

A style of abstract art that developed after World War II which relied on spontaneous, unconscious expression of emotion through color, gestural line, and energetic brush work. Artists include Robert Motherwell and Franz Kline.

Action Painting

A style of nonrepresentational painting that relies on the physical movement of the artist by using such gestural techniques as vigorous brushwork, dripping, and pouring

Pop Art

A style of painting and sculpture that developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s in Britain and the United States, using mass-production techniques (such as silkscreen) or real objects in works that are generally more polished and ironic than assemblages.

Fauvism

A style of painting introduced in Paris in the early twentieth century, characterized by areas of bright contrasting color and simplified shapes

Conceptual Art

A trend developed in the late 1960s; an art form in which the originating idea and the process by which it is presented take precedence over a tangible product.

Happening

A usually unrehearsed event conceived by artists and performed by artists and others, who may include viewers.

Abstract Expression

An art movement, primarily in painting, that originated in the United States in the 1940s in which artists worked in many different styles that emphasized spontanous personal expression.

What are some ways the artists integrated art with everyday life?

Artist integrated art with everyday life by using their society, and use their art to capture that particular time, to examine it, or to express an opinion about it.

Digital Art

Digital art is the creation and production of images with the assistance of a computer. Computer software offers nearly limitless possibilities for creating visual images. Millions of colors, simulated textures, and tools that create abstract or ultra-realistic three dimensional representations have revolutionized image creation in the areas of animation, video games, film that incorporates computer generated graphics, graphic design technology, fine art, and other applications. Digital artists use and exploit the new technologies to their advantage, creating original images, or modifying existing images.

Performance Art

Dramatic presentation by visual artists (as distinguished from theater artists) in front of an audience, usually not in a formal theatrical setting.

Environmental Art

Earth works are sculptural works in which large areas of earth are used as the artistic medium. An example is Robert Smithson's Spiral Jetty at Great Salt Lake, Utah (1970). Natural materials from the land were deposited in a spiral shape, forming a gigantic sculptural work surrounded by water. Postmodern environmental art also includes art that identifies ecological concerns, as in Joseph Beuys' work 7,000 Oaks in which the conceptual artist and his friends planted 7,000 oak trees as an ecological statement in the city of Kassel, Germany.

How can organic abstract sculpture imply a protest against fascism?

European artists in opposition to communist regimes reaffirmed abstract art by forming the group Abstraction creation in 1931.

Was expressionism a revolutionary movement? or was it evolutionary?

Expressionism was a revolutionary movement that changed they way everyone one looked at art.

Installation Art

Installation art is a popular modern and postmodern mode of production. Installations are temporary and are created for a specific site, often a gallery space or an outdoor area. An example is Jenny Holzer's 1989 retrospective installation (Untitled...) at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. Holzer installed electronic signs that flashed pithy aphorisms she calls truisms on the curved walls of the museum. The texts include sayings like: "Save me from what I want," and "You're a victim of the rules you live by." View the Holzer installation by clicking the link at the end of the lecture.

How did the feminists revolt against their predecessors?

Made different forms of art to support the female experience, as opposed to the frequently competitive nature of the male.

Modernism

Modernismis a Western art movement that began in earnest in the last half of the 19th century. Early modern artists, like the Impressionists, questioned established norms by departing from realistic representation. Subsequent artists questioned the very premises of art-making and asked whether traditional culture added anything of value to society. One such movement was called Dada.

Neo-Expressionism

Neo-Expressionist artists reacted to the reductionist tendencies of Modernism by returning to a painterly, emotionally-charged, representational style in which the human figure and complex ideas are often the primary subject. Neo-Expressionists like David Salle combine multiple styles on the same canvas.

What were two initial ways in which modern art arrived in the United States?

Photography and Cubism

Assemblage

Sculpture made by assembling found or cast-off objects that may or may not contribute their original identities to the total content of the work.

Appropriation

The deliberate borrowing of an image and using the image in a new context. An example is Sherry Levine's artwork called After Walker Evans, which is a photograph of a photograph. Marcel Duchamp's drawing of a mustache and goatee on a postcard image of the Mona Lisa is another example of appropriation.

What were the two branches of New York School painting?

The two branches of New York School painting are abstract expressionism and color field

How did the Surrealists believe that they were working for humanity's benefit?

They believed modern emphasis on science, rationality and progress was throwing the consciousness of balance. In response they proclaimed the importance of the unconscious mind, dreams, fantasies, and hallucinations.

How does Analytical Cubism reflect the way we actually see?

They favored painting because the variety of textures and colors possible. It allowed theartist to create a two-dimensional world freely that told a story of somesorts.

How did the Dada Movement express opposition to WWI?

They often protested through play and spontaneity

Video

Video as art was pioneered in the 1970's by Bill Viola. Viola's 1996 video installation at Grand Central Market, Los Angeles includes both video and sound. Video images were projected onto a 6 foot high screen in The Crossing, whichdepicts separate images of a man slowly walking toward the viewer. Water begins to drip on the head of one man with increasing intensity until his form dissolves in a flood of water. A fire consumes the other. The Crossing is imbued with symbolic, sensuous meaning, including metaphors of ultimate demise and spiritual transformation. Sonia Falcone is a masterful video installation artist whose work in the XVII Bienal de Arte de Santa Cruz de la Sierre won her rave reviews.

If an artist only tells you about an idea that she or he had, is that idea art?

Yes, this is known as conceptual art.

Social Realism

a socially and politically committed form of art that became common in many countries between the two world wars and which included a retreat from the radical innovations of modern art, and the desire to communicate more readily with the public about social causes and issues

collage

a work made by giving various materials, such as paper scraps, photographs, and cloth on a flat surface

Automatism

action without conscious control, as employed by Surrealist writers and artists to allow unconscious ideas and feelings to be expressed

cubism

an art style developed in Paris by Picasso and Braque, beginning in 1907, based on the simultaneous presentation of multiple views, disintegration, and geometric reconstructions of subjects in flattened, ambiguous pictorial space.

Postmodern

an attitude or trend of the late 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s; characterized in architecture by a move away from te International Style in favor of an imaginative, eclectic approach, and in the other visual arts by influence from all periods and styles and a willingness to combine elements of all.

Constructivism

art movement that originated in Russia at the time of the Soviet Revolution in 1917, which emphasized abstract art, modern materials, and useful arts such as set design, furniture, and graphics

Photomontage

the process of combining parts of various photographs in one photograph

Why was the idea of motion so important to futurists?

this added a sense of speed and movement

What are postmodern architects doing that modernists did not?

Postmodern architects celebrate the vert qualities of modern life that modern architects rejected; complexity, ambiguity, contradiction, nostalgia, and popular taste.

Dada

~a movement in art and literature, founded in Switzerland in the early twentieth century, which ridiculed contemporary culture and conventional art. ~is an early 20th century art movement that developed in response to the wide-scale destruction of World War I. Dadaists reacted to the horror of war by denouncing the culture and traditions that produced it. They embraced new modes of art production in protest. Leading Dadaist Marcel Duchamp appropriated ready made objects and turned them into art. Duchamp's most recognizable readymade entitled Fountain is one of the most famous modernist works. Fountain is a commonplace restroom urinal that Duchamp purchased, put on a pedestal, and signed with a pseudonym, "R. Mutt." He presented the work for exhibition at the Society of Independent Artists in New York in 1917.