Abstract
In the last three hundred years’ art has changed significantly. It has gone from Rococo art which stylized youth, love, and lightheartedness with loose brushstrokes, curvy lines, and soft pastel colors. Many Rococo painting are slightly asymmetrical in order to provide the scene with a sense of movement. This was followed by Neoclassical Art which sought to emulate the artworks of Classical antiquity. In the 1900’s there was a shift in the art world as art went from representing an ideal to having no form or rules. This is seen in both the Cubist and Surrealist Art movements which focused more on lines and imagination then on realism or beauty. In cubism the artist uses a multi-viewpoint perspective along with linear lines and geometric shapes to create images on the canvas. The idea of Cubism is to reduce and image to its base components from every angle, which are then represented by geometric shapes. Surrealism is supposed to represent the awakening of the subconscious mind. It was based on the idea that the rational mind shuts off the imagination. This meant artists were prevented from truly expressing themselves in their work. Surrealists felt that the rationalism that held artists back could be conquered by enabling the artist to reach the parts of their mind that they had long silenced. Surrealist thought that it was necessary to access the imagination in order to create artworks that were truly representational of the artist. To do this the artist often times would take images from different sources and turn them into something that was dreamlike and irrational.
This paper will look at some of the important artists of the Rococo, Neo-Classical, Cubist and Surrealist movements and the importance of their work.
18th century Rococo
François Boucher
The Toilet of Venus (1751) Oil painting
Louise Elisabeth Vigée le Brun
The Bather (1792) Oil painting
Rococo paintings very lighthearted and ornate paintings that were completed with light soft colors. They were very popular with the elite and decorated many homes along with furniture in the Rococo style. In the Toilet of Venus by Francois Boucher. He uses Madame Pompadour the mistress of Louis XV as his inspiration for the goddess Venus.
In The Bather by Louise Elisabeth Vigée le Brun her daughter Julie poses as she gets out of the bath. One can see the Rococo influence in the portraiture as the colors are kept light and bright and the expression on Julie’s face is open and expressive. However, it is also possible to see Le Brun’s move towards Neo-Classicalism as the colors are a bit sharper then in typical Rococo paintings. Rococo died out before the French Revolution as it was replaced by the more serious Neo-Classical style which represented better the feelings of the populace.
19th Neoclassical
Harriet Hosmer
The Sleeping Faun (1870) Marble sculpture
Edmonia Lewis
The Death of Cleopatra (1876) Marble sculpture
Neoclassical artist sought to depict a world that was sharper and more serious than that of the Rococo period. They felt that painting smooth surfaces that showed no trace of brushstrokes was extremely important. Sculptors copied that styles that they found relevant which were used by the Classical Roman and Greek artists in their sculptures.
This is seen in the sculptures of both Harriet Hosmer and Edmonia Lewis, who were both well respected American female sculptors. In Hosmer’s work a drunk faun falls asleep against a tree stump only to have a satyr tie him to it as a jest. In Lewis’ work she shows Cleopatra in the throes of death.
Harriet Hosmer despite not being permitted to take any art courses that would allow her to make any extraordinary pieces of art became one of the most renown female artists of her time. This was because women were only allowed to make pieces for the home. She got much of her art education from private lessons and taking anatomy classes in order to learn how to sculpt realistic proportions for the body.
Edmonia Lewis who was African American and Native American was the first woman of African American and Native American ancestry to gain international recognition as an artist and sculptor. She spent much of her life living in Rome where she found greater freedom as an artist of African descent. Unlike other artists she would enlarge the wax and clay models herself. This was something that Hosmer insisted on doing also. The reason for this was because men had a habit of accusing them of not actually doing their own sculpting.
First half of 20th 1900-54 cubism
Lyubov Popova
The Pianist (1914) Oil painting
Robert Delaunay
The Red Tower (1912)
Cubism consisted of a couple different phrases the first was Analytical Cubism which was important because it allowed the artists to explore the space between objects in paintings. Artists lost sight of perspective and put backgrounds and foregrounds on even planes as well as showing objects from a mish mash of angles. The second was Synthetic Cubism which used materials seen in everyday life as art. Cubism is important because it opened the door for art that had no form but created a sense of uniformity between the scene and the canvas.
This can be seen in the works of both Popova and Delaunay who use linear and curved lines as well as monochromic colors throughout most of their works to create an abstract pattern that shows that fragmentation of the human spirit.
Second half of 20th 1954 to current surrealism
Salvador Dali
The Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory (1954) Oil painting
Max Ernst
Napoleon in the Wilderness (1941) Oil painting using the decalcomania technique, achieved with glass and tissue
Surrealism is important because it was a part of a movement that came as a response to the violence of war. Surrealist artists thought that it was important to use art as a way to represent their imaginations rather than reality. Part of this was because they rejected reason as being the cause of violence. This rejection of reason can be seen in the works of both Ernst and Dali as the majority of their painting depict scenes that are of a fantastical, dreamy nature. The most important thing about surrealism is not just the artists’ rejection of the truths that they could see for the ones that they could imagine, but also the fact that it was also a philosophy that became a part of many other fields of media such as music, film and even psychology.
References
Adams, L. (2011). Art across time. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Stokstad, M., & Cothren, M. (2010). Art history: Volume 2. Harlow: Prentice Hall.
