Session Eight: Moderns in New York

On August 13 of 2015, Dan and I flew to New York City. We toured the art museums there. Then we flew to Amsterdam. We visited the museums there and in 3 other towns in the Netherlands. Then we took the train to Paris and spent several days touring its famous art museums. Finally we took the train to Madrid to see the museums there.

For our course, I wanted to follow art history in chronological order. The oldest paintings we saw on the trip were at the Louvre, where they have an impressive collection of early Italian art. We moved on to Holland for the art of the Dutch Golden Age. We went back to Paris to look at the long period in the 1700s and 1800s when the French dominated the art world. Then it was time to plunge into the art of the 20th century. We got an introductory survey in Paris, then we filled in the picture in Holland and through an important exhibit from Switzerland that we saw in Madrid.

Tonight we're returning to New York to continue our investigation of the art of the 20th century. In the 1940s and 1950s, the center of the art world shifted from Paris to New York City. Since Europe had been devastated by decades of warfare in the 20th century, New York City became the hub of the world economy, and art collectors there bought up many of Europe's treasures and built museums to display them.  Manhattan has 2 of the greatest art museums in the world: The Metropolitan Museum of art, commonly known as 'The Met,' like the great opera company; and the Museum of Modern Art, commonly known as MoMA. Touring these museums is like the culmination of our studies because for many painters, their very best work is owned by one or the other of these museums.

Tonight's lesson has a change of format. Instead of looking at these museums one at a time, I have combined my photos of the two collections. So, instead of seeing Picasso, for instance, in 2 different museums, we'll see all of the Picasso paintings together. Not only that, but I brought in photos I took on our visit in 2012, plus I borrowed many photos from Dan.

So what we'll have tonight is about 150 art photos and not too much talk. I featured artists that we already know. I added work by selected stars of American art, a few neglected black American painters, and all the paintings by women that I have photographed in these museums.

• Women artists: Mary Cassatt, Berthe Morisot, Suzanne Valadon, Katherine S. Dreier, Alexandra Exter, Georgia O'Keeffe, Frida Kahlo, Dorothea Tanning, Leonora Carrington, Joan Mitchell, Helen Frankenthaler
• African-American artists: Romare Beardon, Jacob Lawrence, Charles White, Basquiat.

Start slide show.

Cezanne

• landscapes
• still lifes with different kinds of contours
• later landscapes
• *male nude is exceptional
• early portrait of Mrs. Cezanne; cockeyed angle and red dress suggests she is in a bad mood.
• *he did a long series of card players; they show his strength and why he had more influence on 20th century.

Monet

• agapanthus
• water lily movie and details
• vague landscape approaching abstract expressionism

Berthe Morisot

• Excellent example; decorative figure; composition has illusion

Renoir

• Family portrait has exquisite rhythms of color and diagonal composition
• Little girls making harmony
• Vaseline smeared landscapes; look at it from the right distance
• Floral painting is very firm but too busy.

Mary Cassatt

• Still life has simplified composition centered around one point of interest; and beautiful color scheme.
• Two sitters who appear to be doing something natural, not posing; rich enjoyment of color and brushwork.
• Mother and child is much firmer; in a religious tradition.

Caillebotte

• Instead of a bouquet he paints flowers still in the ground; unusual perspective

Gauguin

• Transcription of Christian stories to a primitive setting; he felt the way of life in the islands was like the ideals of Christianity.
• Dark nude respects island tradition; the Areoi is a Polynesian secret society.
• The Siesta is more natural snapshot like picture
• 2 semi nudes are performing a ritual.

van Gogh

• 3 landscapes from 1889; starry night is a vision of the nature of the universe.
• 4 flower paintings in the Dutch tradition, but much more free and open.
• Brushy self-portrait; every brush stroke has contrasting one next to it to make each one defined.
• Character studies of postman and his wife with similar wallpaper.
• The woman from Arles is a reader.
• Creative response to Millet

Seurat

• 2 bay-scapes with gleaming light.
• A river view with illusion of reality.
• Circus theme in flat, decorative style.

James Ensor

• One symbolist piece with masks.

Signac

• Pointillist landscape with romantic color manipulation

Kandinsky

• Only one example; Guggenheim has a large group.

Bonnard

• Typical intimate post-Impressionism with intense colors and moods.

Susan Valadon

• Masterpiece nude and self-portrait; what is this woman doing?

Matisse

• The Dance is deliberately crude to focus attention on the movement and interactions.
• Red Studio is color experiment; likewise, Blue Window.
• Laurette in green robe is very friendly and casual.
• Spanish lady looks very uptight.
• 2 similar odalisques; highly decorative; impersonal.
• Woman artist painting male nude.
• Two paintings that are very close to abstraction.

Mondrian

• 2 typical works.
• *Broadway boogie boogie; give interpretation.

Katherine S. Drier

• Substantial and well-structured abstraction.

Paul Klee

• Free-hand geometric abstraction with exotic deep colors.
• Fish-on-the-mind cat is humorous.
• Fish on a dark ground arrays a lot of symbols in a surrealist manner.

Malevich

• Russian abstractionism became constructivism became suprematism, which is like minimalism, but much earlier.

Francis Picabia

• Very early abstractionist; more hard-edged.

Derain

• Very complex and colorful example of Fauvism.

Picasso

• Gertrude Stein is vision of her inner nature, not her outer appearance.
• Nude from unfinished classical phase; boy and horse from same period.
• Demoiselles D'Avignon represents whores offering themselves; ramp up to cubism; African masks might symbolize the ritual nature of an encounter with a prostitute, or the primitive nature of prostitution.
• Analytical cubist nude achieves great dimensionality.
• Three musicians looks pasted up; an obvious example of synthetic cubism.
• Woman in mirror makes cubist de-construction of forms to make a flat, decorative design.
• The dreamer is expressionism, with very pretty arabesques.
• The Reader is also expressionism; the pinks and blues make her seem happy in her studies.

Leger

• Two paintings treating the female figure like an appliance.
• Painting of men is much more relaxed and personal.

George Braque

• Nice example of Fauvism.

Alexandra Exter

• 2 works in Russian constructivist style; 2nd artist in this style

Edward Hopper

• Americans didn't go in for cubism, expressionism, and other introspective styles.
• Most American artists were more focused on the real world they saw themselves.
• Edward Hopper did studies of buildings; we have 3 examples.
• He did interiors featuring women who aren't aware of our gaze; 2 examples.

Modigliani

• 2 typical elongated nudes.

Max Beckman

• Biographical triptych represents childhood, maybe his own.

Robert Delaunay

• Very beautiful example

Georgia O'Keeffe

• First came to fame for extraordinary abstractions.
• New York riverscape.
• Colorful desert scene.

Marc Chagall

• Fantasy pertaining to a Russian village.
• Surrealist romanticism.

Juan Gris

• 3 cubist pieces.

De Chirico

• 3 metaphysical pieces; one is identical to one we saw at the City of Paris museum.

Lyubov Popova

• Russian suprematism; 3rd artist in this style.

Joan Miro

• 1 primitive landscape
• 2 typical surreal abstract
• One color experiment with old shoe

George Grosz

• New Objectivity portrait

Varvara Stepanova

• Russian Constructivist figure; 4th artist in this style.

Magritte

• The Eye is one of most famous paintings; typical illusion and paradox.
• Murder mystery.
• Painting depicting day and night at the same time.

Alice Neel

• A typical gritty portrait.

Dubuffet

• Coffee grinder is erotic humor. He satirizes the conventions of high art.
• City street seems messy but is fairly detailed. He gives people the opposite of their expectations. Use of unconventional materials.

Mark Rothko

• Russian born American abstract expressionist.
• Raised in this country.
• Rectangular fields of color and light.

Salvador Dali

• The Persistence of Memory has fabulous vastness in a small canvas; limp watch in big space is suggestive of the space time continuum.
• Contemplating the sacrifice of Christ.

De Kooning

• Two paintings showing his hatred of women.

Frida Kahlo

• Typical self-portrait.

Dorothea Tanning

• Surrealist comment on time.

Roberto Matta

• Trying to evoke the human psyche; the mind as a 3-dimensional shape.

Romare Beardon

• Black American realist with strong composition.

Jackson Pollock

• 3 examples
• Organization and rhythm

Agnes Martin

• Typical horizontals and minimal means.

Andrew Wyeth

• Christina's world is attractive, but poignant.

Leonora Carrington

• Surrealist self-portrait; compare to Dorothea Tanning.

Jacob Lawrence

• Important black American painter.
• Brilliant story teller; simplified composition.
• Two examples from migration series.

Charles White

• Superb draughtsmanship; too sentimental for white art critics.

Ellsworth Kelly

• 2 examples of minimalism.

Roy Lichtenstein

• Good example of pop art.

Joan Mitchell

• One of her better abstract expressionist paintings because of color statement and organization.

Helen Frankenthaler

• Abstract expressionism featuring poured paint on raw canvas. Spontaneous gestures.

Sol LeWitt

• Typical wall drawing.

Bridget Riley

• Op art from the 1960s, as before.

Basquiat

• Portrait featuring drawing journal.

Conclusion

That completes our Great Museum Marathon. We have toured 14 museums in 4 countries. We have covered about 700 years of art history. We learned the names of numerous painters, we studied many aesthetic terms, and I gave you some pointers on interpretation.

The news has been ugly during the 8 weeks of our course; I hope you have found the course an enjoyable distraction from all that. We have treated ourselves to two hours per week of thinking about color, shape, composition, and meaning. Instead of occupying ourselves with the depravity of the human spirit, we have considered the heights of creativity. I hope you found that comforting, and even stimulating.

Thanks for being good students. Everyone listened so intelligently. Thanks to Elizabeth for her report and to Andy for his enthusiasm. Thanks to Kehsin for the lovely interpretation of Fauvism. Thanks to Dan for his nice report on the Picasso museum, and for being supportive and enthusiastic all the way through the process.

Lecture Seven

Last week, we had two goals:

• To present Dutch art of the 18000s and early 1900s.
• To survey the international art of the 20th century in Dutch museums.

We did pretty well with Dutch art:

You can summarize the history of Dutch art on one hand: Frans Hals, Rembrandt, Vermeer—then a long gap before—van Gogh and Mondrian.

My presentation on the international collection in Holland got a little scrambled. Tonight I want to clarify the picture.

We started our exploration of 20th C. art at the Pompidou in Paris. We looked at art in terms of movements. Let's review that art with the purpose of learning the names of artists we'll be seeing at museums in The Hague and Madrid. Here are some names to know:

• Matisse
• Picasso
• Braque
• Leger
• Sonia Delaunay
• Robert Delaunay
• Leger
• Kandinsky
• Paul Klee
• Mondrian
• Kirchner
• Chagall
• Magritte
• Ellsworth Kelly
• Yves Klein
• Frank Stella

Go over Pompidou slides of these artists in chronological order.

Holland's largest collection of 20th century art is at the Gementemuseum.

• Symbolism: Ferdinand Hodler is one of the few Swiss painters to become well-known. In this example, the figure symbolizes "Day." 
• German expressionism: Jawlensky, Modersohn-Becker, Kirchner, Beckman, Meidner.
• Minimalism: Agnes Martin
• Conceptualism: Sol LeWitt.
• Op Art: Special exhibit by Bridget Riley.

Amsterdam's museum of modern art is the Stedelijk. We covered most of the art there.

• German Expressionism: Kirchner; also at Gementemuseum and Pompidou.
• Minimalism: Agnes Martin.
• Conceptualism: Sol Lewitt; Donald Judd.
• Note the shaped canvas by Frank Stella, like the one at the Pompidou.
• De Kooning is a Dutch American who painted abstract expressionism.
• Abstract expressionist paintings are reflections of the artist's individual psyches. The artist hopes that he also taps into universal inner sources. These artists valued spontaneity and improvisation, and they accorded the highest importance to process.

Now we're ready to get on with today's lesson. Today we have two goals, similar to last week.

• To continue our survey of European painting in the 20th C.; we're going to Madrid, but the first art we are going to look at there is an exhibit that continues our theme of 20th C art in Europe and the U.S.
• Then we'll go on to look at Spanish art in the 20th C.

The Reina Sofia Museum

• Spain's largest museum of 20th C. art.
• They were hosting a special exhibit from the Kunstmuseum in Basel called "White Fire".

White Fire

Post Impressionism

• Ferdinand Hodler: A Swiss post-Impressionist; we saw a naked dancer at the Gementemusum. The Mountain is a perfect mountain with a halo of clouds.

Expressionism

• Ernst Kirchner: German Expressionist; we saw conversation at Gementemuseum and woman at a dressing table at the Pompidou; Mountain Village uses color to express joy and magic.
• Edvard Munch: Norwegian Expressionist; Coastal Landscape is typical of Norwegian landscape; interesting perspective; interesting brushstroke.

Analytical Cubism

• Georges Braque: Point out architecture and jug
• Fernand Léger: Importance of the pattern of blues and whites

Synthetic Cubism

• Braque
• Picasso
• Leger

Individualism

• Paul Klee borrowed from Cubism, Expressionism and even Surrealism, but always in his unique style. He was initially associated with Expressionism.

Abstraction

• Several nice examples by Kandinsky 
• Geometric abstraction by Mondrian
• Theo van Doesberg joined Mondrian in The Style movement.
• Vantongerloo was a Belgian who also allied himself with The Style.
• Josef Albers is classed as a geometric abstractionist, but his theme is color, not geometry.
• Two examples by Barnett Newman show significant textures. Considered abstract expressionism.

Minimalism

• Agnes Martin: Drawing a large grid would induce a meditative state.

Pop Art

• Andy Warhol used a newspaper photo, in a grid pattern, with clashing colors.
• Gerhard Richter created the illusion of a faded snapshot.

Two Swiss Collectors

Impressionism

• Pissarro
• Monet
• Early Gauguin

Post-Impressionism

• Later Gauguin: When will you marry? Dan will add comment
• van Gogh
• Ferdinand Hodler is sometimes called a symbolist or a art nouveau painter
• Suzanne Valadon paints unidealized and self-possessed bodies that are not overtly sexualized; she takes male themes and makes them more realistic from a woman's point of view.
• Picasso: 2 very different portraits from 1901; also a classicist portrait of harlequin.

Expressionism

• Jawlensky: 3 examples show increasing abstraction.
• Chagall: Self-portrait.

Reina Sofia Permanent Collection

International Collection in chronological order

• Kandinsky: 3 abstractions.
• Gleize: cubism
• Orphism: Sonia and Robert Delaunay
• Matta: His mature work blended abstraction, figuration, and multi-dimensional spaces into complex, cosmic landscapes.

Spanish Art in the 20th Century: major artists 

• Picasso: 2 portraits from 1901; most of their collection is in galleries around Guernica, and the whole area is closed to photography, and heavily guarded.
• Guernica: use internet grab for talk; great example of how to use cubism expressively.
• Juan Gris: 3 cubist works.
• Joan Miro: 3 examples show his development.
• Dali: Big trove of his work in chronological order.

Spanish Art in the 20th Century: minor artists

• Francisco Iturrino, 1864-1924, is a Spanish post-Impressionist.
• Daniel Diaz, 1882-1969: late cubism
• Balbuena and de Togores are known very little, even in Spain.
• Benjamin Palencia: one cubism and one realism.
• Ángeles Cantos, 1911-2013, is not referenced on the internet at all. But her works are described on the museum's website.
• Un mundo is halfway between the proposals of Surrealism and the poetics of Magic Realism. The female characters in the scene surround a globe that has changed from its original form into a cube. In a silent procession, large-headed women are lighting the stars with fire taken from the sun, while in a corner of the painting, another group of women play musical instruments.
• The Gathering is New Objectivity.
• Rosario de Velasco, 1910-1991, achieved little recognition or sales. Most of her work is held by her family.

Sorolla Museum Slide Show

Summary:

Tonight we followed the major trends in 20th century art that we learned about in Paris into the museums of the Netherlands. We saw some of the same painters and the same movements that we had seen in Paris, and we learned about new movements such as Op Art and Conceptualism. 

From the Netherlands we went to Madrid where we picked up some of the same trends and the same artists that we had seen in Paris and The Hague and Amsterdam at a special exhibit from a major museum in Switzerland. Next week we'll follow some of those same trends and artists to New York, where we'll visit the Museum of Modern Art.

Lecture Six: Modern Art in the Netherlands

About Styles:

• You don't need to know the style of a painting to appreciate and understand it.
• But if you do know the style, it gives you a way into the painting.
• Painters tend to be experimental and self-conscious about style early in their careers; then they use what they learn to develop their own style.
• Fauvism as such lasted only a few years. The key component of Fauvism was manipulation of color for expressive reasons. It morphed into Expressionism.
• Matisse did 3 times as many Expressionist canvases as Fauvist.
• Analytic and synthetic cubism were experimental phases that lasted only a few years. The key component of cubism was manipulation of shapes for expressive reasons. They became a more generalized form of cubism.
• Picasso continued to paint in a generalized Cubist style sometimes; he also did Surrealism and Expressionism.

About biography:

• You don't need to know the biography of a painter to appreciate a painting.
• Biography is a distraction; the artist is not writing a diary.
• He is trying to create an image that generalizes his experience.
• He is trying to transcend his personal struggles to create something more general, more symbolic.
• Example: Picasso's Woman in Armchair

Returning to the City of Paris Museum:

• Story of Matisse's La Danse
• Most important artists are Delaunay and de Chirico
• Going to see another Jenny Holzer later.

Transition to Modern Art in the Netherlands:
Show map of the Netherlands

Dutch art in the 19th Century:

• Introduce Gementemuseum
• After the Golden Age, Dutch painting went into a slump.
• There was a tepid revival starting in the 1830s.
• The Hague school flourished in the 1870s, the time of Impressionism in France.
• Follow art up to van Gogh
• First major painter of modern era was van Gogh.

 Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam:

• Has the largest collection of van Gogh.
• Does not allow photography.
• When we were there last, many of their best pieces were on tour and the museum was being renovated, so their galleries were disrupted.

Kroller-Muller Museum:

• Second largest collection.
• This museum was established by a woman named Helene Kröller-Müller.
• She recognized his value early and picked up a great quantity cheap.
• She was heir to a German industrial fortune and married Kroller, a Dutch industrial magnate.
• She had plenty of money to spend.She and her husband donated the museum and the surrounding park land to the nation.
• The building we visited was built fairly recently on the site of the original.
• Second big attraction is her big collection of pointillism.
• They also have a few other classics from earlier in the 19th century.
• Review slides.
• Mention Dan's blog on sculpture garden.

Return to Gementemuseum:

• Finish Dutch art.
• Review their collection of International Art.

Conclusion:

• Last week we worked hard to learn the styles and big names of 20th C. art.
• Tonight, we reaped the benefit of our investment.
• We visited three museums: The Gementemuseum, the Kroller-Muller, and the Stedelijk.
• We saw works by artists we already knew.
• We saw works in styles we already understood.
• We also built on that by adding new styles and new artists.

Notes:

• Kirchner was a German expressionist.
• Sol Lewitt is not Dutch. Born here. Parents from Ukraine.
• Théo van Rysselberghe, 1862-1926 is a Belgian.
• James Ensor is Belgian, associated with expressionism and symbolism.
• Jawlensky was a Russian expressionist painter who lived in Germany.
• Expressionism was a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it radically for emotional effect in order to evoke moods or ideas. Expressionist artists sought to express the meaning of emotional experience rather than physical reality.
• Paula Modersohn-Becker was an important German expressionist, but she died age 31.
• She painted with tempera, with a limited choice of pigments. She scratched into the paint.
• Sol LeWitt: "In conceptual art the idea or concept is the most important aspect of the work. When an artist uses a conceptual form of art, it means that all of the planning and decisions are made beforehand and the execution is a perfunctory affair. The idea becomes a machine that makes the art."

Session Five Lecture

5 min--
Impressionism was a trend; artists floated in and out.

• 8 annual exhibits. Different exhibitors each time. Pissarro in all 8.
• Renoir soon went to a harder edge and firmer modeling, and then to a hazy brushstroke.
• Pissarro was a pure Impressionist for awhile, but quickly went to Pointillism.
• Monet started realistic.
• Sisley stuck with Impressionism, but whoever heard of him.
• Cassatt was an Impressionist but sometimes her work is rather flat, like a woodcut.
• Morisot was Impressionist steadily.
• Van Gogh was a post-Impressionist, but he painted several canvases in the Impressionist style, as did Gauguin.

There is also a more general term impressionism, such as California impressionism.

5 min--

Slide show quiz
Do not show answers as quiz. 

5 min--

Show answers as you review the slides
Go over slides briefly

Women artists were respected by colleagues, but less by collectors and historians

Notice the flat, design-y quality of the Signac and Gauguin
van Gogh is Dutch, not French
Cassatt is American
Impressionism varied over time, got more defined, as in Monet's 'Sunrise' vs 'Mums'

5 min--

Legion slides quiz--recognizing artist's styles

35 min--

Technical developments

• First car factory 1903
• Experiments in flight; aircraft in use in WWI

Scientific developments

• Theory of relativity was a complex of new ideas about the nature of reality
• Theory of subconscious introduced a whole new subject to explore

Pompidou Center
Slide show of styles
Slide discussion
Pompidou supplement slide show
Video of Beaubourg

10 min--

Break

10 min--

Dan's talk on Picasso Museum

20 min--

City of Paris




Notes:
Paul Cézanne is generally categorized as a Post-Impressionist, and his unique method of building form with color and his analytical approach to nature influenced art styles of 20th C.

The term Orphism was coined by Apollinaire, referring to the works of Robert Delaunay and František Kupka. Abstract examples of pure painting, as anti-figurative as music.

An Orphic painter's works should convey an untroubled aesthetic pleasure, but at the same time a meaningful structure and sublime significance. According to Apollinaire Orphism represented a move towards a completely new art-form, much as music was to literature.

In "Reading" the two impersonal, frontally presented and monumental-looking figures are examples of what Léger called "object figures", not so much human creatures as complexes of visual and formal elements. The artist has structured the work around a series of contrasts and repetitions, with echoes and tensions between horizontal and vertical masses, rounded and angular forms, hot and cold colors, a clothed body and a naked body. Caught in this contrapuntal rhythm, the figures seem like the gears and cranks of a powerful machine, stilled in a curious timelessness.

Roberto Matta is defined by Wikipedia as both abstract expressionist and surreal.

Kees van Dongen was Dutch but lived in Paris much of the time, depending on conditions such as war. He showed in the original Fauve exhibit.

Modigliani died in Paris of tubercular meningitis, exacerbated by poverty, overworking, and an excessive use of alcohol and narcotics, at the age of 35.

Bonnard is considered a Post-Impressionist, even though he is quite a lot later than the others.

Dada's weapons of choice in their war with the establishment were confrontation and provocation. They attacked traditional artistic values with irrational attitudes and provoked conservative complacency with outrageous statements and actions. They also launched a full scale assault on the art world which they saw as part of the system. It was considered equally culpable and consequently had to be toppled. Dada questioned the value of all art and whether its existence was simply an indulgence of the bourgeoisie.

Session Four Lecture: French Art in the 1900s

Sharing Period

LeNain exhibit

Talk about exploring Great Museum Marathon; not exploring To Teach Art History

Art through the Centuries

1300s—the Italians invented art.

1400s—during the Renaissance, Italians perfected ideals in art.

1500s—the Italians dominated art with Mannerism and the Venetian School.

1600s—Dutch art had a great flowering with Baroque art.

1700s—the French dominated the art scene with Rococo and Neo-classicism.

Early 1800s
Neo-classicism and romanticism: neo-classicism tends to be grandiose and heroic; romanticism tends to be grandiose and anti-heroic, or iconoclastic.

1840s
Cezanne born 1839
Monet born 1840
Renoir born 1841
Photography invented
Pre-mixed tube paints introduced

All this started to have an effect in the 1860s when the artists matured, and photography and tube paints had become more commonplace.

French Art in the last half of the 1800s
During the 1800s France produced a very large number of great artists who dominated the art world.

Art went along two separate tracks at this time. One track included styles that were extensions of the 18th century. We might call this Salon art or academic art, since these artists were generally accepted into the prestigious salons in France which aimed to set standards for art.

On the other track were artists who refused to conform to academic standards: Impressionism and post-Impressionism. Their work develops into the art of the 20th Century.

Artists on the Academic track got really good at traditional art skills: modeling, perspective, textures, light effects, story telling, creating iconic images. This track sort of dead-ended; their styles represent the end of the old way of making art more than they point to the future.

Artists on the other track had modern attitudes:
Rebelliousness, Questioning attitude, desire for self-expression, interest in the real world as they see it, valuing the fleeting moment over the grand statement.

Slide Show

My main purpose tonight is to show you a lot of slides. The goal is for you to be able to recognize certain artists by their styles. For instance, the best way for you to learn to tell the difference between Manet and Monet is to see many examples of their work.

Catch up from last week:
Ingres's "Grand Odalisque"

Start lecture from here. Work through slides.

Session Four Notes

Realism

Millet

Jules Breton specialized in rural peasant scenes.

Rosa Bonheur is a realist specializing in animals.

Gustave Courbet led the Realist movement in 19th-century French painting. Committed to painting only what he could see, he rejected academic convention and the Romanticism of the previous generation of visual artists. His independence set an example that was important to later artists, such as the Impressionists and the Cubists. Courbet occupies an important place in 19th-century French painting as an innovator and as an artist willing to make bold social statements through his work.

Transition from Realism to Impressionism

Édouard Manet, 1832 – 1883) was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, and a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism.

Eva Gonzalès is considered an Impressionist, but this is erroneous. She was a student of Manet and painted pretty much in his style. She died in childbirth at the age of 34, 6 days after the death of Manet. His only student.

Degas was important in the founding of Impressionism because he helped to organize their early exhibitions and showed his work in them. However, he hated the term Impressionism. He considered himself a Realist and related most strongly to Manet.

Caillebotte is considered an Impressionist but his style is more realistic.

Impressionism

Monet
Renoir
Pissarro made important contributions to both Impressionism and Pointillism.
Sisley was a key painter of Impressionism. His output represents the popular notion of 'pure Impressionism. He mostly painted landscapes. He is a less important artist because his style did not grow or change over time.
Berthe Morisot was friends with Manet, but she did not train with him.
Mary Cassatt

They constructed their pictures from freely brushed colours that took precedence over lines and contours. They portrayed overall visual effects instead of details, and used short "broken" brush strokes of mixed and pure unmixed colour—not blended smoothly or shaded, as was customary—to achieve an effect of intense colour vibration.  It is an art of immediacy and movement, of candid poses and compositions, of the play of light expressed in a bright and varied use of colour.

Monet, Sisley, Morisot, and Pissarro may be considered the "purest" Impressionists, in their consistent pursuit of an art of spontaneity, sunlight, and colour. Degas rejected much of this, as he believed in the primacy of drawing over colour and belittled the practice of painting outdoors.[13] Renoir turned away from Impressionism for a time during the 1880s, and never entirely regained his commitment to its ideas. Édouard Manet, although regarded by the Impressionists as their leader,[14] never abandoned his liberal use of black as a colour, and never participated in the Impressionist exhibitions.




Photography developed in 1840s

Salon System

From the seventeenth century to the early part of the twentieth century, artistic production in France was controlled by artistic academies which organized official exhibitions called salons. In France, academies are institutions and learned societies which monitor, foster, critique and protect French cultural production.

Women Artists: Overlooked and Underrated

Over the centuries, women have been second class citizens in the art world—their work has been overlooked, underrated, and attributed to their male teachers. Despite overwhelming odds, some women have been able to make careers as artists and to participate in the development of art theory, but their work is still unfamiliar to most art lovers. There's more to women's art than Mary Cassatt and Georgia O'Keefe. Come see what you've been missing. The world of women artists is full of secrets and wonders, like the hidden world below the ocean's surface.

Session Three Lesson Plan

Sharing Period = 20 minutes

Legion of Honor Museum: Italian and Dutch Art = 10 minutes

French Art through Baroque = 25 minutes

French Art Rococo through Corot = 40 min

Legion: French Art = 15 min

French Art Supplement

International Gothic Style

Jean Fouquet, 1420-1481

Jean Fouquet developed the so-called International Gothic style that spread through Europe and incorporated the new Flemish influence as well as the innovations of the Italian early Renaissance artists.

Renaissance

School of Fontainebleau

Leonardo produced little after to retiring to France.

Francis I turned his ambition as a patron of the arts on the Palace at Fontainebleau. Italian artists brought rather strained Mannerism, which soon turned into French elegance. School of Fontainebleau from 1531 included: Rosso Fiorentino and Niccolò dell'Abbate.

She is the presumed subject of the painting Gabrielle d'Estrées et une de ses sœurs by an unknown artist (c.1594). Gabrielle sits up nude in a bath, holding (presumably) Henry's coronation ring, whilst her sister sits nude beside her and pinches her right nipple. Henry gave Gabrielle the ring as a token of his love shortly before she died.

French Baroque Painting

The Le Nain brothers were uninfluenced by the Italian magnet. They painted powerful pictures of peasant families with deep conviction but little pictorial science.

What interested de la Tour was a dramatic simplicity of tone which candlelight not only produced but made credible: and when he took the further step of rigorously simplifying form, he was able to evolve a style that combined the advantages of startling realism and nearby attraction.

Nicolas Poussin, 1594-1665

Simon Vouet, 1590-1649

Claude Lorrain, 1600-1682

French Rococo Painting

Jean-Antoine Watteau, 1684-1721

Francois Boucher, 1703-1770

Jean-Honore Fragonard, 1731-1806

Jean-Simeon Chardin, 1699-1779

Barbizon School: Corot, Millet

The three Le Nain brothers were painters in 17th-century France: Antoine Le Nain (c.1599-1648), Louis Le Nain (c.1593-1648), and Mathieu Le Nain (1607–1677).

David was imprisoned for his support of the Revolution

1804
At the moment of the crowning when the Pope said, "Receive the imperial crown...", Napoleon turned and removed his laurel wreath and crowned himself and then crowned the kneeling Joséphine with a small crown surmounted by a cross, which he had first placed on his own head.[8] "Napoleon's detractors like to say that he snatched the crown from the Pope, or that this was an act of unbelievable arrogance, but neither of those charges holds water. Napoleon was simply symbolizing that he was becoming emperor based on his own merits and the will of the people, not because of some religious consecration.


Romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism as well as glorification of all the past and nature, preferring the medieval rather than the classical.

Poussin spent most of his working life in Rome. Same is true of Lorrain.

Anne Louise Brillon de Jouy was a French musician and composer.

Oath of Horatii originally commissioned to support royalty. But David supported the Revolution and this painting came to be seen as supporting the revolution.

In the Raft of the Medusa, at least 147 people were set adrift on a hurriedly constructed raft; all but 15 died in the 13 days before their rescue, and those who survived endured starvation and dehydration and practised cannibalism.

Corot is associated with Barbizon school of painting.

The Barbizon school was active roughly from 1830 through 1870. It takes its name from the village of Barbizon, France, near the Forest of Fontainebleau, where many of the artists gathered.

xSession Two Outline: Dutch Art

Preparation
Set timer
Open iPhoto
Write JAN on board
Write lesson plan on board

Before class: Recall any names from last session?

6 min Welcome. Nice to see you.
Thanks for your input.
Enhances course.
Need you to speak up.
My name is JAN.
Plan to address last week's questions again.
But first.

Importance of Renaissance

Looking back to classical scholarship stimulates learning and innovation.

• The antique writings led to humanism in the arts, which basically means the human being dominates most paintings.
• Period of innovation and exploration (School of Navigation: 1418) (Gutenberg press: 1440)
• Dissemination of art techniques: Copyists and marketplaces.
• New Technology; Invention of oil painting; Use of canvas instead of wood.

-------------------------------
Last week's questions:

Where was Wedding at Cana originally installed?
Photos on desktop
San Giorgio Maggiore - late 1500s
Stolen by Napoleon's troops as bounty of war

Why is Mona Lisa important or popular?
Reading list: article from Louvre
Mona is like "my lady" from "ma donna"
Print to examine on desktop

Caravaggio
Intimacy
Composition
Chiaroscuro

----------------------------------------

Moving on

Go to Maps
Search Rome
Show Florence and Venice
Travel up to Netherlands
Show Antwerp Bruges

Session Outline
Louvre
Frans Hals
Rijksmuseum
Mauritshuis
Chronological Summary

Early Netherlandish Art
Louvre Blog

*Dutch art in the Golden Age
Frans Hals Museum
The Rijksmuseum
Mauritshuis

---------------------------

7 min CHRONOLOGICAL REVIEW

Early Netherlandish Painting

Early Netherlandish painting is 1400s.

The economy of The Netherlandish area was centered in Bruges and Antwerp.

In the mid-1500s the northern, protestant area began to separate from the southern, Catholic area, and also to get out from under Spanish domination.

Early Netherlandish painting coincides with the Early and High Italian Renaissance but is seen as an independent artistic culture, separate from the Renaissance humanism that characterised developments in Italy.

The northern painters' doctrine was also built on elements of recent Gothic tradition and less on the classical tradition prevalent in Italy.

Early Netherlandish paintings reveal the pursuit of a common goal—to make the painted image vividly present and to render the unseen palpable. It might be argued that the Ghent Altarpiece defined realism as a vehicle of expression for the next 500 years.

Jan van Eyck, c. 1390-1441
The Ghent Altarpiece, 1432

Jan van Eyck, c. 1390-1441

Arnolfini Portrait, 1434
National Gallery, London

Rogier van der Weyden, 1400-1464

The Descent from the Cross, c. 1435
Prado

From left: Mary of Clops, Saint John the Evangelist, Mary Salome, holding up Mary, mother of Christ. Center: Joseph of Arimathea, Christ, Nicodemus, Mary Magdalene.

Hans Memling, 1430-1494
Virgin and Child with Two Angels, c. 1480
Uffizi

Hieronymus Bosch, 1450 - 1516
The Garden of Earthly Delights, 1490-1510
Prado

Gerard David, 1460-1523
Marriage at Cana, c. 1500
Louvre

Joachim Patinir, c. 1480-1524
St. Jerome in the Desert, c. 1520
Louvre

iPad photo

Pieter Bruegel the Elder, c. 1525-1569
Landscape with the Flight Egypt, 1563

Italian Art Supplement

Before the Renaissance there was the medieval period.

Gothic:
Cimabue
Simone Martini
Duccio
Gentile da Fabrian
Fra Angelico


Painting with oil on canvas did not become popular until the 15th and 16th centuries and was a hallmark of Renaissance art.
as
Descent or Deposition from the Cross: the Gospels' accounts of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus taking Christ down from the cross after his crucifixion. Nicodemus removing the nails.

Annunciation: Gabriel is the angel.

Mantegna's Minerva expelling the Vices  the women in the sky are "the divine companions of the Virtues," as in the banner around the olive tree. The armless woman and tattered woman represent idleness and inertia. The black figure is hatred, malice.The three drunken figures on the right are ingratitude, ignorance, and greed. The attractive woman may be Diana, goddess of maidenhood, who is being captured by a centaur.

Linear perspective was first demonstrated by Brunelleschi about 1413. Mantegna's Crucifixion was after that.

Before oil painting, tempera technique mixed pigment with egg whites or egg yolks, then apply to plaster. So an altarpiece would start with a layer of gesso, which is a type of plaster.

Oil painting started in the Netherlands in 1400s.

Canvas came into use by late 1400s. Starting in Venice where they had canvas for sales.

Joseph of Arimathea provided the tomb, his own, and asked Pilate if he could remove Jesus body from the cross and bury it there. He was a rich man and a secret disciple of Jesus. Nicodemus helps him and brings the appropriate herbs.

Mary, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of apostle James. Also Mary Salome.

Helen was the wife of Greek leader Menelaus. She goes of with Paris of Troy, either voluntarily or by abduction.

It was originally built as a palace by François I

The Renaissance king famed for the gorgeous castles in the Loire Valley actually razed a 12th-century fortress on the right bank to make way for the Louvre palace. Construction began in the mid-1500s, but only part of the building was completed. Every subsequent French king added onto the structure: if you pay attention, you can spot several different architectural styles.

The painting of The Wedding at Cana was commissioned on 6 June 1562 to decorate the new refectory of the Benedictine Basilica of San Giorgio Maggiore, Venice; the dining hall had been designed by the architect Andrea Palladio.

The Italian name for the painting, La Gioconda, means "jocund" ("happy" or "jovial") or, literally, "the jocund one", a pun on the feminine form of Lisa's married name, "Giocondo".

Art through the Ages: A Sight for Sore Eyes

A course in the history of art in eight two-hour sessions.

Catalog Description: Immerse yourself in the healing beauty of art through the ages. The story of art is one of ever-expanding possibilities: greater freedom, greater individuality, greater variety. Through interesting and entertaining slide shows, visit the major art museums of Europe and New York and learn the big names in art history. By touring the Louvre, the Rijksmuseum and other celebrated art museums, discover why the paintings of great artists like Raphael, Rembrandt, and Renoir are rated among the world’s greatest treasures. This course is a must both for travelers and for stay-at-home art lovers.

Course Outline:

Session One: Art from the Beginning: The Italian Masters

Session Two: Dutch Painting in the Golden Age

Session Three: The Early Masters of French Art

Session Four: Impressionism and Post Impressionism

Session Five: Modern Art in Paris

Session Six: Modern Art in the Netherlands

Session Seven: Modern Art in Spain

Session Eight: Modern Art in New York

Expanded Course Outline:

Session One: Art from the Beginning: The Italian Masters

The Italians more or less invented painting as we know it, way back in the 1200s. At first, painting was mainly church decoration—simplified, flat illustrations of sacred stories and ideas. The way Italian painters gradually became stars of culture, the way they widened their subject matter, the way they developed and refined their style—this is a beautiful story, told with a parade of beautiful and moving images. Your ability to appreciate the art of any period is enhanced by studying the roots of art history.

• The Louvre
• Cimabue, Fra Angelico, Mantegna, Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Perugino, da Vinci, Raphael, Bronzino, Vasari, Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese, Caravaggio, Guido Reni, Panini

Session Two: Dutch Painting in the Golden Age

The economy of the Netherlands was booming in the 1600s, and wealth was rather widely distributed. Instead of depending on the land and agriculture, the economy depended on commerce and manufacture; thus, instead of the nation's wealth being hoarded by royalty and the landed aristocracy, it was accumulated by a fairly large class of merchants and traders. This had a good effect on art because a lot of people could afford to acquire or commission works of art. This large art market enabled the development of many talented artists.

• Rijksmuseum, Frans Hals Museum, Mauritshuis
• Frans Hals, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Jan Steen, Judith Leyster, and Rachel Ruysch

Session Three: The Early Masters of French Art

There's more to French Art than Impressionism! Baroque art of the 1600s was flamboyant and dramatic; in the 1700s, Rococo art generated delicately sensuous fantasies, and neo-Classicism retold the classical myths in support of modern political movements. The late 1700s also saw a beautiful flowering of successful women artists. In the early 1800s, Romanticism manifested in great historical dramas, and artists began to treat the landscape as an important subject in itself, instead of just a background.

• The Louvre
• School of Fontainebleau, Simon Vouet, de La Tour, Poussin, Lorraine, de Champaigne, Watteau, Chardin, Boucher, Fragonard, Hubert Robert, David, Vigée-LeBrun, Labille-Guiard, Ingres, Géricault, Delacroix, Corot

Session Four: Impressionism and Post Impressionism

At the moment of perfect ripeness in the development of French painting in the late 1800s, Impressionism burst forth like fireworks and changed art forever. Post-Impressionism laid the foundation of modernism.

• The Orsay Museum
• Jean-Léon Gérôme, Bouguereau, Tissot, Bonheur, Breton, Courbet, Manet, Gonzalèz, Monet, Renoir, Pissarro, Sisley, Morisot, Cassatt, Caillebotte, Seurat, Signac, Gauguin, van Gogh, Cézanne

Session Five: Modern Art in Paris

In the 20th century, artists tumbled from one theory to another: Fauvism, Cubism, Orphism, Abstractionism, Expressionism, New Objectivity, Surrealism, Minimalism, etc. It's enough to make your head spin, but it's not that hard to learn to tell them apart if you have a little guidance and abundant examples. Now's the time to learn the difference between Picasso and Matisse, between Salvador Dalí and Rene Magritte.

• Pompidou Center, City of Paris Museum of Modern Art
• Fauvism, Cubism, Orphism, Abstractionism, Expressionism, Neo-Primitivism, Surrealism, Classicism, New Objectivity, Abstraction Expressionism, Minimalism

Session Six: Modern Art in the Netherlands

After the Dutch Golden Age of the 1600s, art lost its energy in the Netherlands. In the 1700s, economic and political problems caused diminished art activity, and artists continued the same old tried and true themes. The fine arts enjoyed a revival around 1830, a time now referred to as the Romantic period in Dutch painting. The earliest Dutch artist of the modern era to achieve international fame was Vincent van Gogh. In the 20th century, Dutch artist Piet Mondrian developed a style of abstractionism that influenced the future of art. In addition to Dutch art, the museums of the Netherlands have significant examples of international art of the modern era.

• The Kröller-Müller Museum
• The Gemeentemuseum

Session Seven: Modern Art in Spain

It is difficult to report on the history of Spanish art for two reasons. First, you don't see a lot of Spanish art in museums in other countries. A very large portion of Spain's most important artwork has been retained in Spain, mostly at the Prado and the Reina Sofia Museums. The second problem is that the Prado doesn't allow photography at all, and the Reina Sofia prohibits photography of its most important exhibits. The one place you can photograph examples of Spain's rich art history is an academy founded by royal decree in the 1700s, the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. Here you can see works by El Greco and Murillo, and many minor works by Francisco Goya. The first Spanish artist of the modern era was Joaquín Sorolla, whose work derives from Impressionism. An extensive selection of his work may be enjoyed at the Sorolla Museum, located in the artist's studio-mansion. Several Spanish artists became well-known in the 20th century, including Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dalí. Modern Spanish art is exhibited at the Reina Sofia Museum. During our visit, the Reina Sofia was also offering two special exhibits from Bern, Switzerland, that presented a fairly comprehensive review of art of the early 20th century.

• Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Sorolla Museum, Reina Sofia Museum
• El Greco, Velázquez, Murillo, Goya, Sorolla, Picasso, Miró, Dalí
• Special Exhibits from Bern, Switzerland, offer review of early 20th Century

Session Eight: The Museum of Modern Art in New York

The Museum of Modern Art in New York, generally known as MoMA, is the premier collection of international art of the 20th century, filled with iconic paintings. At the time of our visit, the museum had two major exhibits by modern artists, Yoko Ono and Jacob Lawrence.

ONE: Art from the Beginning: Italian Masters

Course Description

The Italians more or less invented painting as we know it, way back in the 1200s. At first, painting was mainly church decoration—simplified, flat illustrations of sacred stories and ideas. The way Italian painters gradually became stars of culture, the way they widened their subject matter, the way they developed and refined their style—this is a beautiful story, told with a parade of beautiful and moving images. Your ability to appreciate the art of any period is enhanced by studying the roots of art history.

Course Material

Italian Art at the Louvre

Names to Share

Cimabue, Fra Angelico, Mantegna, Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Perugino, da Vinci, Raphael, Bronzino, Vasari, Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese, Caravaggio, Guido Reni, Panini

Summary

The first artist to become known as an individual was Cimabue in the 1200s, who mainly painted altarpieces with a lot of gold leaf in the background. 

The 1300s was a period of altarpieces, with modeling and perspective becoming gradually more realistic. 

The Renaissance was the period of Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, and Raphael. 

The Venetian School produced its own giants: Titian, Tintoretto, and Veronese. 

The Baroque period of the 1600s was dominated by Caravaggio, whose influence extended across Europe. 

In the 1700s, architectural studies were all the rage in Italy, and the master of these was Panini.

TWO: Dutch Painting in the Golden Age

Course Outline

In the 1300s and 1400s, the country we now call The Netherlands, didn't have a separate identity. It was clumped together with the country we now call Belgium and they were both referred to as the Lowlands or the Netherlands.

In the mid-1500s, the northern, protestant area began to separate from the southern, Catholic area, and also to get out from under Spanish domination. As they became unified, their fortunes improved.

The economy of the Netherlands was booming in the 1600s, and wealth was rather widely distributed. Instead of depending on the land and agriculture, the economy depended on commerce and manufacture; thus, instead of the nation's wealth being hoarded by royalty and the landed aristocracy, it was accumulated by a fairly large class of merchants and traders. This had a good effect on art because a lot of people could afford to acquire or commission works of art. This large art market enabled the development of many talented artists. We're going to try to learn the names of six of them: Frans Hals, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Jan Steen, Judith Leyster, and Rachel Ruysch.

Names to Share

Jan van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden
Frans Hals, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Jan Steen, Judith Leyster, and Rachel Ruysch.

Museums to Visit

The Louvre, Paris
The Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam
The Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem
Mauritshuis, The Hague

Source Material

Louvre - Early Netherlandish Art

Frans Hals Museum

Rijksmuseum

Mauritshuis

THREE: The Early Masters of French Art

There's more to French Art than Impressionism! Baroque art of the 1600s was flamboyant and dramatic; in the 1700s, Rococo art generated delicately sensuous fantasies, and neo-Classicism retold the classical myths in support of modern political movements. The late 1700s also saw a beautiful flowering of successful women artists. In the early 1800s, Romanticism manifested in great historical dramas, and artists began to treat the landscape as an important subject in itself, instead of just a background.

Source

French Art at the Louvre

Names to Share

Baroque period of 1600s: Georges de La Tour, Nicolas Poussin, Claude Lorrain.

Rococo period, early 1700s: Jean-Antoine Watteau, Jean-Siméon Chardin, François Boucher, Jean-Honoré Fragonard

Neoclassicism of late 1700s: Hubert Robert, Jacques-Louis David, Élisabeth Vigée LeBrun, and Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres

French women artists of the 1700s: Élisabeth Vigée-Lebrun, Adélaïde Labille-Guiard

Romanticism of early 1800s: Theodore Géricault, Eugène Delacroix

Landscape painting of early 1800s: Camille Corot

FOUR: Impressionism and Post-Impressionism

Course Description

At the moment of perfect ripeness in the development of French painting in the late 1800s, Impressionism burst forth like fireworks and changed art forever. Post-Impressionism laid the foundation of modernism.

Post-Impressionism brought us van Gogh, Gauguin, and Cézanne, the giants who laid the foundation of modernism.

Source Material

Musée d'Orsay

Names to Share

Academicism, 1800s: William Bouguereau, James Tissot

Realism, 1800s: Rosa Bonheur, Gustave Courbet

Transition to Impressionism: Édouard Manet, Eva Gonzales

Impressionism, late 1800s: Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Camille Pissarro, Berthe Morisot, Mary Cassatt

Pointillism, late 1800s: Georges Seurat, Paul Signac

Post-Impressionism: Paul Gauguin, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Cézanne

FIVE: Modern Art in Paris

Course Description

In the 20th century, artists tumbled from one theory to another: Fauvism, Cubism, Orphism, Abstractionism, Expressionism, New Objectivity, Surrealism, Minimalism, etc. It's enough to make your head spin, but it's not that hard to learn to tell these movements apart if you have a little guidance and abundant examples. Likewise, it's not that hard to recognize the masters of 20th century art after you've had a little exposure. You don't have to feel like an outsider. Now's the time to learn the difference between Picasso and Matisse, between Salvador Dalí and Rene Magritte.

Source Material

Pompidou Center

Paris Museum of Modern Art

Art Movements of the 20th Century

Fauvism

Cubism

Orphism

Abstractionism

Expressionism

Neo-Primitivism

Surrealism

Classicism

New Objectivity

Abstraction Expressionism

Minimalism

SIX: Art of the Modern Era in the Netherlands

Course Outline

After the Dutch Golden Age of the 1600s, art lost its energy in the Netherlands. In the 1700s, economic and political problems caused diminished art activity, and artists continued the same old tried and true themes. The fine arts enjoyed a revival around 1830, a time now referred to as the Romantic period in Dutch painting. The earliest Dutch artist of the modern era to achieve international fame was Vincent van Gogh. In the 20th century, Dutch artist Piet Mondrian developed a style of abstractionism that influenced the future of art. In addition to Dutch art, the museums of the Netherlands have significant examples of international art of the modern era.

Names to Share

Dutch Artists: Vincent van Gogh, Jan Toorop, Théo van Rysselberghe, Piet Mondrian

International Artists: Georges Seurat, Paul Signac, Wassily Kandinsky, Sol LeWitt, Bridget Riley

Museums to visit

Otterlo: The Kröller Müller Museum

The Hague: Gemeentemuseum

Source Material

Kröller Müller Museum

Gemeentemuseum

SEVEN: Madrid's Art Scene

It is difficult to report on the history of Spanish art for two reasons. First, you don't see a lot of Spanish art in museums in other countries. A very large portion of Spain's most important artwork has been retained in Spain, mostly at the Prado and the Reina Sofia Museums. The second problem is that the Prado doesn't allow photography at all, and the Reina Sofia prohibits photography of its most important exhibits.

The one place you can photograph examples of Spain's rich art history is an academy founded by royal decree in the 1700s, the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. Here you can see works by El Greco and Murillo, and many minor works by Francisco Goya.

The first Spanish artist of the modern era was Joaquín Sorolla, whose work derives from Impressionism. An extensive selection of his work may be enjoyed at the Sorolla Museum, located in the artist's studio-mansion.

Several Spanish artists became well-known in the 20th century, including Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dalí. Modern Spanish art is exhibited at the Reina Sofia Museum.

During our visit, the Reina Sofia was also offering two special exhibits from Bern, Switzerland, that presented a fairly comprehensive review of art of the early 20th century.

Museums to Visit

History of Spanish Art: Royal Academy of Fine Arts
Joaquín Sorolla: Sorolla Museum
20th Century Spanish art and Special Exhibits: Reina Sophia Museum

Source Material

Royal Academy of Fine Arts

Sorolla Museum (same article as above, half-way down)

Reina Sophia Museum

Stars of Spanish Art

El Greco, Velázquez, Murillo, Goya, Sorolla, Picasso, Miró, Dalí

International Art Stars

Van Gogh, Gauguin, Ferdinand Hodler, Ernst Kirchner, Edvard Munch, Alexej von Jawlensky, Georges Braque, Picasso, Fernand Léger, Paul Klee, Piet Mondrian, Andy Warhol, Gerhard Richter

EIGHT: Modern Art in New York

Course Description

The Museum of Modern Art in New York, generally known as MoMA, is the premier collection of international art of the 20th century, filled with iconic paintings. At the time of our visit, the museum had two major exhibits by modern artists, Yoko Ono and Jacob Lawrence. The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a comprehensive museum, covering the whole history of art, and their modern art collection contains many iconic paintings. My website collects modern art from several museums we have studied in the US and Europe.

Source Material

Museum of Modern Art

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Art of the 20th Century

Stars of Modern Art

Gauguin, Mondrian, Picasso, Chagall, Magritte, Dalí, Wyeth

Other Favorites

Cézanne, Klee, Boccioni, de Chirico, Grosz

Special Exhibits

Yoko Ono

Jacob Lawrence

Women Painters

Lyubov Popova, Alice Neel, Frida Kahlo, Dorothea Tanning, Helen Frankenthaler

Review of 20th Century Art Movements

The website Art of the 20th Century combines modern paintings from museums in New York, The Hague and Paris.

American Art in the 20th Century

Course Title: American Art in the 20th Century

Catalog Description

Everyone has heard of Georgia O'Keeffe, but do you know about Florine Stettheimer? What about Joan Mitchell? Let's look at American art of the 20th century from a woman's point of view first. Then let's consider the major African-American artists. Finally we'll turn to the mainstream artists. You've probably heard of Edward Hopper, but what about Thomas Hart Benton and Arthur Dove? American art is so relevant to our lives, the images are so familiar, that the artists seem more like neighbors or friends than far away icons. Come and get to know the people who told America's story in the 20th century in paint.

Course Proposal

Students become familiar with the names of major American women artists: Gertrude Whitney, Florine Stettheimer, Georgia O'Keeffe, Agnes Pelton, Alice Neel, Joan Mitchell, Helen Frankenthaler, Louise Nevelson, Ruth Asawa.

Students learn the names of two of the foremost African American painters: W. H. Johnson, Jacob Lawrence.

Students become familiar with the stars of American art in the 20th century: Edward Hopper, George Bellows, Thomas Hart Benton, Joseph Stella, Arthur Dove, Marsden Hartley, Stuart Davis, Jackson Pollock, Roy Lictenstein, Ellsworth Kelly, Sol LeWitt, Jasper Johns, Wayne Thiebaud, Chuck Close.

Format

Course presentation will take the form of a narrated slide show using instructor's own photos, presented via computer-aided projection. Plenty of time will be allowed for discussion and interpretation. Review periods and exercises will be provided to help firm up learning. Materials provided by instructor, including ample online access to photos of paintings.

Course Material

20th Century American Art

Art of the 20th Century: What's Up with all those isms?

Course Title: Art of the 20th Century

Catalog Description

In the 20th century, artists tumbled from one theory to another: Fauvism, Cubism, Orphism, Abstractionism, Expressionism, New Objectivity, Surrealism, Minimalism, etc. It's enough to make your head spin, but it's not that hard to learn to tell them apart if you have a little guidance and abundant examples. Now's the time to learn the difference between Picasso and Matisse, between Salvador Dalí and Rene Magritte. Slideshow presentation combines masterpieces from the museums of modern art in New York, Amsterdam, The Hague, Paris, and Madrid.

Course Proposal

Students will learn broad, general definitions of each of the major art movements of the 20th century, as listed below. Students will develop basic ability to recognize various art movements by viewing many examples and playing guessing games. Students will become familiar with the names of the major painters of the 20th century by hearing them frequently. Detailed memorization is not the objective; the idea is develop curiosity about who is who, perhaps leading to increased attendance of local art museums.

Art Movements of the 20th century

Fauvism, Post-Impressionism, Cubism, Orphism, Abstractionism, Expressionism, Classicism, Primitivism, New Objectivity, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, Minimalism, Op Art.

Major Artists of the 20th century

10 big names: Matisse, Picasso, Braque, Kandinsky, Mondrian, Paul Klee, Fernand Léger, Marc Chagall, René Magritte, Salvador Dalí.

Many other artists will also be introduced, with special emphasis on women artists when their work is available.

Format

Course presentation will take the form of a narrated slide show using instructor's own photos, presented via computer-aided projection. Plenty of time will be allowed for discussion and interpretation. Materials provided by instructor, including ample online access to photos of paintings.

Material

My photos are available at the following website:

20th Century Art