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Jackie Gaff
Gareth Stevens Publishing
A WORLD ALMANAC EDUCATION GROUP COMPANY
 i I

CONTENTS
CHANGING PERSPECTIVES Spanish-born Pablo
Picasso (1881-1973)
was probably the most
IMPRESSIONISM famous artist of the
20th century. Many
believe he was also the
POINTILLISM 8 greatest. Picasso visited
Paris for the first time
in 1900. He was just
VINCENT VAN GOGH 10 nineteen years old, and
few people outside his
homeland had ever heard
EXPRESSIONISM 12 of him, when one of his
paintings was chosen
for the Spanish pavilion
SYMBOLISM 14
at the Paris World's Fair.

FAUVISM

THE KING OF COLOR 18

NORTHERN EXPRESSIONISM 20

LES DEMOISELLES D' AVIGNON 22

PAUL CEZANNE 24

CUBISM 26

CONSTANTIN BRANCUSI 28

TIMELINE 30

GLOSSARY 31

BOOKS AND WEB SITES 31

INPEX

w
¥ ^-
mf
 .!^L_e:^»__LM. _i tfl.
^EXPOSITION

CHANGING PERSPECTIVES >'QARO|u:uSTPfi

Western art changed more in the first decade
of the 20th century than at any time in the
previous five centuries. Avant-garde painters
abandoned naturahstic color and perspective
and stopped painting the world as it appears
to our eyes. What artists saw became less
important than expressing their personal
inner visions.
Most of the new ideas in Western art were
born had long been the center
in France. Paris
of the art world. Modern art began there in the
19th century, when a group of young painters,
now called Impressionists, took the first steps In 1900, millions of people visited the
to overthrow five hundred years of tradition. Paris World's Fair,where thousands of
paintings and sculptures from all over
Impressionist paintings are now among the the world were shown in new, specially
Back
world's best loved. in 1874, however, constructed art galleries.

"impressionist" was
the horrified response
of an art critic to the
radical new style of
Frenchman Claude
Monet (1840-1926).

Monet and other

Impressionists were
fascinated by modern
technology, including
the 19th century's
biggest symbol of
progress and
speed — the
steam engine!

La Gare Saint-La/arh, Claude Monet, 1877

vr "¥ ir~E
 X in

-7 IMPRESSIONISM
^^ In Monet's day, the accepted style of painting

a was an almost photographic depiction of

reality. Such detail demanded a level of

technical skill that took years of training to achieve,

I
and a finished painting could take months to
complete. Artists worked indoors in their studios,
even to paint landscapes. The traditional subjects The invention of photography
in the 1820s freed artists from
of their paintings were weighty, including religious the responsibility of reproducing
and mythological scenes and historical events. reality in precise detail.

Ik

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 f _a-

A MODERN WAY OF LIFE

Color theories
Impressionists wanted to portray the
Scientists discovered that a color's
bustling, turn-of-the-century society brightness depends on the colors
beside it. The vibrant Impressionist
that was growing right outside their
style came from using complementary
studios. They were influenced, too, colors, such as red with green, yellow

by discoveries in optics, which is the with purple, or blue with orange.

science of light. Trying to capture

the way human eyes perceive the flickering effects of In the 1880s, Australian artists Arthur
natural light, these artists had to work rapidly, using Streeton (1867-1943) and Tom Roberts
(1856-1931) began to use Impressionist
quick, rough brushstrokes. As a result, their work
techniques to portray the distinctive
looked sketchy and unfinished to 19th-century eyes. colors of the Australian landscape.

X ^

THE WALK (ARGENTEUIL)

Claude Monet, c. 1872-1875
'*'«?;
Impressionists were fascinated by
the play of natural light flickering
on surfaces. Their paintings seem
to vibrate with color. Impressionist
artists often worked outdoors,
painting snapshotlike images of
Parisians enjoying weekends in the
country. New railways had brought
Summer Droving, Arthur Streeton, 1891

the countryside within easy reach

of city dwellers. Painting outdoors THE FRENCH IMPRESSIONISTS
became possible with the invention, Besides Monet, the leading Impressionists based in
in the 1840s, of portable metal
France included French artists Edgar Degas (1834-
paint tubes.
1917), Edouard Manet (1832-1883),
Berthe Morisot (1841-1895), Camille
Pissarro (1830-1903), and Auguste
Renoir (1841-1919); American Mary
Cassatt (1844-1926); and Englishman
Alfred Sisley (1839-1899).

Later in life, Monet worked in his studio,

creating a series of vast canvases of the
water lily pond outside his house in
Giverny, near Paris.
 fr.s^m.
.^

2 P0INTILLI6M Seurafs Pointillist

paintings are

One of Impressionism's first spin-offs was meant to be

viewed from
the art stylecommonly known as Pointillism, a distance.
from the French word point, which means
"dot." Georges Seurat (1859-1891), the
French
1880s, Up dose, you see tiny
artist who developed Pointillism in the
(

dots of pure color.)

preferred to call it Divisionism.

A SUNDAY AFTERNOON ON THE ISLAND OF LA GRANDE JATTE

Georges Seurat, c. 1884-1886

Wanting to create something more Works such as La Grande Jatte have a

rnarmTriTi
Such attention to detail took time. Seurat
of what the eye sees in a glance, Seurat
worked in his studio on this particular
composed his paintings carefully to
achieve order, balance, and harmony. painting for over a year.

1 'I
f-'"^

SEEING 5P0T6
i
The Impressionists were greatly influenced by the

latest scientific theories about light and color. Their

shimmering paintings tried to reproduce the way

light appears to the eye when it is reflected off of

surfaces. By the 1880s, scientists had proven that

light is seen inside the eyeball as tiny colored dots.
The brain combines these dots into images. Seurat

applied this theory in developing his new style.

UNMIXED PALETTE
To achieve vibrant color, Impressionists mixed the
primary colors red, yellow, and blue to create the
Seurat (above) died complementary colors green, purple, and orange.
suddenly at the age
Mixing blue and yellow, for example, makes green.
of thirty-one. Fellow
Pointillist Paid Signac To achieve even more vibrant color effects, Seurat
(1863-1935) claimed
painted dots of primary colors side by side. When
Seurat killed himself
through overwork. he wanted green, for example, he would paint
thousands of tiny, separate, blue and yellow dots.

Impressionist
Architecture tvas also
Camille Pissarro
breaking with tradition
adopted Pointillism
near the turn of the century.
for a while in the
Most people thought the
1 880s, but he
Eiffel Tower, completed
found it blocked
in 1889, was an eyesore.
his spontaneity.
Seurat, however,
admired it, and
he painted it

that same year.

im^ii
 WL J L^
-r VINCENT VAN GOGH
^^ After artists had gone about as far as
^^ they could in translating the science
of light into the poetry of painting,
the shift awav from naturalistic color met
with an increasing focus on emotions.

Woodblock prist, Kitagawa Utariiaro

(1753-1806), c. 1797

Going j.\P-Axese
Japanese woodblock prints, first seen
in Europe in the 1850s. had a great
influence on avant-garde Western art.
Their simplified forms, flat colors,
unusual composition, and flattened
perspective were new to Western eyes.

PAINTING FROM THE HEART

Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh
(1853-1890) believed that Impressionisn-
could not portray feelings. By the end
of his short life, van Gogh had found a
personal sr>'le of painting that expressed

strong emotions, such as joy, hope, fear,

and sorrow.

-.,v
 WHERE DO WE COME FROM? WHAT ARE WE? WHERE ARE WE GOING?
Paul Gauguin, 1897
In 1895, Paul Gauguin turned his back on Gauguin wanted to paint the inner world of
Western civilization and moved to the South the imagination and the soul. In Where Do
Pacific, where he hoped to cultivate his art We Come From?, he portrayed the cycle of hfe
into "something primitive and wild." from infancy to old age.

Near the end of his life, van THE ART OF PASSION

Gogh was tormented by intense on the canvas with
Van Gogh used paint thickly, laying it
depression that drove him to
suicide at the age of thirty-seven. broad, bold brushstrokes. To van Gogh, colors represented
Van Gogh's life has been the example, the color of sunshine, meant
feelings. Yellow, for
subject of many books and films.
In the 1 956 film Lust for Life, life, hope, and happiness. About his painting The Night Cafe
van Gogh was played by actor (1888), van Gogh said, "I have tried to express the terrible
Kirk Douglas (left) and Gauguin
passions of humanity by means of
by Anthony Quinn (right).
red and green."

A PASSION FOR ART

Van Gogh collaborated briefly with
French artist Paul Gauguin (1848-

1903). Their artistic differences,

however, led to a violent quarrel on
Christmas Eve, in 1888, after which
van Gogh cut off his own earlobe.

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 i^
-7 EXPRESSIONISM
^ Although its we
foundations were laid in the 1880s, Expressionism, as
»i know it, did not gather enough strength to be labeled an art movement
until the early 1900s. Vincent van Gogh and Norwegian Edvard Munch
(1863-1944) were the artists who started the movement. Munch's The Cry is
one of the world's most famous paintings.
 L_l f

EMOTIONAL INTENSITY
As Its name suggests, Expressionism was all about expressing
inner feelings. It was an anti-naturalistic style that used vigorous

brushstrokes and exaggerated or distorted shapes and colors to

create the most intense emotional storms possible. Unlike

van Gogh, who created joyful paintings as well as sad ones.

Munch had an artistic view of the world that was, for many
years, a long, waking nightmare.

Freudian analysis
In developing his theories on the
workings of the human mind,
One of Munch 's
Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund
inspirations for The Cry
Freud (1856-1939) concluded that
ivas an Incan mummy
much of our behavior is shaped by
that he saw at the Paris
the unconscious, the part of our
World's Fair in 1889.
minds that contains memories,
For Munch, this mummy
thoughts, and feelings of which
was the embodiment of
we are unaware. Although Freud's
fear and panic. Gauguin
theories were not widely known
ivas also fascinated by
until well into the 20th century,
the mummy and used it
painters such as Edvard Munch
as an image of death in
were already expressing them
some of his paintings.
artisticailv in the 1890s.

MIRROR OF THE SOUL

Edvard Munch had a
tragic childhood. After

his mother and his older

sister died of tuberculosis,

his father, driven almost insane with grief, developed a

religious obsession that sometmies erupted in violence.

Munch wrote, "For as long as I can remember I have

suffered from a deep feeling of anxiety which I have
tried to express in my art." Until hisown breakdown
in 1908, his paintings were as tortured as his life. He

exposed his innermost feelings of love, sickness, death,

Freud argued that our dreams can
and the fear and loneliness so vividly expressed in the
contain clues to our unconscious.
swirling, unnatural shapes and colors of The Cry.

^ ^m \ -«***
 •7 6YM30LI6M
^> Because the "isms" of art history are often
^^
H ! invented by art
of a new style,
critics well after the development
they can include artists whose
work appears puzzlingly different. The Symbolism
movement of the late 19th century included one of
the most eclectic artistic groupings. Symbolist art
varied wildly in both style and subject.

MATERIAL WORLD
Symbolism was a reaction to the naturalism of the The Cyclops, Odilon Redon,
1898-1900
Impressionists and to the greedy materialism of modern
industrial life. Gauguin was a leading
Redon was described by
one critic as the ^'prince of
Symbolist, and Munch is often mysterious dreams. " In Greek
described as one. Other Symbolists mythology, the giant one-eyed
Cyclops was hopelessly in love
included Frenchmen Gustave
with the nymph Galatea.
Moreau (1826-1898) and
[4
'^S OdilonRedon (1840-1916),
Dutchman Jan Toorop Art nouveau
In the 1890s and early 1900s, the
(1858-1928), and curling, twisting lines and stylized
AL natural imagery of art nouveau were
Austrian Gustav Klimt
>^ at the height of their popularity in
(1862-1918). Instead of architectureand the decorative arts.
4^
depicting the real world, The influence of art nouveau can be
seen in the swirling shapes
these artists drew upon
of Munch's The Cry
their ideas, emotions, and Klimt's
The Kiss.
imaginations, and
dreams. Their subjects
were exotic and mystical.

J Gustav Klimt was a large This art nouveau

man with an intense passion lampshade was designed
for life and love. Many of by American Louis
his contemporaries criticized Comfort Tiffany
Klimt's work as corrupt (1848-1933).
and decadent.
 THE KISS
GusTAV Klimt, 1907-1908
Klimt's work spanned Symbolism and art Klimt, who had trained as an applied artist,
nouveau. His painting The Kiss is one of loved gold leaf and rich patterns. In the 1900s,
the world's most luxurious and decorative he created glittering mosaic murals for the
celebrations of desire. In it, a man and a Vienna Workshops, a group of artists and
woman kneel and kiss in a field of flowers, craftworkers who created the Austrian
lost in their own golden dream of love. version of art nouveau.
^ FAUVI6M This review of

^
^K
In 1905, the rumblings
of an artistic revolution
a scandalous
Fauvist exhibition
appeared in the

IB finally erupted into the first November

issue
4,

of the French
1 905

major avant-garde art movement weekly magazine

of the 20th century Fauvism.— L'lUustration.

THE WILP ONES

had scorned the Impressionists back in the
If art critics

1870s, it was nothing compared to their reaction to

Fauvists. Some described Fauvists as "invertebrates" and

"incoherents." When art critic Louis Vauxcelles [b. 1870;

d. unknown) jokingly exclaimed that they painted hke

"wild beasts," or fauves, the name stuck.

EXPLOPING COLOR THE POOL OF LONDON

What people found so shocking about Fauvism was the Andre Derain, 1906
savagely unnatural use of color. The group's leader, Henri Outrage at the first Fauvist

Matisse (1869-1954), for example, painted a portrait of his exhibition was accompanied
down the center of her face. by instant fame in Parisian
wife with a bright green streak
art circles, and art dealers
subsequently offered contracts
to several artists. In late 1905.
Picture palaces
avant-garde dealer Ambroise
France's official annual art
exhibition was the Paris Salon. VoUard (c. 1867-1939)
Dating back to the 17th century, commissioned Andre Derain
it was a showcase for traditional to visit London, where Derain
painting and sculpture. People created some of his best work
went there to admire conventional In The Pool of London, as in
works of art, as shown (left) by
other Fauvist works, color,
an illustrator on the magazine
rather than the scene, was
L'lUustration. Salon des
Independants, formed in 1884, the subject of the painting.
and Salon d'Automne, founded Derain wrote of Fauvism,
in 1903, were two major annual "Colors became charges of
exhibitions set up in opposition dynamite everything coul
. . .

to the Salon. They showed be raised above the real."

IHE Masterpiece, Albert modern art.
Guillaume, 1905
'
n
L i

While Impressionists iiad used bright colors to PORTRAn Oh

Ambroise
represent natural light, Fauvists freed color from
Vollard,
reality. Their unnatural colors were bold, fierce, Paul
Cezanne,
and often deliberately clashing.
1899

SHORT BUT 5WEET

The Fauvists all were French except Dutch-born
Kees van Dongen (1877-1968). Besides Matisse,
they included Andre Derain (1880-1954), Albert
Marquet (1875-1947), Georges Rouault (1871- ^^
Gaitgitui, van Gogh, Derain,
1958), and Maurice de Vlaminck (1876-1958).
de Vlaminck, Picasso, Matisse,
Fauvism, however, was short-lived. By 1907, its and Cezanne (1839-1906) all

artists had gone separate ways — some to continue

were among the avant-garde
painters championed by art
on alone, others to experiment with new styles. dealer Ambroise Vollard.
 1
i!
f THE KING OF COLOR THE DANCE (II)
Henri Matisse, 1910
Henri Matisse was a genius who enriched art in all
Although he created ^

kinds of ways, from color to composition. \\ ith works designs for the Russian
like The Dance (U), Matisse helped shift the focus of Ballet in 1920, Matisse

composition from perspective and depth to the is said to have preferred

country dancing. The
harmonious and expressive use of color.
sardana, a circular
country dance, is thought
DEPTH OF COLOR to have inspired The
In traditional art, perspective is used Dance (II), a huge 13- by

make paintings that are like mirrors

8-foot (3.9- by 2.6-meter)
to
mural commissioned for
reflecting our eyes" three-dimensional
the Moscow home of
view of the world around us. In Russian Sergei Shchukin
1908, Matisse wrote, "What I am (1854-1936), Matisse's
biggest patron. Using just
after above all is expression . . .

three colors, Matisse

Expression to my way of
expressed all the wild
thinking does not consist of abandon of dancing.
the passion mirrored upon
V a human face . . .

The whole
arrangement
of my pictures

is expressive . . . Composition
is the art of arranging in a

decorative manner the various

elements at a painter's disposal

for the expression of his feelings."

/;; 1 905, at age

Vaslav Dancing to a ntw tune thirty-six, Matisse
Nijinsky The Russian Ballet caused a sensation when it first
was the oldest
(1890-1950) performed in Paris in 1909. As with art, a revolution
Faiwist — atid the
was the took place in dance, too. Believing that classical groups ?jati4ral
starof the ballet technique was artificial and meaningless, leader. The serious-
Russian pioneers of modem dance, such as the Russian Ballet, looking Matisse
Ballet. explored freedom of expression and movement. ivas nichiamed
"the Doctor."
MATISSE THE MASTER
One of the great masters of 20th-century art, Matisse
experimented with color and composition throughout his

long life. In his seventies and bedridden with illness, he

began cutting out shapes from boldly painted sheets of paper.
His assistants would move
the cutouts around until

Matisse was satisfied with

Writer and art collector
the composition and Gertrude Stein (1874-1946)
balance of color. Some of was a friend and generous
patron to Matisse, Picasso,
his most brilliant works, and other avant-garde
such as The Snail (1953), artists. Wealthy collectors

played a crucial role in

were created this way in
supporting modern artists
the last years of his life. early in their careers.

TTTT
 NORTHERN EXPRESSIONISM
1 The term Expressionism was first seen Northern European Expressionists
Egon Schiele
included Austrians

€^ in print, in 1911, describing a German (1890-1918) and Oskar Kokoschka

"^ avant-garde group founded in 1905, the
(1886-1980). Kokoschka, who was
a playwright as well as a painter,
same year the first Fauvist exhibition rocked created this poster for one of his

Paris. Like the Fauvists, the northern

European own plays.

Expressionists distorted color and shape. Most

Fauvist paintings, however, radiated a kind of
joyfulharmony. The Expressionist paintings
were far more jagged and harsh.

The new group of German

avant-garde artists formed in
Dresden. By 1911, however,
the entire group had moved to
Berlin, where the artistic and
social scenes were far more Poster for
vibrant — and decadent! MURDERER,
Hope of
Women,
: Oskar
Kokoschka,
1909
 /

$!(imMi:i-:'%!jt% ''^s^susasoiB^^f^?

BUILDING "THE BRIDGE"

SELF-PORTRAIT WITH MODEL
The Germans called themselves Die Briicke, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner,
which means "the bridge." Founding 1910 {overpainted in 1926)
members of the group were Fritz Bleyl Die Briicke artistswanted to express themselves
(1880-1966), Erich Meckel (1883-1970), "directly and passionately." Their main subject
Ernst Ludvvig Kirchner (1880-1938), and was their own way of life. Like many avant-
garde artists of the period, they aimed for
Karl Schmidt-Rottluff (1884-1976). One
artistic and social freedom, leading bohemian
of Die Briicke's goals was to escape the lifestyles and deliberately scorning accepted
dominance of French culture. In 1912, codes of social behavior. Many of Kirchner's
Kirchner wrote, "We have a duty to eariy paintings were set indoors in his studio,
using himself and one of his many girlfriends
separate ourselves from the French ... it
as models. The model sitting on the bed in
is time for an independent German art."
Self-Portrait with Model was called Dodo.
She was the most important woman in
Kirchner's life, and art, from 1909 to 1911.
WOiMEN IN ART
Although not widely
known at the time
of her death, Paula
Modersohn-Becker
(1876-1907) was one
of the leading German
artists of the 1900s, a
rime when it was still

very hard for women

to train or be
accepted as artists,

particularly among
Self-Portrait, Paula
the avant-garde.
Modersohn-Becker,
Because her painting
1900s
is less concerned with
portraying reality than
expressing inner
feelings, she is often
called an Expressionist.

'^"^ »._ «*»"''??5 ^3rti»

 .^^
,-l

LE5 DEM0I6ELLE5 D'AVIGNON

^^ If traditional painting held a mirror up
^ African inspiil\tion

H to reality, in 1907, Spanish artist Pablo

Picasso (1881-1973) threw a stone at the
mirror and shattered it. Even Picasso's friends
In the 19th centur\', with European
colonization of Africa at its

a flood of plundered art objects

height,

appeared in European markets.

were shocked by Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. Few people in Europe, including
One of them said that looking at it was like Picasso, knew anything about the
ritual or tribal meanings of this art,
being forced to drink gasoline! but they responded to the energ>-
and freedom of its distorted reahrv'.

REVOLUTIONARY ART
Picasso's controversial painting was a guerrilla attack on
the traditional treatment of form, the individual shapes

in a work of art and the

relationships bets\'een

them. Instead of three-

dimensional realit}-,

he created two- Tribal

MASK
dimensional, angular
from the
planes that resembled African

shattered slass.
Congo

STRANGE BEAUTY
The distorted heads of

the two women on the right-

hand side of the painting were inspired by African

masks. Picasso had seen African sculptures at a Paris

museum and said they were "the most powerful and

the most beautiful of all the products of the

human imagination." In the end, however,

Picasso hid Les Demoiselles away
in a corner of his studio.

This photograph of Picasso was taken in 1904

the year he left Spain and settled in Paris
 LES DEMOISELLES D'AVIGNON
Pablo Picasso, 1907
Picasso set out to shock people with his The viewpoints in this painting are
treatment of this painting's subject. Instead deliberately confusing. For example,
of art history's soft, submissive female forms, Picasso has painted some of the women
he portrayed anger and aggression. Instead with their eyes facing straight forward but
of celebrating beauty, he flaunted ugliness. their noses in profile, facing sideways.
 A '•• >

r
T PAUL CEZANNE
^^ Picasso's chief inspiration for the shifting
^^
! French
viewpoints in Les Demoiselles d'Avignon
came from
artist
the paintings of the great
Paul Cezanne (1839-1906).

THE HEART OF THE MATTER

Cezanne began painting in the 1860s. He experimented
with Impressionism for a while but soon decided that he
wanted to do something more "sohd and durable." The
Cezanne was born in Aix-en-Provence
problem with Impressionism, he thought, was that it
in southern France. He studied law
dealt with only the surface of nature. Cezanne wanted to before moving to Paris to paint, when
expose the heart and the skeleton. In trying to do so, he he was in his early twenties. In the
1 880s, Cezanne returned to Provence
developed a new approach to volume, which is the space
and remained there until his death.
a three-dimensional object appears to fill in a painting.

Tricks of the trade

Techniques of perspective are used to
create the illusion of three-dimensional
space and depth on a flat surface. One
technique is to draw lines extending into
the distance so they meet on the horizon.
In real life, the lines would be parallel.
Another technique is to make distant
objects smaller than close ones, even
though in real life they are the same size.
 L_
A QUESTION OF PERSPECTIVE MONT SAINTE-VICTOIRE
Paintings are, of course, fiat, two-dimensional objects. Paul Cezanne, 1904-1905
Artists use perspective to give the illusion of space and This painting one of more than
is

depth. In traditional art, perspective was based on a ten oil paintings in which Cezanne

As Cezanne struggled to get to tried to capture the essence, or heart,

single, fixed viewpoint.
of a mountain near his home in
the heart of nature, he found it impossible to maintain
Provence. Mont is the French
this fixed viewpoint. Whenever he blinked his eyes or
word for "mountain." There are
moved his head, his view shifted. no perspective devices to lead our
eyes toward the horizon in this
landscape, as the trees do in
A CHANGE OF VIEWPOINT Monet's The Walk (Argenteuil)
Cezanne built this shifting viewpoint into his on page 6. Instead, both the
later paintings, such as the scenes of Mont Sainte- mountain and the fields and trees
in front of it seem near and far
Victoire. This technique is one reason many people
away at the same time. Cezanne
now consider Cezanne the greatest artist of the
with blocks of
built his paintings
19th century and the most influential figure in color, like the pieces of a mosaic,
the development of modern art. often showing objects from different
angles at the same time.

This photograph of
Mont Sainte-Victoirc
was taken from the
road outside
Cezanne's studio.
-7 CU3\5M
^^ Inspired by Cezanne's
Oj unique style of painting,

^H and jump-started by Picasso's

outrageous Les Demoiselles
d'Avignon, the revolutionary art
movement known as Cubism
exploded on the scene late in 1907.
Itwas the joint creation of Picasso
and his friend Georges Braque
(1882-1963), a French artist. ^^^

The painting styleof Georges Braque, who

Fame at last lived to the age of eighty-one, changed at
Cezanne's work was not widely known until different stages of his career. In the 1920s,
after 1895, when art dealer Ambroise VoUard his style became more fluid and less angular
gave him a one-man show in Paris. Among than his early Cubist works.
Cezanne's admirers was French artist Maurice
Denis (1870-1943). In 1890, Denis had drawn
attention to the contradiction of showing a
three-dimensional scene on a two-dimensional CREATIVE PARTNERSHIP
surface. "Remember," Denis declared, "that a
Picasso and Braque worked together so
picture — before being a war horse or a nude
woman ... is essentially a flat surface covered closely over the next few years that it is

with colors assembled in a certain order." often hard to tell their paintings apart.

Braque said they were "roped together like

mountaineers." Together they achieved an

entirely new way of looking at the world.
The old idea of a single, fixed viewpoint

was shattered. Picasso and Braque broke

apart people, objects, and landscapes and
painted them from several angles at once.
The cubelike forms and geometric patterns
that resulted gave rise to the term "Cubism.'

That term was coined by Louis Vauxcelles,

Ho\L\GE TO Cez.\nne, Maurice Denis,

the same art critic who had named Fauvism
1 900
back in 1905.

^ » %
 HOUSES AT L'ESTAQUE
Georges Braque, 1908
In 1908, Braque, who was an ardent In Braque's painting, the houses are cubes
admirer of Cezanne, visited L'Estaque in and triangles, much Hke children's building

southern France. L'Estaque is the place blocks. Some of their corners seem to jut
Cezanne lived and worked in the 1870s. out of the canvas. Others point into it.
 m.
T C0N5TANTIN BRANCUSI
^^ By the late 1900s, sculpture, like painting, stood poised between the old

a world and the new. The most radical sculptor of the period, and one of the
most respected and influential of all 20th-century artists, was Constantin
Brancusi (1876-1957). Although born in Romania, Brancusi settled in France in 1904.

ACORN OF INPEPENPENCE
In Paris, Brancusi met the great French sculptor
Auguste Rodin (1840-1917). Brancusi admired
Rodin enormously, and Rodin's influence was
evident in Brancusi's work. When Rodin offered

to take Brancusi on as an assistant, however,

Brancusi refused. "No other tree," he said, "can

grow in the shadow of an oak."

By 1900, Rodin had gained such respect FORM

SIMPLICITY OF
that an entire pavilion was devoted to his
sculptures at the World's Fair in Paris.
ANPTHE MEANING
OF A KISS
By 1907, Brancusi had started to develop his own distinctive st>'le. It

was based on simplifying form to create universal truths — things

so powerful that they speak to our deepest feelings. Brancusi

created his first sculpture in this new style in about 1908. He

called it The Kiss. Although it has the same title as Rodin's

famous sculpture, the two works are centuries apart.

Carved in stone
Brancusi was a master stonecutter and helped The Kiss,
revive the art of direct carving, which is making Auguste
a sculpture by cutting directly into the material. Rodin, 1886
In the 19th century, sculptors had modeled their
work in clay or wax. To have something cast in
bronze or carved in marble was expensive, and
usually done only after the sculpture was paid
for. Successful sculptors, such as Rodin, employed

assistants to copy their work in stone, with the

sculptor sometimes adding the finishing touches.

^W^
 f

THE KISS
CONSTANTIN BrANCUSI, C. 1908

Carved from a single block of stone, two lovers

are locked in a kiss for eternity. Brancusi said his
distinctive stylewas based on his feeling that "what is
real is not the external form but the essence of things.
Starting from this truth it is impossible for anyone to
express anything essentially real by imitating its
exterior surface." Brancusi made a series of versions
J" \^V
of The Kiss. One of them, carved in 1909, was placed
in the Parisian cemetery of Montparnasse, on the
grave of a young girl who had committed suicide.

]>^ i •

•^^^

This photograph of Brancusi's

c/-}
studio shows one of his bird
sculptures toivard the back.
"'Why write [about my p?*
sculptures]," he said. ""Why
not just show the photographs^

THE SIMPLE LIFE

Brancusi continued to refine
and simplify his sculpture

throughout his long life. His -^, ''-^i-iv-.tt^

,,v

themes of creation, life, and

death were monumental, but
his subjects were as pared
!.W.6|,>?

down as his style. Pure, egg-

shaped heads symbolized

dreaming and creation, and
birds were elongated into
teardrops, soaring upward
through space and time.

::^'^T"
.^^ j<.i
 1
1

I
•TIM E L 1 N E 1

ART WORLD EVENTS DESIGN THEATER & FILM BOOKS & MUSIC ,

1
.1900 •Pans: art and sculpture •China: Bo.xer Rebellion •Pans design exhibition •Hennk Ibsen: When We •Freud: The Interpretation i

of 29 nations exhibited •U.K. Labour Party formed celebrates art nouveau Dead Awaken of Dreams
at the World's Fair •Death of Oscar Wilde •Puccini: Tosca |

•Redon: The Cyclops

Il901 •Picasso's Blue Period •Commonwealth of •'Victor Horta: A •Anton Chekhov: •Rudyard Kipling: Kim '

(to 1904) Australia proclaimed LTnnovation (art The Three Sisters •Edward Elgar: Pomp and |

•Cezanne's one-man show •U.S.: President nouveau department •Strindberg: The Dance Circumstance (No. 1 ) i

at Vollard's Paris gallery McKinley shot store in Bntssels) of Death

|1902 •South Africa: second •Carlo Bugatti: •George Melies's A Trip to •Scott Joplin: "The 1

Boer War ends Snail Room the Moon: first science Entertainer" •

•Anglo-Japanese alliance •Burnham: Flatiron fiction film (14 minutes) •Arthur Conan Doyle: The '

Building in New York Hound of the Baskervilles 1

|1903 •Deaths of Gauguin • Wright brothers complete •Mackintosh: Willow •Edum S. Porter's The •Jack London: Call of 1

and Pissarro first powered flight Tea Rooms in Glasgow Great Train Robber)-: first the Wild '

•Paris: Salon d'Automne •U.K.: Wometi's Social (to 1905) Western film (1 1 minutes) 'Henry James: \

founded atid Political Union •'Vienna Workshops The Ambassadors 1

organized

11904 •Picasso moves to Pans •Japan and Russia at •Otto Wagner: modernist •Ca?nille Clifford's •Puccini: Madame |

•Matisse ignites war (to 1905) Post Office Savings Bank London
stage debut in Butterfly i

Faui'ism with Luxe, •U.K. and France: in Vienna (to 1906) •Dublin: Abbey •Joseph Conrad: Nostromo '

Calme et Volupte Entente Cordiale Theatre opens

.1905 •Parts: first Fauve •Norway gains independence •Antonio Gaudi begins •George Bernard Shaw: •Albert Einstein: Special
exhibition from Sweden designing Casa Mild Mrs. Warren's Profession Theory of Relativity '

•Dresden: Expressionist •Russia: first revolution (to 1907) •U.S.: first nickelodeon •Franz Lehdr: The |

group Die Briicke formed theaters open Merr\' Widow

Il906 •Derain: The Pool •U.S.: San Francisco •McKim, Mead, and •Tait brother's The Stor\- •John Galsworthy: The 1

of London earthquake White: Pennsylvania of the Kelly Gang; first Man of Property (first 1

•Death of Cezanne •France: end of Dreyfus Station in Neu- York feature film (SO minutes) Forsythe Saga novel) .

Affair (Dreyfus cleared) (to 1910) •]. Stuart Blackton: one of

the first cartoon films

1907 •Klimt: The Kiss (to 1908) •New Zealand acquires •Munich: Deutsche •J. M. Synge: The Playboy •Hillaire Belloc:
•Picasso: Les Demoiselles Dominion status Werkbund founded of the Western World Cautionar.- Tales 1

d'Avignon (first Cubist art) •Russia, U.K., and France: •P. Behrens starts industrial •Ziegfeld Follies opens •Maxim Gorky: Mother 1

Triple Entente design for AEG in New York

Il908 •Braque: Houses at •Austria annexes Bosnia- •Behrens: AEG Turbine •£. Al. Forster: A Room '

L'Estaque Herzegovina Factory in Berlin With a View |

•Brancusi: early versions •Henry Ford launches (to 1909) •Bartok: "String Quartet
o/TheKiss Model T car .Vo. 1
"
'

Il909 •Italian urtter F. T. Marinetti •Bleriot flies across the •Frank Lloyd Wright: performance
•Paris: first •Gustav Mahler: The Song 1

publishes first Futurist English Channel Robie House in Chicago of the Russian Ballet of the Earth 1

manifesto in French paper •'Young Turks overthrow •France: Pathe newsreel •Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier ,

Le Figaro Turkish sultan introduced

L
GLOSSARY
^ K n
art nouveau: a design style that features plant and of color, trying to imitate the fleeting effects of
flower forms with graceful, curving lines. reflected light the way it is seen by the human eye.

avant-garde: having, or pioneering the development perspective: the creation of three-dimensional space
of, new, bold, or experimental styles or techniques. and depth on a flat, two-dimensional surface, such
as an artist's canvas.
composition: the placement or arrangement of
elements, such as shape, color, and balance, in Pointillism: a style of painting, developed in the
a work of art. 1880s, in which the artist, to achieve more vibrant
color, applied small strokes or dots of primary
Cubism: a modern art style that features abstract,
colors that would blend together when viewed
geometric shapes and fragmented forms.
from a distance.
decadent: in a state of moral decline or decay.
stylized: represented as an artistic design or pattern,
eclectic: made up of a variety of styles, often drawn rather than in a natural or traditional form.
from diverse sources, that are considered "the best''
Symbolism: an art movement of the late 1800s that
of their type or class.
rejected the realistic presentation of scenes and
Impressionism: a style of painting, especially among objects by using shapes, colors, and symbols to
French artists in the late 1800s, that depicted suggest meanings and to portray emotions, dreams,
everyday objects and scenes with dabs or strokes and ideas.

MORE 300 KS TO READ

1900-20: The Birth of Modernism. 20th Century Mary Cassatt: Portrait of an American
Design (series). Jackie Gaff (Gareth Stevens) Impressionist. Trailblazers Biographies (series).
Thomas Streissguth (Carolrhoda Books)
Auguste Rodin. Life and Work o/" (series).
Richard Tames (Heinemann Library) Matisse. Famous Antony Mason,
Artists (series).
Andrew S. Hughes, and Jen Green (Barrons)
Cezanne. Famous Artists (series). Antony Mason,
Andrew S. Hughes, and Jen Green (Barrons) Perspective. Eyewitness (series). Alison Cole
(DK Publishing)
Cubism. Art Revohitions (series). Linda Bolton
(Peter Bedrick Books) Picasso: Breaking the Rules of Art. Great Artists
(series). David Spence (Barrons)
Impressionist Art. Off the Wall Museum Guides
for Kids (series). Ruthie Knapp and Janice Van Gogh. Eyewitness (series). Bruce Bernard
Lehmberg (Davis Publications) (DK PubUshing)

WEB SITES
ArtLex Visual Arts Dictionary: Cubism. Gardens of the Sunlight: The Art of Impressionism.
www.artlex.com/ArtLex/c/cubism.html art.koti.com.pl/index_en.html

The Fauves: The Wild Beasts of Early 20th Century WebMuseum, Paris: Seurat, Georges.
Art. ivww.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/2933/fauves wivw.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/seurat

Due to the dynamic nature of the some web sites stay current longer than others. To find additional web
Internet,
sites, use a reliable search engine with one or more of the following keywords: art nouveau. Cubism,
Die BrUcke,
Expressionism, Fauvism, Impressionism, Pointillism, Symbolism, and the names of individual artists.
 1 1

9 !1

INDEX
African art 11 Freud, Sigmund 13 Morisot, Berthe 7 Self-Portrait11
architecture 9, 14 Munch, Edvard 12, Self-Portrait with
art critics 5, 14, 16, 16 Gauguin, Paul 11, 13, 13, 14 Modem
art dealers 16, 17, 26 14, 17 Murderer, Hope of Seurat, Georges 8, 9
art nouveau 14, 15 Germany 20 Women 20 Shchukin, Sergei 18
avant-garde 5, 10, 16, Guillaume, Albert 16 Signac, Paul 9
17, 19,20,21 Night Cafe, The 1 Sisley, Alfred 7
Meckel, Erich 21 Nijinsky, Vaslav 18 Snail,The 19
Berlin {see Germany) Homage to Cezanne 16 Spain 22
21
Bleyl, Fritz Houses at L'Estaque 27 optics (see light) Stein, Gertrude 19
Brancusi, Constantin Streeton, Arthur 7
28-29 Impressionism 5, 6-7, 8, painting 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, Summer Droving 7
Braque, Georges 26, 27 9, 10, 14, 16, 17,24 10, 11, 12, 13, 16, Sunday Afternoon on the
inventions 6, 7 18, 20, 21, 22, 23, Island of La Grande
carving 28 24, 25, 26, 27, 28 Jatte, A 8
Cassatt, Mary 7 Japanese prints 10 Paris 4, 5, 7, 13, 16, 18, Symbolism 14-15
Cezanne, Paul 17, 20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 29
24-25, 26, 27 Kirchner, Ernst Paris Salon 16 Tiffany, Louis
color 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, Ludwig 2 Pere Tanguy 10 Comfort 14
12, 13, 16, 17, 18, Kiss, The (Brancusi) perspective 5, 10, 18, Toorop, Jan 14
19, 20, 25, 26 28,29 24,25
composition 10, 18, 19 Kiss, The (Klimt) photography 6 Utamaro, Kitagawa 10
Cry, The 12, 13 14, 15 Picasso, Pablo 4, 17, 19,
Cubism 26-27 Kiss, The (Rodin) 28 22-23, 24, 26 van Dongen, Kees 17
Cyclops, The 14 Klimt, Gustav 14, 15 Pissarro, Camille 7, 9 van Gogh, Vincent
Kokoschka, Oskar 20 Pointillism 8-9 lO-n, 12, 13, 17
dance 18 Pool of London, The 17 Vauxcelles, Louis 16, 26
Dance (II), The 18 La Gare Saint-Lazare 5 Portrait of Amhroise Vienna Workshops 15
Degas, Edgar 7 landscapes 6, 7, 25, 26 Vollard 17 Vlaminck, Maurice
Denis, Maurice 26 Les Demoiselles portraits 10, 16, 17 de 17
Derain, Andre 16, 17 d' Avignon, 11-13, Vollard, Ambroise 16,
Die Brucke 21 24, 26 Redon, Odilon 14 17, 26
Divisionism (see light 7, 9, 10, 17 Renoir, Auguste 7 volume 24
Pointillism) LTllustration 16 Roberts, Tom 7
Dresden (see Germany) Lust for Life 11 Rodin, Auguste 28 Walk (Argenteuil), The
Romania 28 7,15
Eiffel Tower 9 Manet, Edouard 7 Rouault, Georges 17 Where Do We Come
emotion (feelings) 10, Marquet, Albert 17 Russian Ballet 18 From? 11
11, 13, 14, 18,21,28 Masterpiece, The 16 World's Fair, Paris 4, 5,
Expressionism 12-13, Matisse, Henri 16, 17, Salon d'Automne 16 13,28
20-21 18-19 Salon des
Modersohn-Becker, Independants 16
Fauvism 16-17, 18, Paula 21 Schiele, Egon 20
20,26 Monet, Claude 5, 6, Schmidt-Rottluff,
torm 10, 22, 28 7,25 Karl 21
France 5, 7, 16, 24, Mont Sainte-Victoire 15 sculpture 5, 16, 22,
27,28 Moreau, Gustave 14 28,29
wim
 20™ CENTURY AKT
is a time capsule of
art history for every
decade from 1900
to the year 2000.
^-^- —> This exciting series
pr&ents toists, ^^^ artistic developments as they
relate to the wodd events, people, politics, social changes, and
technology of each era. Dynaniic text and colorful images, along
^th^ a convenient tinie line, capture the cutting-edge creations
and Bold statements made by modern artists.

NIMWA^S OF SEEING
Oi>tiGS,i'^dots," passions, and Picasso shifted artistic viewpoints

froin snapshots of nature to portraits of the soul. From the first

flicker of Impressionism to the shattered patterns of Cubism,
traditioriaiaM changed forever.

fittesa-^Sib^^ ARt series:

1940-.60
1960-80
1980-2000

R .^ E "
T H