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EXPRESSIONISM: Scream For The Spirit!

Expressionism aims to express the artist's subjective emotions and inner experiences rather than physical reality. It developed in Europe in the early 20th century as artists rejected academic traditions and sought new ways to confront the devastation of World War I. Major artists like Kandinsky and Beckmann used simplified forms and exaggerated color to evoke moods. American Expressionism evolved after World War II as immigrant and outsider artists addressed social issues through works like Guston's The Tormentors. Abstract Expressionism developed a painterly style using energetic paint application seen in works by Pollock and Gorky. Neo-Expressionism revived figurative painting to depict the world's harshness in the 1980s, as seen in the works

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Riza Pepito - Leachon
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294 views

EXPRESSIONISM: Scream For The Spirit!

Expressionism aims to express the artist's subjective emotions and inner experiences rather than physical reality. It developed in Europe in the early 20th century as artists rejected academic traditions and sought new ways to confront the devastation of World War I. Major artists like Kandinsky and Beckmann used simplified forms and exaggerated color to evoke moods. American Expressionism evolved after World War II as immigrant and outsider artists addressed social issues through works like Guston's The Tormentors. Abstract Expressionism developed a painterly style using energetic paint application seen in works by Pollock and Gorky. Neo-Expressionism revived figurative painting to depict the world's harshness in the 1980s, as seen in the works

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Riza Pepito - Leachon
Copyright
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EXPRESSIONISM: Scream for the Spirit!

“The stuff of thought is


the seed of the artist.
Dreams form the
bristles of the artist’s
brush. As the eye
functions as the brain’s
sentry, I communicate
my innermost
perceptions through the
art, my worldview.”
-Arshile Gorgy,
Abstract Expressionist
Expressionism…
 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 meaning
or emotional experience rather than physical
reality
 The art aims to reflect the artist's state of mind
rather than the reality of the external world
-
http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/tl/20th/expressionism.html
1905-1937
Early Expressionism in Europe
 tended to dwell on the darker, sinister aspects of the human psyche
 a fascination with the enticing yet often sordid experiences of modern urban life
 emotionally charged portraiture
 the need to confront the devastating experience of World War I and its
aftermath.
 Renouncing the stiff bourgeois social values that prevailed at the turn of the
20th century, and rejecting the stale traditions of the state-sponsored art
academies, they turned to boldly simplified or distorted forms and exaggerated,
sometimes clashing colors
 Directness, frankness, and a desire to startle the viewer characterize
Expressionism in its various branches and permutations.

Artists:
Vasily Kandinsky, Heinrich Campendonk, Max Beckmann, Egon Schiele
http://www.moma.org/explore/collection/ge/index
Some Important Artists from Early
Expressionism

Vasily Kandinsky Vasily Kandinsky


Picture with an Archer Untitled (Ohne Titel)
1909 1915
Heinrich Campendonk
Two Goats
1918

Heinrich Campendonk
Jean Bloé Niestlé
1921
Max Beckmann
Königin Bar (Self-Portrait)
Max Beckmann
1920
Morgue (Totenhaus)
1922
Egon Schiele
Egon Schiele
Shaw or the Irony (Shaw
Death and the Maiden
oder die Ironie)...
1915
1910
1920-1950
Expressionism in America
 From the 1920s until after the end of World War II, a
distinctly American form of Expressionism evolved.
 Most of the artists in this movement, children of
immigrants from eastern and southern Europe,
African-Americans and other outsiders to American
mainstream culture, grew up in the urban ghettoes of
the East Coast or Chicago.
 Artists tackled social problems such as poverty, the
working poor, the Great Depression, racism, anti-
Semitism, the onset of Fascism, World War II and
nuclear threat during the Cold War.
Artists:
Philip Guston, Max Weber, Marsden Hartley
Philip Guston, The Tormentors, 1947-8

Philip Guston, The Porch, No. 2, 1947


Chinese Restaurant
Max Weber
Max Weber 1915
Grand Central Station
1915
Marsden Hartley    Marsden Hartely
E Sustained Comedy
1915 1939
1950-1960s
Abstract Expressionism
 an American post-World War II movement
 the first specifically American movement to achieve
international influence and put New York City at the center of
the western art world, a role formerly filled by Paris
 Painterly style of messiness and extremely energetic
applications of paint – sometimes called “action painting”.
 a supposed unconscious manifestation of the act of pure
creation
 To many viewers, the whole movement seemed like youthful
antagonism--hardly worthy of the name "art."
Artists:
Arshile Gorky, Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Joan Mitchell
Arshile Gorgy
They Will Take My Island Arshile Gorky
1944 Garden in Sochi
1941
Willem de Kooning
Willem de Kooning Two Figures in the
Gotham News Landscape
1955 1967
Jackson Pollock
Number 1
1949
Joan Mitchell
Untitled
1950 Joan Mitchell
Girolata Triptych
1964
Late 1970s -1990s
Neo-Expressionism
 the arrival of graffiti art (the expressive rawness of graffiti
marks) in the galleries in the 1980s
 artists return to working with form while depicting the
world as it existed, in all its harshness and ugliness
 artists did not feel obliged to glorify the world or "tamper
with reality" 
 Supporters of Neo-Expressionism, and the larger return to
painting in the 1980s, argued that Conceptual Art,
Minimalism, and Pop Art had neglected art's ability to
activate the imagination, to invent myth, and to allow for
human emotion in art

Artists:
Anselm Kiefer, Francesco Clemente, Jean-Michel Basquiat
Anselm Kiefer Anselm Kiefer
The Paths of World Wisdom:
Grane
Hermann’s Battle
1980-1993
1982–93
Francesco
Clemente
I
1982
Francesco Clemente
My Parents
1982
Jean-Michel Basquiat Jean-Michel Basquiat
Untitled (Skull) Mona Lisa
1984 1983
Jean-Michel Basquiat
Notary
1983
Questions to ponder…
 Why do you think that artists have
consistently gone back to expressionism
throughout the last 100 plus years?
 Do you feel this art is relevant to an
audience/viewers or only important for the
artist?
 Is it imperative for artists to express their
emotions/feelings through their artwork in
a way that others can easily understand?

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