expressionism (1)

Expressionism

(German)

Properties of Expressionism

• Focused on the symbolic, emotional and spiritual meaning of art

• Artist’s inner world• Expressionism is a state of mind, not a style• Subjects appeared non-natural

– Distorted figures– Irregular shapes

• Often contained social commentary • Used bright color, dark lines, and bold shapes, to

help convey message

Starry Night

The Starry Night Vincent Van Gogh (1889)

The Scream

Edvard Munch (1893)

• Vincent Van Gogh

• Edvard Munch

• James Ensor

Influences

•Symbolism

•German Romanticism

•Economic and Social Change in Germany

The Old Peasant Woman

Paula Modersohn-Becker

(1905)

Assunta

Georg Kolbe

(1921)

The Survivors

Käthe Kollwitz

(1923)

Die Brücke

(The Bridge)

•Founded 1905, Dresden, Germany

•Founders: Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Fritz Bleyl, Erich Heckel, and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff

•Emil Nolde, Max Pechstein, and Otto Mueller joined later

•Depicted psychological pressure of city life

•Influenced by the poetry of Walt Whitman, Scandinavian and Russian literature

•Often had erotic and morbid overtones

•Very public with their ideas•They thought they were revolutionaries

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner

• Studied architecture at the Dresden Technical College

• Innovative woodcutting techiques

Street Life in Dresden (1908)

Lithograph

Dancer with Raised Skirt (1909-1910)

Woodcut

Winter Landscape by Moonlight

Oil on Canvas (1919)

Emil Nolde

• Studied art at the School of Applied Arts in Karlsruhe

• Expressive colors and brushstrokes

Loading Dock, Hamburg

Etching (1910)

The Prophet

Woodcut (1912)

Sunflowers

Oil on Canvas (1932)

Max Pechstein

• Painted using decorative colors influenced by Van Gogh and the Fauves

• Later incorporated more primitive aspects

• Mainly was a printmaker

Under the Trees

Oil on Canvas (1911)

Dancer Reflected

in Mirror Woodcut (1913)

Der

Blaue

Reiter(The Blue Rider)

Wassily Kandinsky

• Co-founder of Der Blaue Reiter.

• Style stretched between abstraction and expressionism.

• Gave meanings to shapes and colors.

Study for Painting with White Form

Oil on Canvas (1913)

Franz Marc

• Other co-founder.• Mainly painted

animals – he saw them as pure.

• Created his own color theory based on red, blue, and yellow.

• Later moved toward abstractionism.

Yellow Cow

Oil on Canvas (1911)

Animals in a Landscape

Oil on Canvas (1914)

Fighting Forms

Oil on Canvas (1914)

Oskar Kokoshka

• Austrian expressionist.

• Mainly known for his portraits – distorted and allegorical.

• Focused on portraying the psyche, mentally sick people.

The Bride of the Wind

Oil on Canvas (1913-1914)

Demise of Expressionism

• Die Brücke– Kirchner and

Pechstein attempted to create a program to teach modern painting in art in 1911, failed in 1912.

– Kirchner wrote Brücke Chronicle in 1913, which ended the group.

• Der Blaue Reiter– Franz Marc and

August Macke were killed in combat during 1914.

– Group disbanded shortly after.

Demise of Expressionism

• Post-Expressionism rose to prominence in 1925.

• An announcement from the Kunstalle in Manneheim ended Expressionism in 1925.

• Germany’s poor post-war economy and condemnation by the Nazis in the 1930s accelerated the decline, many artists fled after being labeled “degenerate artists.”