romanticism · romanticism: characteristics •unrestrained exuberance, imagination, spontaneity...
TRANSCRIPT
Romanticism
Focus Question
• How were late 18th and 19th century art movements
(Neo-Classicism and Romanticism) a reaction to
recent events/developments (Enlightenment, French
Revolution)?
Romanticism: Characteristics
• Unrestrained exuberance, imagination, spontaneity
• Focus on the wonder of nature and emotion
• Reaction against Neoclassicism and the Enlightenment
– Neoclassicism
• Rules and standards for creating art, music, literature
• Tried to emulate the ancient Greeks who had perfected the rules
– Enlightenment
• Rules and natural laws of logic
• thoughtful, processed
Romanticism: Characteristics
• Human intuition, imagination, & emotions are valid
sources of knowledge
• Individualism interest in unique traits of people
• Like Neoclassicism, admired heroism
• Attraction to the bizarre and unusual
Classical Art
Nicolas Poussin
Jacques-Louis David
Neo-Classical
Art: Classical into Romantic
Gericault “Raft of the Medusa”
Gericault “Raft of the Medusa”
Differences?
They are slight
Romantic Art
Eugene Delacroix
• Often considered greatest of
Romantic painters
• Dramatic scenes that stirred
emotions
• Exotic subjects
• Revolutionary subjects against
oppression
Liberty leading the people.
The Algerian Apartment
“Massacre at
Chios”Greece v. Ottomans
John Constable
• English
• Landscape Paintings
John Constable-The beauty of nature
John Turner
• English
• Landscape Paintings
• Attempted to convey
“moods” of nature
• Leads into
Impressionism
Joseph Turner- nature unleashed
Romantic Literature
Romantic Poetry• Classical philosophy would say poerty has a form, rules
that govern that form, a purpose, and these qualities can
be measured, or at least judged, through the application of
reason.
• Meter and rhyme can be tested and found to meet the rules
• The Romantic philosophy would describe the poem as
subjective to the object of inspiration.
• The images and emotions behind the poetry are quantified
by the re-creation in words.
• Structure is dictated by the moment and the inspiration,
rather than fitting inspiration into a previously defined
structure.
William Wordworth “The Daffodils”
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Keats
“Ode on a Grecian Urn”
O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede
Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed;
Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!
When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st,
"Beauty is truth, truth beauty," - that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.
Mary Shelley
Frankenstein
• Bizarre and unusual
• Science gone awry
• Focuses on fantasy rather than reality
• Focuses on struggles and emotions
Lord Byron
• Famous Romantic
• Great poet
– Uses heroism in his poetry
• Lived on the edge
– fought for Italian Independence
– fought and died fighting for Greek
Independence
– Heroic yet with epic flaws in his
humanity
Lord Byron“She walks in beauty”
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow'd to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
Victor Hugo“The Hunchback of Notre Dame”
• Great poet and novelist
• Created imaginative characters with
great emotions in historical settings
• Quasimodo and Esméralda– She saves him, he saves her, she gets hung, he
kills his father figure then saddened, he starves
himself to death at her grave
– Their skeletons later found together in an
embrace
Romantic Music
• Evokes powerful images and emotions
– Chopin
– Beethoven
Architecture
• Revival of medieval Gothic architecture
The British
parliament building,
though it looks like it
was built in medieval
times, was built in the
mid 19th century
Religious Revival
• Rejection of Deism
• Revival of Catholicism
– Awe of God, awe of Cathedrals
• New Protestant movement: Methodism
– Emphasized deep emotional experiences/conversions
John Wesley, founder of Methodism