Contextual Studies 6 Subject Matter & Content

1. Contextual Studies 6Subject Matter & Content Fauvism & Cubism Expressionism(New Objectivity) & Surrealism

2. Monet, Poplars at Giverny, 1888 Seurat, study for Bec du Hoc, 1885

3. Matisse, The Red Studio, 1911 Matisse, The Pink Studio, 1911

4. Matisse, The Green Stripe, 1905 Matisse, Femme a la Violette, 1927

5. Matisse, Sculpture with Goldfish, 1913

6. Andre Derain, Portrait of Henri Matisse, 1906

7. Derain, The Mountains at Collioure, 1905

8. Derain, The Bridge at Charing Cross, 1906

9. Maurice de Vlaminck, River Seine at Chatou, 1906

10. Vlaminck, Still Life, 1910

11. What is Matisse’s attitude to subject matter? • Why is composition so important? • 3. What is art about, and why? • 4. What is his attitude to nature?

12. Henri Matisse, ‘Notes of a Painter’ (1908) in Art in Theory, pp69-75 ‘What interests me most is… the human figure. It is that which best permits me to express my almost religious awe towards life. I do not insist upon all the details of the face…’ p.73/26-8 ‘I will condense the meaning of the body by seeking its essential lines.’ p.71/17-18 ‘What I am after above all, is expression… The place occupied by the figures or objects, the empty space around them, the proportions, everything plays a part… Everything that is not useful in the picture is harmful.’ p.70/23-37 ‘A work of art must carry within itself its complete significance and impose that upon the viewer even before he recognises the subject matter. When I see the Giotto frescoes at Padua I do not trouble myself to recognise which scene of the life of Christ I have before me, but I immediately understand the sentiment which emerges from it, for it is in the lines, the composition, the colour.’p.73/33-6

13. Giotto, The Lamentation, c. 1306-12

14. ‘What I dream of is an art of balance, of purity and serenity, devoid of any troubling subject matter, an art which could be for every mental worker, for the businessman as well as the man of letters …a soothing, calming influence on the mind…’ p.73/38-41

15. Ruskin, Gneiss Rock, 1853

16. Matisse, Landscape at Collioure, 1905

17. ‘I cannot copy nature in a servile way… I am forced to interpret nature and submit it to the spirit of the picture. When I have found the relationship of all the tones, the result must be a living harmony of tones, a harmony not unlike that of a musical composition.’p.72/33-6

18. Braque, Clarinet and a bottle of rum on a Mantelpiece, 1911 Picasso, Le Torero, 1912

19. Juan Gris, Portrait of Picasso, 1912

20. Braque, Violin and Jug, 1910

21. Picasso, Les Desmoisellesd’Avignon, 1907

24. Picasso in his studio c.1905

25. Paul Cezanne, Mont Ste. Victoire, 1904/5

26. Cezanne, Mont Ste.Victoire, 1906

27. Braque,Viaduct at l’Estaque, 1909

28. Picasso, The Factory at Horta de Ebro, 1909

29. Extracts from Georges Braque ‘Thoughts on Painting’,1917 in Art in Theory, p214-5 3. The charm and the force of children’s paintings often stem from the limited means employed… 4. New means, new subjects. 5. The subject is not the object; it is the new unity, the lyricism which stems entirely from the means employed. 6. The painter thinks in forms and colours. 7. The aim is not to reconstitute an anecdotal fact but to constitute a pictorial fact. 9. One must not imitate what one wishes to create. 10.One does not imitate the appearance; the appearance is the result. 11.To be pure imitation painting must make an abstraction of appearances. 12.To work from nature is to improvise. 14.The senses deform, the mind forms.

30. Braque, Violin and Sheet Music on a Table, 1913 Braque, Musical Forms, 1913

31. Juan Gris, Violin and Playing Cards, 1913

32. Picasso, Still Life with Mandolin and Guitar, 1924

33. Pablo Picasso, Still Life with Chair Caning, 1912

34. New Objectivity George Grosz & Otto Dix

35. George Grosz, Grey Day, 1921

36. Grosz, Café, 1928

37. Grosz, At Five in the Morning, 1921

38. Grosz, John, The Sex Murderer, 1919

39. Grosz, The Burial, 1919

40. Grosz, Berlin Street Scene, c.1922

41. Grosz, The City, 1916/17

42. Otto Dix, Cardplaying War Invalids, 1920

43. Dix, Wounded Soldier, 1924

44. Dix, The Match Seller, 1921

45. According to the text by Grosz: • What is the role of the artist? • What style of art is he arguing for?

46. George Grosz, ‘My New Pictures’, 1921 in Art In Theory pp 272&3 You can’t be indifferent in this trade, about your attitude toward the problem of the masses… (p272 l.3&4) All this painted nonsense certainly can’t stand up to reality. Life is much too strong for it. (p273 l.21&22) I am again trying to give an absolutely realistic picture of the world. I want every man to understand me. (p273 l.30&31) I am suppressing colour. Lines are used in an impersonal, photographic way to construct volumes. (p273 l.43&44)

47. John Heartfield (formerly Herzfelde), Adolf the Superman Swallows Gold and Spouts Junk, 1932

48. Surrealism

49. Salvador Dali, The Persistence of Memory, 1932 Dali, Soft Construction with Boiled Beans: Premonition of Civil War, 1936

50. Rene Magritte, The Human Condition, 1933