Transcript Ch.27-Lect2.

Ch. 27-Modernism in Architecture,
Art and Music—section 2



Constant experimentation and a
search for new kinds of expression
Strange and disturbing
Great artistic eras/
Architecture and Design




Modernism-A label given to the artistic and
cultural movement of the late 19th and early
20th centuries, which were typified by radical
experimentation that challenged traditional
forms of artistic expressionism.
Transform the physical framework of urban
society
Chicago School of architects-Louis Sullivan
Frank Lloyd Wright-radically modern
houses/
Architecture and Design

FunctionalismThe principle that
buildings, like
industrial products,
should serve as
well as possible the
purpose for which
they were made.

Le Courbusier



1887-1965
“a house is a
machine for living
in” (pg. 861)
Towards a New
Architecture


Adopt latest
technologies
International style/
Frank Lloyd Wright: Fallingwater,
43 miles (69 km) southeast of
Pittsburgh
Architecture and Design
Bauhaus-A
German interdisciplinary school of fine
and applied arts that brought together many leading
architects, designers, and theatrical innovators. (pg. 862-863)

Walter Gropius
 1887-1965
 Founded the
Bauhaus school
 Working together
as a team
 Stress
functionalism and
good design

Ludwig Mies van der
Rohe
 1886-1969
 Director of
Bauhaus
 Escaped from Nazi
Germany
 Skyscrapers!
New Artistic Movements


Increasingly abstract
Break down into





Lines
Shapes
Colors
Whole culture emerged with new techniques
Became political

Avant-garde artists=communism

Many moved to US after WWII/
Impressionism






Early modernist movement
Paris
Portray sensory “impressions” in their work
and capture fleeting moments of color and
light in often blurry images
Looked to world around them
Turned back on traditional themes
Capturing a fleeting moment was more
important than detail!/
Claude Monet

1840-1926--Sunrise
Edgar Degas

1834-1917 The Dance class
Mary Cassat--Child’s Bath


1844-1926
American
Postimpressionists and
Expressionists


Added a deep psychological element
Search within self to find inner most
feelings/
Vincent van Gogh-built on impressionist
motifs of color & light, but added an
attempt to search ones inner feelings

1953-1890—Starry Night
Gustav Klimt-abstract works rooted in
emotion, in this case love & sensuality

1862-1918—The Kiss
Cubism

Highly analytical approach to art
concentrated on a complex geometry
of lines and angled, overlapping
planes./
Pablo Picasso
Girl with mandolin
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon.
Picasso--Guernica
Dadaism—pg. 864 pic






Launched during WWI
Attacked all familiar standards of art and delighted in
outrageous behavior
“anti-art”
If life is meaningless, so is the meaning of art
“Dada is the international expression of our times, the
great rebellion of artistic movements…Blast the bloodless
abstraction of expressionism!” –Richard Huelsenbeck—
pg. 865
Often artists wrote manifesto’s
 Richard Huelsenbeck’s Collective Dada Manifesto1920/
Surrealism
Influenced by Freudian Psychology
Portrayed images of the unconscious/
Salvador Dali


1904-1989
Metamorphosis of Narcissus-pg. 865
Salvador Dalí
The Persistence of Memory
Modern Music




Express emotional intensity in radically
experimental forms
Modernism flourished in opera and
ballet
Arranged sounds without creating
recognizable harmonies
Did not begin to win acceptance until
WWII/
Igor Stravinsky



1882-1971
Russian born
composer
Ballet- Rite of
Spring(pg. 866)


Caused near riot in
premiere in 1913 in
Paris
Fertility rite on
stage=pornographic/
Alban Berg



1885-1935
Composer
Opera- Wozzek



Half-sung/Half
spoken dialogue
Atonal music
Depicted a soldier
driven by inner
terrors to murder
his mistress/
Arnold Schonberg



1874-1951
Viennese composer
Broke with tonality

“twelve-tone”-all 12
tones of the scale were
arranged in a n abstract
mathematical pattern
only observable by
those who were
educated and looking
at musical score./
An Emerging Consumer
Society



1918-1939
Consumption
Leisure time- commercial
entertainment/
Mass Culture

New Consumer Culture






Goods produced inexpensively and in many
quantities, easily transported to national markets
Marketed through professional advertising
Leisure time
Housework
Travel
Department Stores/
Impact



Consumption helped democratize
Western society
Break social barriers
Reinforce social differences/
“New Woman”

Surprisingly independent female who could:








Vote
Hold a job
Fashionable
Makeup
Smoke
Use sex appeal
Inspired by the fact that consumer culture was
transforming the lives of many young women.
Stereotype to sell manufactured goods./
Critics

Left:


Socialist writers
Consumer culture
was undermining
working-class
radicalism

Right:



Conservatives
Destroyed the
livelihood of
traditional artisans
Undermined proud
national traditions
Religious Leaders:
•argued that it encouraged individualism and materialism
•destroyed morals and undermined spirituality./
Appeal to Cinema

Development




First in US-1880
1910- “Movie factories”-LA and New York
European nations establish their own
Distraction and propaganda/
Gaumont Palace in Paris..largest
cinema in the world (pg. 870)
Golden Age of Silent Film


1920s
US and European studios


Germany’s Universal Film Company
(UFA)
Theaters to seat thousands
APPEAL by 1920s: increasing 20-25%
take in at least one movie a week./
Propaganda



Indoctrination tools
Soviets and Nazis
Sergei Eisenstein



1898-1948
Propaganda for Russians
Leni Riefenstahl


1902-2003
Triumph of the Will

1934 Nazi Party rally in Nuremberg/
The Arrival of Radio





1880s
US and Britain major broadcast in the
1920s.
BBC-National Broadcasting Networks
Direct government in Europe
Private ownership in United States/
Guglielmo Marconi
BBC
Radio and Propaganda



Platform for political speeches
Roosevelt and British Prime Minister
Baldwin used informal “fireside chats”
for support
Hitler and Mussolini controlled airways
and speeches./