from paris to new York: art btwn wars & capitols

• rappel a l'ordre (return to order) c. 1920-1939

-return to classical roots of french art/history/classicism

-nationalist sentiment
-post-WWI
-return to order in art & literature in europe --> retreat from modernism & abstraction
-desire for order, comprehensible, less challenging to understand

• picasso returns to classical themes & representation

olga picasso in an armchair- picasso 1917

mother & child- picasso 1921

• also return to classicism by force by nazi party

-bauhaus is shut down
-rise in facism in italy
-soviet dictatorship under stalin
-rejection of experimental modernist aesthetics
-return to order lasts until WWII 1939

• aftermath of WWII--> new wave of avant-garde practices

world's fair 1937 in paris: the german (left- eagle)
& soviet pavilions face off (right- bodies)

• cultural warfare
• germany still licking wounds from WWI defeat, soviet becoming world superpower

german pavilion- albert speer 1937
eagle on swatstika
german strength, national pride

readiness- arno breker 1939
figurative sculpture of strength of german nation

-parallel to anti-semitism

-holocaust

-ideology: rejection of democracy in favor of all power to leader- hitler

-eliminated free press, unions, etc.

• hitler waged cultural warfare on modern art

-degenerate art exhibition 1937 munich
-1000+ confiscated artworks

protest against facist art:

guernica- picasso 1937
guernica aerial bombed w help of nazis
chaos, anguish
can only see victims in the scene
complications of perspective
monochromatic
confusion of body parts
community, collective confrontation
figuration returns
not classical
non-utopian
t.j. clark's modernism about traumatic change,
upsetting social organizations of past times

guerilla art action group, MOMA 1970
painting reactivated in context of VN war
using painting as lens/beacon to illuminate parallel tragedy in present
mỹ lai massacre- american military had to explain what happened

the armory show, new york 1913
put american art next to european modern masters
appreciation of modern art in U.S.

the armory show, chicago 1913
american artists taken out of show bc no space to show them
not received well by everyone- still seen as radical
negative criticism

others works included in armory show:
blue nude- matisse
mlle progany- brancusi
nude descending a staircase no. 2- duchamp

• ^influenced artists in american vision:

light coming on the plans II- georgia o'keeffe 1917
abstraction & landscape

i saw the figure 5 in gold- charles demuth 1928
dynamism of fire engine
abstraction & urban space

• ashcan school: "art for life's sake"- needed to depict reality

the hairdresser's window- john sloan 1907
realist in nature

cliff dwellers- george bellows 1913
realist in nature
mayhem, many bodies

• artists needed to tell stories about american culture to define what it is, who they are -->

american scene painting & regionalism:

american gothic- grant wood 1930

the hailstorm- thomas hart benton 1940

nighthawks- edward hopper 1942