Final exam question

What inspired art in the twentieth century ?

Take home Final

            The first painting I chose from the MoMA to speak on is The Persistence of Memory painted in 1931 by the Spanish painter Salvador Dali.  This art style is known as Surrealism, and was a very prominent style of art starting around the mid 1920’s, and its influence lasting until about the mid 1960’s.  It has been considered to be the most influential art movements of the 20^th century.  In this style of art one of the main aspects that makes this art style unique is the inspiration behind it, Sigmund Freud the psychologist who studied people’s subconscious was a big inspiration to the artists that started this movement.  These artists began to explore subject matter in a way that was unrealistic giving way to its name, Surrealism.  These paintings were often mentioned in the same regards as a dream considering the imagery was just as bizarre as the dreams one might have.  In the painting I chose, the artist demonstrates a lot of these ideas of surrealism beautifully.  In this painting you see a desolate setting kind of like a desert with mountains in the background along with a lake or sea.  Meanwhile in the foreground and middleground of the painting you see different images.  To the left you’ll notice a platform with clocks draped over a branch of a tree that’s on the platform, and the platform itself.  Towards the middle of the painting you’ll see what seems to be a portion of the face draped over a rock with another clock draped over the face, and out of what seems to be the nose portion of the face there seems to be a tongue sticking out almost like a snail.  This imagery is very unrealistic and is a perfect example of Surrealism at its finest.  When you look at it, it’s something that looks like it came straight out of a dream and onto the canvas.  When I look at this piece I think the artist is trying to tell us that time won’t bend for anyone, no matter how badly you may want to speed it up or slow it down depending on what is happening in your life, it just won’t.  So I think the artist used the clocks bent and adapting to whatever form they were on to tell us that he wishes time did.

            The second piece I decided to speak about from the MoMA is Pablo Picasso’s painting done in 1910 called Girl with a Mandolin.  This art style is known as Cubism, and began in the early 1900’s.  Many of the artists who painted in this style of art were influenced by many indigenous tribes’ sculptures, mainly their masks.  These painters looked at these masks that they would see from African cultures and noticed their use of geometric shapes to create these masks, and decided to explore those shapes more.  These artists would start to create images using nothing more than just many geometrical shapes in many different ways such as fragmented, abstracted, and in such ways that you thought differently about the shape itself.  In this painting by Picasso, it is using many different geometrical shapes to create the image of a woman holding a mandolin.  The reason I chose this painting is because I really felt it captured the essence of what the Cubist movement was all about.  Picasso does a wonderful job in placing his shapes to create the illusion of a woman holding a mandolin, also with the use of lighting and shading it gives you the feel that this painting is actually three dimensional and is popping out at you.  When I look at it, just from the simple use of minimal color and shading I can tell the woman’s hair color, body size, and really just gives me a new appreciation for shapes in general.  It is quite incredible how someone can fragment and utilize shapes in such an abstracted way in order to create an image so potent and strong.  I feel this is a perfect example of the Cubism art movement.

PS1

During my visit to PS1 i happened to see this painting by Maria Lassnig.  When i look at this painting it reminds me a lot of Rembrandt's paintings.  The very realistic detail in the facial features, along with the positioning of the eyes make you feel the emotion as she painted this piece. The glaring look she delivers, shows her agitation at the moment. Along with the excellent use of lighting to give it that Baroque feel.  I feel this was a painting done in rebellion, at the time in 1942 she was in school in Vienna and was told to paint her self portrait in a German way, which she did not like. So instead she used more classical methods to make a self portrait. What is amazing to me is that she was able to recreate a piece from a period of art that was 200 years prior to this painting, but does it with her own flair using very little natural colors unlike Rembrandt.

Dada collage

Robert Gober

Bibliography:
http://www.matthewmarks.com/new-york/artists/robert-gober/

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/1370459/Robert-Gober

http://tyrusclutter.blogspot.com/2009/11/robert-gober-theres-no-place-like-home.html

Outline:

1-2 minutes:
Introducing the artist, and their influence and methods.

3-5 minutes:
Displaying the artists' work and explaining the piece in detail.

Art Thoughtz: catch a millennial

In this video, Hennessy Youngman is talking to a crowd in Chicago about how to keep up with this generation that is so into technology. He uses satire when he talks about this generation by making fun of them in a half serious/half joking manor, pointing out how things to them only are real if it is posted in facebook. He uses the example of how one decides whether their relationship is real or not based on whether it's written down somewhere on their facebook page. As bad as it sounds that is the fabric of the society that we live in. Seeming so fickle in nature, the way we feel or treat someone is can solely depend on what they are posted as in our lives. He also speaks about the implementation of more interactive pieces in museums that would cater and attract these millenials since they are so absorbed with the idea of technology. Even as he makes joking remarks while delivering this idea, he is absolutely right. The more people feel involved the more likely they are to do something. All in all watching this video was surprisingly eye opening and refreshing, seeing that he was very intellectual but very relatable. 

Ai Weiwei

Ai Weiwei grew up as the son of famous poet, Ai Qing.  So it's no surprise how Ai Weiwei developed a passion for art.  Ai Weiwei is a mixed artist, known to make sculptures, use photographs, and create installed pieces of art in different places to express his message.  Ai Weiwei is also known as a political activist using his art as a medium to convey his message.  Most of his art is thought provoking and tackle many social issues that take place in the world.  Usually Ai Weiwei will use the space he has available to his advantage when making his installed art spacing things out very carefully, to create the illusion and thought he wants to get across to the viewers.  He tends to use salvaged items that are traditionally Chinese in his sculptural pieces.  However his installation work is what spoke to me the most.  Weiwei created a piece called Untitled which is installed at Harvard university.  This piece takes 5,335 students backpacks who were killed in the 2008 Sichuan Province earthquakes and pairs this together with the audio of Remembrance which is an audio that says every students name that was killed.  It is a very emotional and strong piece paired together.  The way the backpacks are arranged in clusters gives you the feeling of the overwhelming lose of life in the incident, along with the very haunting voice stating the names makes this a very touching piece.  Ai Weiwei had to employ a citizen investigation in order to get the student names since the Chinese government was hiding it from the public.  Because of that this piece serves as both a tribute to those lost and a slap in the face to the Chinese government for hiding this information.

Ai Weiwei's "Untitled" at Harvard University.