Art History IIInstructor Dustin M Price

What did we cover last time?

-a group of artists called the Anonymous Society(Corporation) of Painters, Sculptors, Printmakers, etc.

- Impressionism

- defined the term, Modern (ism)

- Claude Monet

- Muffin Haystacks

- Mary Cassatt

- Edgar Degas

-Had Quiz 8

Post Impressionism:

-The English critic Roger Fry coined the term “Post-Impressionism” in 1910 to describe a diverse group of painters whose work he collected for an exhibition.

-These artists styles differed but they all shared a common link in using Impressionism as a springboard

- Georges Seurat (1859 – 1891)

-Seurat was born in Paris on December 2, 1859 to a rich middle class family. Not much is known about Seurat's early schooling except that at age 15 he attended a specialized evening school of drawing

- He also took lessons at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and beginning in 1878 he worked for two years in the studio of Henri Lehman and was a very “average student”

Students of the Lehmann’s studio, 1890 (Seurat is highlighted)

Post Impressionism:

-In 1879 Seurat rented a studio with fellow artist and lifelong friend Edmond Aman-Jean. In May of the same year the two visited the fourth exhibition of the impressionists.

-this exhibition was dominated by the works of artists such as; Pissaro, Degas, and Monet. Viewing this show made a deep impression on the two young artists.

-Seurat enlisted for his one-year “volunteer service” in 1879 and was then stationed in the city of Brest. During this time he filled 2 sketchbooks with drawings.

-Upon his return to Paris in 1880 he rented a small apartment near his parents home, where he would paint some of his most important works

Post Impressionism:

-Living and working in his small apartment for nearly 2 years Seurat was divided between making artwork, reflection, and frequent trips to the outskirts of Paris with Aman-Jean.

-It was during this time that Seurat's brilliance and artistic maturity began to surface.

-It was during the first years of the 1880s that the simple and reductive line drawings that had formed the bulk of his works (see Man with a bottle left) went through a sudden transformation, evolving almost spontaneously into what is still considered some of the most formidable draughtsmanship ever

Man with Bottleblack Conté crayon 1877

study for Bathers Asnieres, black Conté crayon

Post Impressionism:

-During the summer of 1885 Seurat stayed in Grand Camp, a small seaport on the English Channel, He spent a great amount of time there contemplating the basic principles of art and the way in which the viewer “see’s” a painting

- It was at this time that he devised Tone Separation. Instead of mixing the colors together prior to applying to canvas he would leave them divided and apply them to the canvass individually next to one another.

-He came back to Paris and began working once again on a painting he had previously started titled Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte but this time in a far more “Pointillist” style

- when he painted it, Seurat was a mere 25 (with only seven more years to live)

Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte 1884 - 86

Post Impressionism:

-Pointillism “The theory or practice in art of applying small strokes or dots of color to a surface so that from a distance they blend together

-Seurat spent two years painting this picture, concentrating painstakingly on the landscape of the park before focusing on the people; always their shapes, never their personalities. Individuals did not interest him, only their formal elegance (from Sister Wendy's American Masterpieces )

-Now while Seurat and his followers are most commonly known as Pointillists. Seurat actually never cared for the label. “The term pointillism was coined in 1886 by art critic Flix Fnon to describe George Seurat’s “Peinture au Point,” or painting of points (Osborne).

Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte 1884 -86

Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte DETAIL OF RED AREA (see left image)

- Seurat actually preferred the term divisionism for his artwork which encompassed both the dotting technique and the theory of juxtaposed colors positively interacting with each other.

Vincent van Gough and Paul Gauguin: Blame it on the Absinthe?

Post Impressionism:

-Vincent van Gough (1853-1890)

- Among the many artists to experiment with Divisionism, Impressionism and Modernity was the Dutch painter Vincent van Gough

- Was the oldest living son of a Protestant minister he decide to become an artist at the age of twenty-seven

- He studied for brief periods of time in Brussels, The Hague, and Antwerp and then moved to Paris in 1886 but he is mostly self-taught

- Is obviously one of the most famous artists from this period (not just for his paintings)

- He is also known for his mental illness and ultimate suicide, some artists and scholars feel that the comparison or “expectation” that many great artists are alcoholics, drug abusers, and/or have mental illnesses stems from van Gough

Post Impressionism:

- Over the course of his decade-long career (1880–90), he produced nearly 900 paintings and more than 1,100 works on paper. Ironically, in 1890, he modestly assessed his artistic legacy as "of very secondary importance."

-In February 1888, Van Gogh departed Paris for the south of France, hoping to establish a community of artists in Arles. Captivated by the clarity of light and the vibrant colors of the Provencal spring

-Gauguin (an artist and friend) joined Van Gogh in Arles in October and abruptly departed in late December 1888, a move precipitated by Van Gogh's breakdown, during which he cut off part of his left ear with a razor (supposedly)

Post Impressionism:

Fearing another breakdown, Van Gogh voluntarily entered the asylum at nearby Saint-Rémy in May 1889, where, over the course of the next year, he painted some 150 canvases

-After nearly a year at Saint-Rémy, Van Gogh left, in May 1890, to settle in Auvers-sur-Oise, where he was near his brother Theo in Paris and under the care of Dr. Paul Gachet, a homeopathic physician and amateur painter.

-In just over two months, Van Gogh averaged a painting a day; however, on July 27, 1890, he shot himself in the chest in a wheat field; he died two days later

-By the time of his death in 1890, Van Gogh's work had begun to attract critical attention. His paintings were featured at the Salon des Indépendants in Paris between 1888 and 1890

Post Impressionism:

-What about that damned ear?

- a number of theories exist on why he did it but despite popular belief he only cut off a portion of his lobe, and not the entire ear

- One interpretation says that the event occurred because of a homosexual impulses induced by the presence of Gauguin. “According to this account, the ear was a phallic symbol (the Dutch slang word for penis, lul, resembled the Dutch word for ear, lel), and the act was a symbolic self-castration” (Runyan)-).-In the few months prior to van Gogh’s self-mutilation, there were 15 articles about the sadist, Jack the Ripper, who butchered the bodies of prostitutes, sometimes removing the ears. Van Gogh might have been influenced by these articles

Post Impressionism:

-Some feel he may have been a paranoid schizophrenic and was having auditory hallucinations

- Another explanation is that van Gogh was influenced by the bullfights that he saw in Arles. The tradition is that a matador would after a fight cut off the ear of the bull and present it to a lady of his choice. This seems that van Gogh was confused in his own head, and thought of himself as both the winner (matador) and the loser (bull) in the same time, and thus cut off his own ear, and just like the matador does, presented it to Rachel, a lady of his choice (Runyan).

- Some believe there was a drunken brawl between Gauguin and van Gough over a prostitute and Gauguin cut him with a sword, there was then a cover up by the two friends so Gauguin would not get in trouble

Post Impressionism:

-Paul Gauguin

- The Father of Primitivism

- Primitivism: The borrowing of subjects or forms usually from non-European or prehistoric sources by Western artists.

-“Gauguin was influential as a persona: the father of modernist ‘primitivism,’ he reformulated the vocation of the Romantic artist as a kind of vision-quest among tribal cultures.”

- Paul Gauguin explored the roots of artistic practice in tribal cultures as a way to try to retrieve an honest escape into nature, a return to the origin, to the basic instinct of humankind. All these ideas were projected onto tribal cultures of the time particularly in Africa, as with Picasso and in Oceania, with Gauguin.

Post Impressionism:

-This interest in tribal art and “primitive culture” was not only an artistic interest but a societal one at the turn of the century. This interest in primitive culture was based in European Imperialism.

- “The culmination of this interest by the artist in tribal culture was Paul’s move to Tahiti in 1891

-Gauguin, “ was inspired to go to Tahiti in part by the “native villages” that were set up like zoo displays of indigenous peoples at the 1889 Universal Exhibition in Paris; he was also taken by Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.

-Legend has it that Gauguin arrived in Tahiti wearing a cowboy hat.”

Post Impressionism:

-Gauguin disenchanted with European egotism and culture lived in Tahiti for a number of years only shortly returning to Paris in 1893 to manage his artistic market presence.

-He lived in Tahiti until 1901 when he moved to the Marquesas Islands.

- The longer Paul was entrenched with the indigenous people of the south pacific the more he felt that Europe was corrupt and that the tribal culture he surrounded himself in was pure.

-He wrote referring to Europe, “everything is putrefied, even men, even the arts.”

Paul Gauguin Manao Tupapau (Spirit of the Dead Watching)

Exam III:

Vocab:

-Post-Impressionism -Pointillism -Divisionism -Primitivism

Artists:

-Georges Seurat-Vincent van Gough- Paul Gauguin

Artwork:

Georges Seurat Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte 30-34van Gough The Starry Night 30-35Paul Gauguin Manao Tupapau (Spirit of the Dead Watching) 30-36

Read pages 1001 – 1015 by Wednesday