Level 3 NCEA Art History Fauvism and Expressionism Workbook Pages Fauvism and Expressionism What this is: Acknowledgements These pages are part of a framework for students studying This workbook was made possible: NCEA Level 3 Art History. It is by no means a definitive • by the suggestions of Art History students at Christchurch document, but a work in progress that is intended to sit Girls’ High School, alongside internet resources and all the other things we • in consultation with Diane Dacre normally do in class. • using the layout and printing skills of Chris Brodrick of Unfortunately, illustrations have had to be taken out in Verve Digital, Christchurch order to ensure that copyright is not infringed. Students could download and print their own images by doing a Google image search. While every attempt has been made to reference sources, many of the resources used in this workbook were assembled How to use it: as teaching notes and their original source has been difficult to All tasks and information are geared to the three external find. Should you become aware of any unacknowledged source, Achievement Standards. I have found that repeated use of the please contact me and I will happily rectify the situation. charts reinforces the skills required for the external standards Sylvia Dixon and gives students confidence in using the language. [email protected] It is up to you how you use what is here. You can print pages off as they are, or use the format idea and the templates to create your own pages. More information: You will find pages on: If you find this useful, you might be interested in the full • the Blaue Reiter workbook. Have a look at the commercial section through the • Kandinsky link: • Marc http://arts.unitec.ac.nz/resources/commercial/Art+History/ • Münter • Macke • revision charts • vocabulary for analysing style • glossary • references • templates Hoping this helps in some way. 3 FAUVISM & EXPRESSIONISM 5 7 8 2 4 6 1 3 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 18 17 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 Across Down . “Colour is the __________, the eye is the hammer....” . Marc thinks this is a brutal colour 4. Nietzsche’s ideal man 3. A Fauve 7. This is often represented in Kandinsky’s deluge paintings 5. One of the forefathers of German Expressionism 5. One of the forefathers of German Expressionism 6. A philosopher who influenced German Expressionism 3. The Fauves were more concerned with portraying this than 8. The leader of the Blaue Reiter the evils in society 9. A German word meaning the unity of all the arts 5. A Fauve 0. A collection of Blaue Reiter writings 7. Colour that is not the true colour of the object . He wrote The Interpretation of Dreams . One of the art forms which influenced Expressionists . The event which brings about the end of the world 4. A composer who had a huge influence on Kandinsky 4. A French artist who influenced Marc & Macke 5. A religion that influenced Blaue Reiter artists 6. Hitler called Expressionist artists this 6. Where Die Brücke began 7. Kirchner painted himself drinking this 8. Marc’s favourite animal 9. An apocalyptic flood 0. A medium used a lot by the German Expressionists . Marc painted a yellow one 3. The most Fauve of the Blaue Reiter artists 4 Blaue Reiter beginnings • began in Munich Germany Major artists: • lasted from 909 to 94 • Kandinsky • Marc • Münter • Macke Stylistic features: Influenced by: • bright, subjective colours • Van Gogh • distorted, angular forms • Gauguin • impasto brushwork • Fauvism • areas of bare canvas • Nietzsche • abstracted forms • Theosophy • Wagner • Russian folk art • Darwin Kandinsky: design for the cover for the Blaue Reiter Almanac 9 watercolour, 3.5 x 4cm, Stadtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich The use of painting as a means of communicating personal experience and emotion, a central aim of the Expressionists, was The figure of St George was chosen for the cover of the shown in a more spiritual way in the work of the painters of the Blaue Reiter Almanac to express the idea that the artists saw Munich based group Der Blaue Reiter (The Blaue Reiter ). their spiritual role as rescuing the innocent from the ravages The Blaue Reiter actually began as the New Artists’ Alliance, of materialism - the dragon. St George became the symbol of Munich, formed in 909 and led by Wassily Kandinsky. At both renewal, of the overcoming and redemption of the materialistic 909 and 90 exhibitions, contributions were taken from old world by the purifying power of the spirit. non-Germans such as Braque, Picasso, Derain and Vlaminck. Like St George was patron saint of Moscow as well as the village Die Brücke, the New Artists’ Alliance, was united by similar aims of Murnau where the artists spent much of their time painting. rather than style. Unlike their Dresden contemporaries, however, Here he is compressed into a narrow vertical format, protected they included Russian folk art among their influences. by his shield and strange headgear. Beneath him winds the In December 9 Kandinsky, Gabriele Münter and Franz dragon with its scaly tail rearing up. In the right foreground is Marc resigned from the New Artists’ Alliance, because one the figure of the princess. of Kandinsky’s large works was rejected by the exhibition committee, and set up the first Blaue Reiter exhibition in the . What was the central aim of Expressionism? same month. The second exhibition was in March 9 and was mostly graphic works, including contributions by Die Brücke artists, Picasso, Braque, Derain and Vlaminck. The Blaue Reiter Almanac . How was the Blaue Reiter different from Die Brucke? The group published a Blaue Reiter Almanac in May 9, containing essays on music and theatre as well as art. There were 44 illustrations, which included work by contemporary artists, such as Kandinsky himself and Franz Marc, as well as Van Gogh, Cézanne and Gauguin, examples of Bavarian and Russian 3. When was the first Blaue Reiter exhibition? folk art, children’s drawing, and a wide variety of ethnographic objects - a Ceylonese dance-mask and an Easter Island figure. The variety of work considered in the Almanac reflects the 4. What does Gesamtkunstwerk mean? artists’ concern with the idea of Gesamtkunstwerk, the equality of all forms of art, proposed by the composer Richard Wagner around the middle of the 9th century. In the Almanac they stated their aims as: • to free their creativity from the constraints of tradition 5. How did they aim to express spiritual ideas? • to discover and create the fresh and original • to connect with the creativity of primitive societies which had not been corrupted by the materialism of modern life • to create an art that could be universal in its interpretation • to explore the spiritual potential of art. 6. What did St George symbolise? For the Blaue Reiter artists, the gradual movement from clearly defined forms to more abstract ones was a way to provide a transcendental experience. They aimed to express spiritual realities by going behind appearances - the object. 5 Blaue Reiter Kandinsky Stylistic Development Kandinsky had worked as a lawyer in Russia. While a student, he had travelled into the heart of Russia to research peasant legal systems and had been struck by the power of the folk art they used to decorate their homes. Kandinsky went to Munich in 896 to study painting in the fashionable Jugendstil (style of Art Nouveau). He focused on the Symbolist work of late 9th century Russian artists, German art from the Middle Ages and even older Byzantine art. He used simplified forms and flat, unnatural colours, often applied in large stippled dots. He travelled throughout Europe between 903 and 908, exhibiting in Paris and winning a Grand Prix in 906. While living in Paris during 906 - 07, Kandinsky attended many of the early exhibitions by the Fauves. Their influence on him was tremendous. In their paintings he saw the liberation of colour from representation, and he spent the rest of the decade incorporating the implications of this freedom in his art. These early works by Kandinsky were particularly notable for their bright colours and imaginative use of fairytale subjects such as knights on horseback. From September 907 to August 908, Kandinsky lived in Kandinsky: Blue Horseman 905 oil on canvas, 5 x 54cm, EG Buhrle Collection, Zurich Berlin where he met Rudolph Steiner. In 908 Gabriele Münter bought a house in the rural area of Murnau. It was here that Kandinsky began to develop his own style, encouraged by Alexi von Jawlensky, recently returned from a year in the studio of Matisse. Kandinsky’s paintings from 908 and 909 are dominated by strong colour, abbreviated forms and a sense that the subject is only a pretext for his experimentation with colour. From 909 Kandinsky was painting heavily simplified pictures which still contain ciphers or abbreviated symbols of natural objects. His colours are expressive and non-representational. He began to title works as either: • Impressions – still some recognisable subject matter • Improvisations – spontaneous emotional works often using the automatic drawing technique. He produced 35 numbered Improvisations between 909 and 94 as well as some unnumbered ones. Kandinsky: Lyrical 9 • Compositions – more complicated, lots of preparatory oil on canvas, 94 x 30cm, Museéum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam drawings. He only did 0 of these from 90 What does the recurring horse mean? 90 is the year in which Kandinsky is supposed to have • Kandinsky had begun using it with a rider in his early work painted the first abstract oil painting. influenced by Russian folk tales. In 9 he met the composer Schoenberg who was breaking • It became a symbol of St George – fighting against rules of composition in music - atonality.