Quarter I: MODERN ART

INTRODUCTION
In all of human history, art has mirrored life in the
community, society, and the world in
all its colors, lines, shapes, and forms. The same has been
true in the last two centuries,
withworld events and global trends being reflected in the
artmovements.
The decades from 1900 to the present have seen the
human race living in an evershrinking
planet.The 20th century saw a boom in the interchange of
ideas, beliefs, values,
and lifestyles that continues to bring the citizens of the
world closer together.

Technological breakthroughs
From the Industrial Revolution of the late
1800s, the world zoomed into the Electronic
Age in the mid-1900s, then into the present
Cyberspace Age. In just over 100 years,
humans went from hand-cranked telephones to
hands-free mobile phones, from the
first automobiles to inter-planetary space
vehicles, from local radio broadcasting to
international news coverage via satellite, from
vaccinations against polio and smallpox
to laser surgery.

Effects on the world of art

The art movements of the late 19th
century to the 20th century captured and
expressed all these and more. Specifically,
these were the movements known as
impressionism and expressionism. While
earlier periods of art had a quite set
conventions as to the style, technique, and
treatment of their subjects, impressionists
and expressionists conveyed their ideas and
feelings in bold, innovative ways. These
were the exciting precursors of the modern art
of the 21st century.

Impressionism: Origins of the Movement

Impressionism was an art movement that emerged
in the second half of the 19th
century among a group of Paris-based artists. The
duration of the impressionist
movement itself was quite short, less than 20 years
from 1872 to the mid-1880s. But
it had a tremendous impact and influence on the
painting styles that followed, such as
neo-impressionism, post-impressionism, fauvism,
and cubismand even the artisticstyles and
movements of today.

The name impressionism was coined from

the title of a work by French painter
Claude Monet, Impression, soleil levant (in
English, Impression, Sunrise).

Impression, Sunrise
Claude Monet, 1872
Oil on canvas

The Influence of Delacroix

As with all emerging art movements,
impressionism owed its inspiration to earlier
masters. One major influence was the work of
French painter Eugne Delacroix.
Delacroix was greatly admired and emulated by
the early impressionistsspecifically
for his use of expressive brushstrokes, his
emphasis on movement rather than on
clarity of form, and most of all his study of the
optical effects of color.

In particular, Delacroixs painting, The

Barque of Dante, contained a then
revolutionary technique that would
profoundly influence the coming
impressionist movement. And it involved
something as simple as droplets of water.

The Barque of Dante

Eugne Delacroix, 1822
Oil on canvas

When studied closely, it is seen that four

different, unmixed pigmentsyellow, green,
red, and whitecreate the image of each
drop and its shadow. Viewed from a little
distance,these colors blend to
representindividual drops glistening with
light. The distinct colors merge in the eye of
the viewer to appear monochromatic
(single-colored) or, in this case of water
droplets, colorless. In short, an impression
is formed.

Putting this and similar principles into

wider practice, future painters would
carry
French art into one of its richest
periods: impressionism.

Impressionism:
A Break from Past Painting Traditions

There were several areas in

which impressionist artists moved

away from the established practices
of art at that time. These involved
their use of color, choice of subject
matter and setting, and technique
for capturing light and conveying
movement.