Art Appreciation

Art History and Art Movements (Part 2)

COL006

9 Module on
Art History and Art
Movements (Part 2)

This module will continue to discuss the history of art and the various art movements. This module will
also cite important characteristics of the different artworks in the different era.

At the end of this module, you should be able to:

1. present the history and movements of arts through a timeline; and
2. cite important characteristics in an artwork based on the era movement.

Directions: Look at the pictures below and write your ideas regarding the message of these pictures. Write your
answer on the space provided below.

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2. ____________________________________________________
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3. ____________________________________________________
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DIFFERENT ART MOVEMENTS (Part 2)

 Symbolism. Contrary to Impressionism where the realities of the generated surface of painting were
emphasized, Symbolism was an artistic phenomenon as well as a literary one that implied ideas through symbols
and stressed the definition underneath shapes, lines, forms and paints.
Example:
In this painting the black dress and wings of the Angel of Death contrast with the white background of the snow-
covered graveyard. She had just caught an old gravedigger by surprise, as evident from his tense hand grasping
at his own heart. The green light she holds most likely represents his soul. Surrounding the grave where the old
man had been standing and which will be his ultimate resting place, there’s growing grass. It symbolizes the start
of a new life while another is ending.

 Art Nouveau. Art Nouveau sought to modernize the design and

avoid the diverse historical styles previously common. Artists were
influenced by both organic and geometric shapes, which emerged in
elegant designs that brought together flowing, natural forms that
resemble plants and blooms.
Example:

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One of Gaudi’s most impressive designs, Casa Battlo sparks
anyone’s imagination. You can see that Gaudi, like most Art
Nouveau artists, was inspired by nature: there are few straight
lines, the building seems to ‘move’ like sea waves. Mosaic
patterns remind viewers of fish scales, and the structure of the
building has a skeletal look. The house was redesigned by Antoni
Gaudi in 1904 for Josep Batllo I Casanovas.

 Fauvism. The Fauves were a loosely associated community

of French painters with common interests. A number of these were
the pupils of Gustave Moreau, a symbolist, who admired the older artist's focus on self-thought, like Henri
Matisse, Albert Marquet and Georges Rouault.
Example:
Matisse’s "Le Bonheur de Vivre (The Joy of Life)" is characterized by unnatural colors and simplified forms. It was
inspired by Paul Cézanne’s 'Bathers' which also depicted nude figures in a landscape. The sense of depth and
the interplay of light and shadow have been replaced with flat
surfaces and bold pairings of complementary colors.

 Expressionism. Expressionism has emerged as an answer to

the widespread concern over the increasingly division between
humankind and the world and the lost feelings of legitimacy and
spirituality in different cities across the world at the same time.
Example:
Self-Portrait with Chinese Lantern Plant  features a depth of
emotion despite the simplicity of the piece. The artist sits at an angle, looking at the viewer with a look of
skepticism. His head and facial features are enlarged, and the body twisted unnaturally, insinuating a subtle
tension that permeates the piece. The plant in the background also cranes to the side, mimicking the body
curvature of the artist. The face is rendered with intense color depth
and muscular detail, unlike the surrounding clothing and
background, suggesting an acutely psychological aspect to the
piece. 

 Cubism. Through focus on the underlying nature of shape,

Paul Cezanne utilized several points of view to fragment photos into
shapes. The objects were represented as complex arrangements of
masses and planes where background and foreground combined,
instead of constructed shapes in an illusionist vacuum.

Example:
Les Demoiselles d’Avignon  by Pablo Picasso depicts five nude women in a brothel in Barcelona. The piece is
rendered in muted, paneled block colors. All the figures stand to confront the viewer, with slightly disconcerting
facial expressions. Their bodies are angular and disjointed, standing as if they are posing for the viewer. Below

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them sits a pile of fruit posed for a still life. The piece is one of
the most famous examples of Cubism’s divergence from traditional
aesthetics.

 Futurism. The Futurists concentrated on change and

progressivism and tried to eradicate and replace conventional
artistic conceptions with a robust affirmation of the era of the
technology. Emphasis was on the development of a creative and
vibrant future vision and artists integrating urban landscape
representation and emerging technology in their depictions, such as
trains, cars, and aircraft.
Example:
This 1913 sculpture depicts a bronze, human-like figure expressing fluid movement. The aerodynamic figure is
armless like the incomplete Walking Man sculpture or armless Nike
of Samothrace, and it has no face. Boccioni created many
paintings, but he found the lack of constraints when creating three-
dimensional sculptures to be freeing and more effective for
conveying his message. It’s a figure in motion rendered in
geometric shapes. Today, the sculpture is shown on the Italian-
issued 20 cent euro coin.

 Dadaism. Dada's aesthetics is characterized by spiteful

ridicule of materialism and nationalism that had a strong influence
on artists in a wide number of urban areas, including Berlin,
Hannover, Paris, New York, and Cologne. The trend vanished from the development of surrealism, but the
concepts it gave rise to become the foundation of different styles of contemporary and modern art.
Example:
Construction for Noble Ladies  is an example of Schwitters’ use of abstraction in collage and sculpture. This
assemblage piece also exemplifies the ‘found object’ style of
sculpture, as it is constructed of a variety of broken and disjointed
materials: a funnel, a metal toy train, broken wheels, and other
scrap objects. It also includes a horizontal portrait of a noble lady,
from which the piece gets its title. The assembly of the work is
rough, and the painting has a rugged finish to it, further adding to its
diversion from preceding artistic expectations. However, the entire
piece has an elegant asymmetry, showing that even scrap objects
can create a masterpiece. 

 Surrealism. The Surrealists tried to incorporate the

unconscious so that the creativity might be opened. The Surrealists
assumed the rational brain was disdainful for rationality, literature realism, and strongly influenced by
psychoanalysis, and the force of creativity was suppressed by tabus. Inspired by Karl Marx, too, they believed
that the psyche would have the strength to expose and spur revolution on contradictions in the daily world.

Example:

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One of the many but too little known Surrealist women artists,
the American painter Leonora Carrington was a bold artist who managed to establish herself as a key figure of
Surrealism despite the discrimination of her male peers. Many of the surrealist male artists were rather
misogynistic and would solely acknowledge women as a mere sexual desire and object. Thankfully women such
as Leonora Carrington depicted deeper women experiences, especially in male-dominated societies and
environments. In this self-portrait, she explores her femininity by creating a mimesis between her and a hyena,
relating herself to the animal’s rebellious nature.

 Constructivism. It drew inspiration from Cubism, Surrealism and Futurism, but in essence was a totally new
approach to the creation of objects, which tried to remove through composition conventional artistic
considerations and to substitute them for "construction." Constructivism required rigorous scientific study of new
materials and intended to ultimately develop innovations for use in mass manufacturing that suited the aims of a
new, communist state.
Example:
Monument to the Third International, also sometimes known simply as Tatlin's Tower, is the artist's most famous
work, as well as the most important spur to the formation of the Constructivist movement. The Tower, which was
never fully realized, was intended to act as a fully functional
conference space and propaganda center for the Communist Third
International, or Comintern. Its steel spiral frame was to stand at
1,300 feet, making it the tallest structure in the world at the time -
taller, and more functional—and therefore more beautiful by
Constructivist standards—than the Eiffel Tower. There were to be
three glass units, a cube, cylinder and cone, which would have
different spaces for meetings, and these would rotate once per year,
month, and day, respectively.

 De Stijl. The De Stijl transformation in the Netherlands involves

an abstract wall-down aesthetic concentrating on important design
content such as geometric shapes and primary colors. The
decreased quality of De Stijl art was seen as a universal visual style,
suitable to contemporary days, in a new, spiritualized global order, as a reaction in part to the decorative
exaggerations of Art Deco.
Example:
This early work employs the signature geometric shapes of the De Stijl aesthetic, yet its layering of shapes and
forms, and combination of horizontal, vertical, and diagonal lines--
along with the absence of color - reflect a different approach from
that of the movement's leading artists, van Doesburg and Mondrian.
The work's suggestion of a human figure - accomplished by the
arrangement of geometric forms and placement of a cube at the top,
possibly representing a head - is also unique in De Stijl art. 

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 Pop Art. The subjects were not conventional "great art,"
but spiritual, mythological, and historical stories; rather, modern
artists depicted ordinary artifacts and characters, trying to lift popular
culture to the level of fine art. Pop Art may have become one of the
most recognized forms in visual art due to the introduction in
advertising images.
Example:
Roy Lichtenstein’s Whaam! is a large, two-canvas painting
composed like a comic book strip of a rocket explosion in the sky.
Lichtenstein was interested in portraying highly charged situations in
this particularly detached, calculated manner.

 Minimalism. The modern art preferred the sleek over "dramatic"— its works were mostly made of recycled
resources and stressed the abstract expressionism’s anonymity. Artists avoided the open-ended metaphors and
emotional substance, rather than the materiality of their art.
Example:
Carl Andre’s 144 Magnesium Square in 1969 is an example.
Factory-manufactured or shop-bought materials: Carl Andre
frequently used bricks or tiles as the medium for his sculpture; Dan
Flavin created his works from fluorescent bulbs purchased from a
hardware store; Judd's sculptures are built by skilled workers
following the artist's instructions

 Conceptual Art. Conceptual art is a trend which rewards concepts about the visual or formal components of
pieces of art. Conceptualism has adopted a multitude of forms including performance, events and ephemera,
rather than a firmly unified movement.
Example:
Ewa Partum’s Active Poetry in 1971 is an example. Ewa Partum
used performance as a means of creating her poetry. Her poetic
works were made by taking individual letters of the alphabet cut
from paper, and scattering them in city and countryside locations.
By deconstructing language, the artist aimed to explore its
structures.

 Photo Realism. The name Photorealism (also known as Hyperrealism or Superrealism) refers to the artists
who relied heavily on photographs and often project them onto
canvas to reproduce images correctly and accurately.
Example:
Brooklyn-born photorealist Robert Cottingham is best known for his
depiction of urban American landscapes and typefaces, particularly
focusing on building facades, neon signage, movie marquees, and
storefronts. His works are displayed in radically cropped
compositions which can be seen in some of his famous
compositions like Candy (1979) and Women-Girls (2000). Robert

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Cottingham’s Ritz Hotel in 1982 was sold for $8,000 via Doyle
New York.

 Installation Art. Installation art is a term widely used to

characterize artworks found in 3D interior spaces because "install"
denotes inside something else. This is also site-specific-built to
provide an architectural, abstract, or social connection, whether
temporal or permanent, with the space environment.
Example:
Thomas Dambo's Troll Hunt is a fun take on the concept of an art installation. It comprises of around six
'sneaky' trolls situated around Illinois’ Morton Arboretum during the summer of 2018. 

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Name: ______________________________________ Year & Section: __________________

A. Directions: Complete the table by writing examples (aside from the examples mentioned in the lesson)
and the philosophy of the different art movements. Cite 2 examples per art movement.

EXAMPLES (2 EXAMPLES
ART MOVEMENTS PHILOSOPHY
EACH)
Symbolism

Art Nouveau

Fauvism,

Expressionism

Cubism

Futurism

Dadaism

Surrealism

Constructivism

De Stijl

Pop Art

Minimalism

Conceptual Art

Photo Realism

Installation Art

B. Directions: Using a diagram / timetable of your own choice, present the history and movements of arts.

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Art History and Art Movements (Part 2)
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Write your work on the space provided below.

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Directions: Write the gist of the lessons that we have tackled. Write your answer on the space provided below. Focus
on the following topics:
A. Art History and Art Movements
B. Important Characteristics of these Art Movements
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Directions: Cite the important characteristics of the artworks below based on the art era they belong. You may use
the discussion in the module as your guide.
1. Casa Battlo

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2. Angel of Death

3. Whaam!

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Name: _____________________________________
Year and Section: ____________________
Directions: Circle the letter of the correct answer.
1. Which art movement modernized the designs of the artworks?
A. Art Nouveau B. Cubism C. Fauvism D. Expressionism
2. Which art movement focuses on the underlying nature of shape?
A. Art Nouveau B. Cubism C. Fauvism D. Expressionism
3. Who painted Le Bonheur de Vivre (The Joy of Life)?
A. Albert Marquet B. Antoni Gaudi C. Georges Rouault D. Henri Matisse
4. Who is Surrealism’s greatest inspiration?
A. Carl Andre B. Ewa Partum C. Karl Marx D. Leonora Carrington
5. What art movement is widely used to characterize artworks found in 3D interior spaces?
A. Conceptual Art B. De Stijl C. Installation Art D. Photo Realism
6. What art movement has adopted a multitude of forms including performance, events and
ephemera?
A. Conceptual Art B. De Stijl C. Installation Art D. Photo Realism
7. Which kind of art is Robert Cottingham best known for?
A. Expressionism B. Minimalism C. Photo Realism D. Surrealism
8. Which of the following is an example of Symbolism Art?
A. Active Poetry B. Angel of Death C. Casa Battlo D. Whaam!
9. Which of the following is an example of Pop Art?
A. Active Poetry B. Angel of Death C. Casa Battlo D. Whaam!
10. What is Ewa Partum’s means in creating her poetries?
A. Blogs B. Novels C. Performance D. Pocket Books

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