Discuss the ideas behind the development of Cubism

I chose to discuss and to explore the development of Cubism because I consider it one of the most important movements of modern art and even art history, due to the novelty that it brings in understanding and relating the space. Despite the fact that in many books and documents Cubism appears like a movement which has been developed at the beginning of 1907, Cubism has no birth certificate because there is a long history behind the development of it. After 1900, the evolution of art has accelerated in a way that we have never seen before. The existence of a current could be reduced even for a few years and most of them could exist at the same time. The artist of the 20th century will have as task the demolishing of old traditions. The form, the space, the color-all will suffer major changes specific to the period of avant-garde. After the discovery of the perspective in the Renaissance, Cubism was the most important revolution in the history of painting. Like many stylistic terms of art history, the word cubism was first used ironically, in this case by a critic, observing that Braque reduced everything in his paintings to small cubes. Great innovators in terms of singular vision, by using multiple perspectives in the same painting, cubist painters reordered and fragmented the forms of an object, so that painting was not a window through which an image could be contemplated, but was rather a flat surface on which the artist was arranging his reply. Suddenly, the artists were free to rearrange the reality in any way they felt that it would fit. Starting with the Impressionist movement and strongly influenced by Cezannes work and even Ingress and Gauguins work, Cubists looked at the human figure with different eyes. Cezannes man and women bathers were elements of nature and elements of painting-no more and no less; Gauguin and Van Gogh began to disregard the convention governing the representation of the human face, to depart from the colors that apparently characterize it; Matisse painted a red nude, a Male Nude whose volumes are rough-hewn as if with an axe. Picasso painted a self-portrait slashing the face with green.( Daix 1983 p18 ) There are several stages in the development of Cubism. The first part is based on Cezannes art who treats nature as a sphere, cylinder, cone and also has the tendency of eliminating the perspective which is evident. All of us started from Cezanne as Fernand Leger said ( Daix 1983 p10 ). Whoever understands Cezanne will already have an inkling of Cubism( Daix 1983 p10 ) The first major branch of Cubism known as Analytic Cubism (both radical and influential) corresponds with a period in which artists gave geometric aspect to their paintings and tended to fragment forms and surfaces, this fragmentation also corresponding to their

analysis which is purely an intellectual operation. Another specific aspect of the Analytic Cubism is the two dimensions of space that they tended to give to their canvases, the color which became monochrome and the light which didn't have a definite source in the paintings but it had clear edges (main artists- Picasso, Braque). The second phase is Synthetic Cubism. This time the volumes are coming to divide into facets by letting the air and light circulate into the spaces (the space still being two dimensional). There isnt obvious light, the color becoming brighter and there is also the introduction of lettering in the painting from newspapers, for example (see figure 1). Collage is a new innovation that Synthetic Cubists bring (they build an image using things cut from magazines). The sculpture has suffered lots of changes in this period of Synthetic Cubism, by using cardboard and playing around the space (see figure)(main artists- Picasso, Braque, Gris, Leger, Laurens). There is also an extensional phase of Cubism outside France (Russia, Germany, United States, England), after the development of the two latter phases, but the current developed in this period tends to look more abstract. Even though this was the first reaction of the viewers, the paintings from the Analytic Cubism and the Synthetic Cubism were not abstract, they just reinterpreted the space and they always wanted to keep a connection with the reality. One of the most representative artists of this period is Pablo Picasso. There are indeed many artists who have joined him, such as his closest friend, George Braque, but in Picassos art, Cubism is occurring in all stages of development. Picasso was not always cubist; he experimented various things until becoming one. Firstly, he was influenced by Cezannes art that tended to give an appearance of geometric forms and to eliminate the optical illusion of perspective; color is more important and it has the role of expressing feelings and communicating with the viewer. And we can see echoes in the Three women bathing of Cezanne, in the Demoiselles dAvignon (see figure 2 and 3). But he also became really interested in Ingress work and composition, even in the most classical of his paintings (see figure 4 and 5).In his nude, Picasso had often added extra vertebrae just as Ingres did in his Large Odalisque. (Daix 1983 p20 ) The Iberian Sculpture that he saw, gave him the idea of simplification and the solidity but he did not wanted to copy it, he tried it just as an experiment (see figure 6 and 7). Another profound influence on him was the primitive art, discovered by Picasso in an exhibition of tribal art from Africa and Oceania, opened in Paris, which he described as a true revelation. He felt especially attracted, as inspiration, by the deformation of human facial features and flattering shape in two-dimensional representation, with features in relief, as in the masks originating from Central Africa (see figure 8). Still life with cane chair was one of the first synthetic cubist style work (see figure 9) work built by applying external factors, such as paper, instead of painting it entirely. The first phase of Cubism Analytical Cubism had the effect of a radical innovation, while the second phase, Synthetic Cubism, was in some perspective more detached. Since the Renaissance, European painters used only colour, as a means of expressing the artists vision. Nobody but Picasso borrowed elements from the outside, apparently arbitrarily, in

order to stick them together in a single composition. The Synthetic Cubism that allowed the artist to use colour more vivid than in the pas, had been limited by issues of formal order in Analytical Cubism, where form, not colour, was the main factor, but now, fade to gray and brown tones prevailing in their range, could be ungraded with more vibrant colours, obtained by objects placed together in collages. But the painting which put Picasso in the spotlight was Demoiselles dAvignon the most important single picture which the century has so far produced ( Daix 1983 p31 ). This painting reflects actually the impact of Negro Art in Picassos work and the influence taken from Cezanne's composition. This disturbing picture marks a decisive change in 20th century art. Breaking the tradition, the young Picasso, has created a new artistic language. We could see that Picasso created disagreeing paintings with brown over the character from the left and crating to the women from the right facets like masks. The character who stays squatter, also suffered severe deformation and the woman is represented in terms of front and rear at the same time and the asymmetrical eyes are painted in contrasting colour, while the nose forms a curve, like a sew along the face. Such images evoke both tribal masks and horribly distorted faces of patients of syphilis that Picasso studied in the prison of the hospital st. Lazare (see figure 10). The fragmented drapery with its sharp creases with white lighting effects is reminiscent of El Greco but shows signs of the influence of Cezannes technique, the representation of space by planes and facets, as a look toward the future bold cubist art. Picasso painted also cubist portraits; however, in his non-cubist work was, above all, a painter of human facets. Also, despite the style of modern art, Picasso was strongly influenced by the art of the past, for example he painted a series of works based on the work of the most famous Spanish painter of his predecessors, Diego Velazquez, whose work dates on the 17th century. (see figure 11 and 12) Looking back upon it now, we begin to understand why Cubism cannot be defined as simply a matter of painting and sculpture. It was more than that. It has brought about a transformation of vision, in the same way that the invention of perspective had transformed mans vision five hundred years before. And by doing so it has amounted to a transformation of the human intelligence and its representation of the world. In this sense Cubism has been indeed the birth certificate of 20th century art.(Daix 1983 p153) Despite the fact that cubism has raised much controversy and it had many enemies, it could be considered as a new beginning for the future artists and can provide a much more free way of thinking. Cubism was inspired by a wide range of artists (even some classical) like Cezanne, Gauguin, Ingres, Velazquez and many others, and the stages that it passed make it one of the most complex current in the history of art.

Georges Braque: Tenora Figure 1

Cezanne: Three women in bathing Figure 2

Pablo Picasso: Demoiselles dAvignon Figure 3

Ingres: The Turkish Bath Figure 4

Pablo Picasso: The Harem Figure 5

Iberian Sculpture Demoiselles dAvignon (detail) Figure 6

Pablo Picasso: Figure 7

African sculpture influence Figure 8

Pablo Picasso: Still life with cane chair Figure 9

Pablo Picasso: Weeping Woman Figure 10

Diego Velazquez: Las Meninas Figure 11

Pablo Picasso: Las Meninas Figure 12

Bibliography

Daix, (1983) CUBIST AND CUBISM by Macmillan London LTD Daval, (1979) MODERN ART The Decisive Years 1884-1914 by Macmillan London LTD Daval, ( 1981) AVANT-GARDE ART by Macmillan London LTD Green, ( 1987) CUBISM AND ITS ENEMIES ( Modern Movements and Reaction in French Art 1916-1928) Yale University Press; New Haven and London Venturi, (1978) CEZANNE by Macmillan London LTD Brown, (1986) VELAZQUEZ Painter and Courtier Yale University Press; New Haven and London Picon, (1980) Jean-Auguste-Dominique INGRES by Macmillan London LTD