Plenty to talk about last class.
First the personalities: Cheret, Beardsley, Mucha, McDonald, Pizarro, Schmidt- Rottluff, Paul Klee, Adolf Loos, etc.
Stylistic influences: the difference between Arts and Crafts and Victorian and the difference between the latter and Nouveau. The Viennese Secession, van de Velde, The Beggarstaffs, Gesamtkunstwerk, Werkbund, etc.
Your comments are getting better, keep it on.
11 comments:
The artist I found most intriguing during last class was Paul Klee. Klee was the epitome of what I view as a graphic designer. The way he mixed expressionism, cubism, futurism, surrealism, and abstraction sets him aside from all the other artists. This many combinations makes his artwork very hard to classify. The difficulty of classification truly shows his genius, because the audience can never concretely determine what his meaning is. From looking at his painting, I can see how he combined many different styles of art techniques, such as oil, paint, watercolor, ink and pastel, and transformed them into one single piece. Furthermore, Klee experimented with Color Theory. His experimentation was a major development for modern art, similar to Leonardo DaVinci's impact on the Renaissance. This artist has had a variety of different works ranging from monochromatic to polychromatic. I liked how most of his drawings seemed fragile and childlike but ultimately portrayed a deeper meaning. I was especially fascinated by his works that included musical notation which were transcriptions of music, which reflect his feelings at the time.
- Chris Green
The gesamtkunstwerk concept of an all-embracing art form hit home for me. In Miami, we are surrounded by art - both organically and anthropomorphically. The blend of a tropical climate with grandiose, modern architectural design creates an almost mystical ambiance. Delving deeper into the underlying gesamtkunstwerk principles, it seems that physical location can play a significant role. Inside an architectural piece of artwork (ex. Brickell City Center) there is a compelling drive to be within another world, one created by the designer. The artistic creation can transition an audience from their current state to one that the creator envisions. Outside of architectural artwork (as in physically outside of a building), the integration of geometric design with the surrounding environment can bring out an compelling sensation to be closer to our actual world. The uneven complexity of nature is art in itself, a perspective our brain is wired to appreciate. (From an evolutionary perspective, those more in touch with their environment would have a greater chance of survival and reproduction. Thus, a dopamine loop associated with the beauty of nature is within understanding.) The addition of anthropomorphic shapes into the environment offer a more consistent, simplistic representation. It seems reasonable to conclude that there could be an optimal blend of environmental complexity and anthropomorphic simplicity that triggers an innate desire to fully experience the artistry surrounding us.
-Ryan Berkun
I found the concept of Victorian garden design in France and Gothic in London very interesting. It's interesting how one completely despises and disagrees with the taste of the other. Beyond just these two, I know that Japanese rock gardens are also very influential in garden design and have been very impactful in that aspect of the design world.
I was also interested in the different areas in Miami that are design rich that we discussed such as Brickell, and the Garages by Lincoln Road. It is crazy to know that just being designed by a specific artist can make the price of living or even just parking in a certain area so expensive.
The one artist that stood out to me the most in our previous lecture was Aubrey Beardsley. Not only is his actual work very beautiful, but the way they're presented in the books was very simple and tasteful in framework. His thin line work comes off as this sort of fragile style, and with most things that are fragile, you know a lot of work was put into creating them. The delicate aura from his work is completely flipped because of the intense use of black when filling in, making his work very beautiful and versatile in appreciation. I know that in class we said his style comes off as feminine but the versatility makes it come off as more androgynous than anything, especially his caricatures. I really appreciate his style and I feel it will inspire me in my work as well.
- Gianfranco Blanco
I enjoyed our discussion of Adolf Loos and his insistence that ornament was evil and for this reason he encouraged a more utilitarian, minimalist approach to architecture and design more generally. I find it fascinating how ornament is understood by many to be ostentatious, symbolic of excess. Excess is often given a negative connotation, with regard to many different cultures. For example, we know that in Catholicism, the seven deadly sins are considered human behaviors in their most excessive form. Often to avoid partaking in sin, excess, or superficial/earthly endeavors many religious individuals from Catholics to Buddhists have partaken in and do partake in asceticism. Ironically, asceticism in certain circumstances could be considered an excessive reaction to excess. In a sense asceticism mirrors minimalism, it’s just that asceticism is design for the body or the spirit, and minimalism is design for art. However, both designs are imbued with the same general essence –discipline and reduction in hopes for a uncorrupted result.
-Abbie Auster
I enjoyed the discussion of the last class very much. I love the expressionist of graphic art work, it seems like it was made by printmaking. Which is a very unique way of making art. I believe that Karl's work has a consistancey of abstract human figures. It kinda reminds me of Picasso work in a way. He was a German expressionist painter and printmaker; who focuses on landscapes and nudes. What I love about his art is how he follows the same techniques but varies between colors. Some pieces are bright and vibrant, black and white and nude colors. After world war one Schmidt became very interested in religious themes. However, when the nazis gained power in Germany he was forbidden to paint. He regained the works of art after world war 2, he resumed painting and started to teach art.
I found the architecture from last class to be the most interesting. Werkbund’s architecture is so notable because he focused so much on the spirit and the form of what he was creating. Not only are his designs captivating to look at, but they are also functional. His glass building with the spiral staircase is geometrically pleasing. However, what I found most important about his work is how he integrated mass production and craftsmanship. At the time of his designs, mass production was becoming increasing popular and people were concerned about factories and machines replacing jobs and craftsmanship. Werkbund was a move towards modern design and then Horta was a move towards art nouveau. I noticed similarities with the spirals. Horta’s spirals and circular patterns represent nature but also reminded me of Werkbund’s spiral staircase. Horta’s stairs and wispy designs were a freer form style than Werkbund, but still had similar a similar original shape.
I found the interaction of music and design of particular interest in last weeks lecture. The sensory depictions of Kandinsky and Paul Klee show there is a transient quality to sound, colour and taste in emulating how powerful graphic design is to help people visualise/feel things in a certain way. In Kandinsky's early works, the feeling of claustrophobia comes into play because of the lack of space given to a picture. The importance of space, therefore, is something else I hadn't come to realise until taking this class. The effectiveness of simplicity in some of the early 20th century designs also reiterates this (e.g. Art Nouveau sought for curvacious clean lines in replacement of Victorian excess decor)
- Gemma Finegold
I really enjoyed the discussion we had last class. As an art major I have studied expressionism, the Viennese secession and art nouveau, but I had never seen the graphic design side of these movements. One of my favorite topics we saw last class was Karl Schimidt Rotttluf. I had never heard of this German expressionist painter although I’ve seen many art history classes on this period. When I first saw the image our professor showed us I thought it was a piece made by Picasso. Both him and Picasso were living during the expressionism movement and this could explain much of their resemblance. The way they both represent the human figure in an abstract and cubist way with a colorful pallet lets me believe how both artists where influenced by African art and this is why they resembled, but at the same time their style was divided by the different social crisis and personal experiences both of these artists where facing individually.
- Sara Valbuena
I really enjoyed last class, in particular the references to the Viannese “Sezesion” and Art Nouveau. Having lived and worked at the Albertina Museum, I walked by the Wiener Secsession building every day. I also really enjoyed the works of Beardsley and his curvo-linear, feminine representations. This made me think about the role of gender in art and architecture and whether a city can be labeled feminine or masculine. (Thinking about Vienna and Paris, I would probably think of the cities of feminine, but taking Miami into consideration I wouldn’t know how to answer).
Moreover, I would even dare to argue that during the course of our last class, the works went from feminine, detail-oriented art-nouveau styled creations and architecture, to having a more masculine, simplistic flair (exemplified by the works of Josef Hoffman, and Adolf Loos’ famous detest for ornamentation).
One striking point that also fascinated me was the one that Germany (this was brought up when discussing van de Velde’s works) made design a politic of the state. This made me ponder the interactions between politics and art, two subject areas –or better say worlds- that almost never intersect. I would wonder what the countries today would look like if art was one on their political agenda. Would our infrastructure be better? How would our quality of life change if the government would stress art and design as a national priority (obviously while still paying attention to this countries needs).
-Victoria von Faber-Castell
The part of the lecture that I found most interesting was the connection between art design and interior design. Looking back on the pictures from last week what first caught my attention was the 1956 image of the Copenhagen hotel designed by Jacobsen because my sister has the Egg and Swan sofa that he designed for that hotel. Looking further into the other images of interior design it is easier to see that the dynamics between lines, curves, textures and even lighting placement makes the room a canvas. Gesamtkunstwerk is a popular art method used by many of these artists which uses all or many art forms. It was difficult for me to fully understand what I meant until seeing the tall chairs of Robie House with the lamps directly on the table. Creativity is not exempt from interior design.
-Camila Chediak
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