​EARLY MODERNISM

Realism, Photography, &
19th Century Architecture
​(1836 - 1908 C.E.)

​KEY IDEAS

  • Realism was based on the theory of being positive (positivism)
  • Japanese art had a profound impact on late 19th century painting.
  • Impressionist art is all about painting "en plein-air"
  • Symbolist painters seek to portray mystical personal visions.
  • The Skyscraper is a new type of building due to technological advances
  • Art Nouveau unifies painting, sculpture, and architecture with curvilinear lines and organic forms and motifs.
  • Artists were inspired by the past but rejected the tradtional subject matter.
  • Almost all artworks are purely secular with no religious symbolism or intent.

​HISTORY

  • Europe was in a move from aristocracies to democracies = Revolutions in Sicily, Venice, Germany, Austria, and Lombardy. 
  • Franco-Prussian War of 1870
  • Concept of positivism fueled by Comte (knowledge must come from proven ideas based off science)
  • Darwin and Marx = Human evolution and social equality
  • Invention of telephones, motion pictures, bicycles, and cars!
  • The avant-garde
  • New excavation begins in Greece, Turkey, and Europe
CONTENT: What do you see?
FORM: The details (what you see more exactly). How the artist delivers the content.
CONTEXT: Everything NOT observable.
FUNCTION: The intended purpose of the work.

​APAH 250 Images:

Realism
113. The Stonebreakers, Gustave Courbet 
* The Gleaners, Millet
115. Olympia, Édouard Manet 
* The Gross Clinic, Eakins
* The Thankful Poor, The Banjo Lesson, Tanner
119. The Burghers of Calais, Auguste Rodin 
* Age of Bronze, Gates of Hell
Photography
114. Nadar Elevating Photography to Art, Honoré Daumier 
110. Still Life in Studio, Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre 
117. The Horse in Motion, Eadweard Muybridge 
127. The Steerage, Alfred Stieglitz 
19th Century Architecture
124. Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company Building, Louis Sullivan 
* Bibliotheque Nationale, Labrouste
* Crystal Palace, Paxton
* Eiffel Tower, Eiffel
* Marshall Field Building, Richardson

​VOCABULARY

Aquatint
Avant-garde
Caricature
Drypoint
Japonisme
Lithography
Modernism
Plein-air
Positivism
Skeleton
​Zoopraxiscope