Expressionistic Movements: Life, Death and Anxiety at the turn of the Century

FUSELI,Henry 1741-1825
The Nightmare (Incubus) 1781-82

Paul Gauguin, Spirit of the Dead Watching 1892
Oil on burlap mounted on canvas 
28 1/2 x 36 3/8 in. 
Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY

 
 
 
 
 
 
Gustav Klimt, 
Death and Life, 1916
Oil on canvas 178 x 198 cm
Private collection, Vienna
Stokstad calls him Art Nouveau
or Sezession-stil (Germany)
Secessionist

For as long as I can remember I have suffered 
from a deep feeling of anxiety which I have 
tried to express in my art. Without anxiety and 
illness I should have been like a ship without a rudder. 
(Edvard Munch) 

 
 
 
 
 
Gustav Klimt, The Kiss, 1907-8
oil on canvas, 5'10"x6'
Vienna National Museum
Stokstad calls him Art Nouveau
or Sezession-stil (Germany)
Secessionist

 
 
 
 
Edvard Munch The Scream 1893
Norway Expressionist

"I was walking along the road with two friends. 
The sun set. I felt a tinge of melancholy. 
Suddenly the sky became a bloody red. 
I stopped, leaned against the railing, dead tired. 
And I looked at the flaming clouds that hung like blood 
and a sword over the blue-black fjord and city. 
My friends walked on. I stood there, trembling with fright. 
And I felt a loud, unending scream piercing nature."

 
 
 
 
Edvard Munch The Scream 1893
Norway Expressionist

"It would be quite amusing to preach a bit to 
all those people who for many years now have 
been looking at our paintings and either laughed 
or shook their heads reproachfully. They do not believe 
that these impressions, these instant sensations, could 
contain even the smallest grain of sanity. 

If a tree is red or blue, or a face is blue or green, 
they are sure that is insanity."

 
 
 
 
 

The Dance of Life is rooted in Munch's relationships with Mrs. Heiberg and Tulla Larsen. The man in the center of the painting is Munch himself, dancing with his old love, Mrs. Heiberg. Tulla Larsen is displayed on the left wanting Munch's love and on the right side, she stands rejected by him. Munch's description of the painting in his diary supports this interpretation:

I am dancing with my true love - a memory of her. A smiling, blond-haired woman enters who wishes to take the flower of love - but it won't allow itself to be taken. And on the other side one can see her dressed in black troubled by the couple dancing - rejected - as I was rejected from her [Mrs. Heiberg's] dance.
 

 
 
 
 

Edvard Munch The Dance of Life 1899
Norway Expressionist
 The Dance of Life is rooted in Munch's relationships with Mrs. Heiberg and Tulla Larsen. The man in the center of the painting is Munch himself, dancing with his old love, Mrs. Heiberg. Tulla Larsen is displayed on the left wanting Munch's love and on the right side, she stands rejected by him. Munch's description of the painting in his diary supports this interpretation:

I am dancing with my true love - a memory of her. A smiling, blond-haired woman enters who wishes to take the flower of love - but it won't allow itself to be taken. And on the other side one can see her dressed in black troubled by the couple dancing - rejected - as I was rejected from her [Mrs. Heiberg's] dance.
 

 
 
 
 
 

Munch, The Vampire 1895
Munch Madonna 1902

 
 

German Expressionism


Ernst Ludwig Kirchner Self Portrait as a Soldier 1915
German Expressionist
 
 
 
 
 


Ernst Ludwig Kirchner:  1880-1938 Street Berlin, Germany  1913
German Expressionist



 
 
 
 

CAILLEBOTTE,Gustave 1848-94 
Paris, A Rainy Day,1876-77 o/c  Chicago,A.I.
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner:  1880-1938 
Street Berlin, Germany  1913

 
 
 
 
 
Pierrot
Pronounced As: pro [Fr.,=little Peter], character in French pantomime. A buffoon, he wore a loose white tunic with big buttons, balloon sleeves, and white pantaloons. His face was painted white. A creation of Giuseppe Giaratone or Geratoni (fl. 1639-97), Pierrot was introduced to early 19th-century France by Deburau.

Arnold Schoenberg also spelled Arnold Schönberg 1874–1951

Pierre lunaire, No. 18 "Der Mondfleck"
palindrome
sprechstimme (speech song)
Comedia del Arte (Commedia dell’Arte)

 
 
 
 

Arnold Schoenberg also spelled 
Arnold Schönberg 1874–1951

Pierre lunaire, No. 18 "Der Mondfleck"

  • palindrome
  • sprechstimme (speech song)
  • Comedia del Arte (Commedia dell’Arte)
 "The 'beautiful' in music is a by-product of the composer's integrity, a function of his search for truth."
— Arnold Schoenberg

The Viennese composer Arnold Schoenberg, under the influence of the German Expressionist movement, sought new ways to organize pitches. He first abandoned tonality altogether (atonality), then unhappy with the results, devised a complex system (serialism or twelve-tone method) based on a particular arrangement of the twelve chromatic tones (a tone row), which became the source for building themes, harmonies, and counterpoint. His music is dissonant and highly disjunct in style. He also united text and music through the use of a new vocal style (Sprechstimme), used in Pierrot lunaire. He refined the twelve-tone system in his later years, while teaching in the United States.
http://www.wwnorton.com/enjoy/lessons/lesson63.htm

 
 
 
 


Visual Art
Formal Elements
color 
texture
lines
light
shape
composition
     symmetrical
     asymmetrical		 Musical Art
Formal Elements
medium (tone color)
texture
rhythm
tempo
dynamic contrast
melody
Meaning/Content
iconography
symbols or icons

context
background, social, cultural or historical		 Meaning/Content
conclusion