Expressionist Art Movement

Lyonel Feininger

1871-1956

American Cubist Painter, member of the Blaue Reiter group

Feininger was one of the original artists who taught at the Bauhaus, until the Nazis declared that he along with all his artist friends were “degenerate artists” and slammed the doors shut in 1933.

According to Lyonel Feininger "Each individual work serves s an expression of our most personal state of mind at that particular moment and of the inescapable, imperative need for release by means of an appropriate act of creation: the rhythm, form, colour and mood of a picture" Cubism is an avant-garde modern art movement headed by PabloPicasso and Georges Braque. The term "cubism" was coined by Henri Matisse in 1908. The movement was something of a backlash to the impressionist period. Cubist painting caused a scandal in the art world and was considered revolutionary at the time. Picasso and Braque catalyzed a transformation in innovative techniques and mediums. Artists, inspired by their style, started breaking away from the dogma of impressionism and post impressionism which had maintained a strangle-hold over the modern art world.

The Expressionist prefered gritty reality over plump, rosy cheeked cherubs, dreamy landscapes, water lilies and Japanese bridges. Controversial Austrian Expressionist Painter, Egon Schiele asserted, "I must see new things and investigate them. I want to taste dark water and see crackling trees and wild winds." Expressionist painters looked inward at their own emotions, and less upon the outside world for inspiration. Painters of the Expressionist generation grew up on the battlefield, witnessing wartime atrocities and returning to war ravaged countries.

Important Cubist Painters

Juan Gris Spanish,1887-1927

Fernand Léger French, 1881-1955

Pablo Picasso Spanish, 1881-1973

Paul Cezanne French, 1839-1906

Georges Braque French 1882-1963

Characteristics, Terms and Phrases Associated With Cubist Painting - geometrical forms, sum of destructions, simplified forms, subdued colors, non-objective, pictorial rhythm, Analytical Cubism, Synthetic Cubism and collages.