Art

Many of the images we have seen this semester use elements such as landscape and natural light to indicate a narrative behind the picture, to communicate a political or social perspective.  Manets La rue Mosnier aux drapeaux (1878) sends a tragic political message as a maimed veteran, mocked on all sides by flaccid flags, hobbles through a dreary street.  Malevich comments on the drudgery of peasant life in Bringing in the Harvest (1911) as cylindrical workers with stoic expressions gather cylindrical grain.  It often seems that artists with a social or political purpose are bound to a dull and dismal aesthetic.  But in the work of those artists who see the natural world as nothing more or less than a source of aesthetic pleasure, there is a daring use of color and form and an exuberance not found in the other images. These artists amplify natural colors and exaggerate natural forms to achieve a pleasurable aesthetic effect, caring less about the truth of nature.  

If artists like Malevich and Manet seek to tell a political or social truth, Picasso is content to tell a lie. He tells us that those visual lies are necessary to our mental selves . . . it is through them that we form our aesthetic view of life (no. 6). In Les demoiselles davignon (1907) he has distorted nature, present here in the female form, for a purely aesthetic end.  The young ladies taunt the viewer with mask-like faces. They flaunt their nudity in a manner seen in classical sculpture, yet the two-dimensional plane taking up much of the composition evokes an avant-garde cubism. The work is a vivid mix of cultural influences and styles, in it Picasso reminds us as he did in a 1923 interview, Through art we express our idea of what nature is not (no. 6).  

With his The Blue Nude (1907), Matisse rivals the decadence of Picasso as the female form is distorted to an absurd degree, drawn as she is out of nearly perfect circles.  Incredible shades of grass and water play off the bone-colored skin of the reclining figure.  The clash of colors surprises the eye.  The scene seems unreal, as though it has little to do with the everyday world. We ought to take Matisse at his word when he says, I am unable to proceed beyond a purely visual satisfaction (no. 5).

Mondrian is another artist for whom the real world is just a departure-point for expressive distortions.  His View from the dunes with beach and piers, Domburg (1909) demonstrates the austere abstraction de stijl could impose on the natural world.  Broadway Boogie-Woogie (1942-43) is a more energetic expression of the same abstraction.  Mondrian defies expectations and tradition with white space.  His ability to make something so exuberant out of basic colors and shapes has to be admired.  He seems to understand the instinctive way color affects the viewer (no. 5).  Yet for all its restrained abstraction, there is something decadent about the piece.  It challenges the viewer to have a purely aesthetic experience.  It is as defiant as the gaze of Picassos mademoiselles. Mondrian is not concerned with demonstrating his talent or sending a message. His distortions of the world are a challenge to the viewer.  There is the pleasure of the unexpected in Mondrians work (no. 6).  

Perhaps the most decadent distortion of the natural world is to be found in the Cellini Salt Cellar (1543).  The sea and the land have been gloriously personified in golden figures that gaze at each other from luxurious poses. In his mannerist style, Cellini has wrought two idealized human forms.  The seahorses and surrounding foliage are just as flawless, and all the forms somehow resemble each other in their perfection.  This is surely what nature is not (no. 6).  And of course the piece has as little to do with the real world of sixteenth-century Europe, with inquisitions and religious wars, as possible. The work seems to defy what might be commonly thought of as good taste, even making a king gasp in amazement, yet its beauty undeniable (no.4).