Cubism: Early Twentieth-Century Art Movements

Picasso and Braque as Modern Art Masters

Mar 10, 2009 Marc Zeale

A brief history on the advent of Cubism, and how Picasso and fellow artists inspired a revolution in modern art during the course of two World Wars.

Fauvism’s failure in 1907 left Parisian artists searching for an influential voice, away from Impressionism’s rigid form. A polar reaction against establishment views; the influence of African tribes in Western art; the parallel advance of Italy’s Futurism; the continuing legacy of Cezanne’s death in 1906; all these factors were fertile soil for an art form that stressed geometric forms and stripped art down to rhythms of disparate components and fractured planes.

Early Developments

Pablo Picasso is the figurehead most often associated with Cubism’s greatest achievements. French artist Georges Braque, however, done with Fauvism, was more responsible for the movement’s genesis. In 1907, while Picasso was creating his landmark painting Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, Braque returned to the fishing village of L’Estaque near Marsailles, and painted the enigmatic piece Houses at L’Estaque.

The landscape painting, first seen at a 1908 Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler Gallery exhibition after being refused by the Salon d’Automne, drew disdain from critic Louis Vauxcelles, who commented that Braque’s painting reduced all elements to “geometric schemas and cubes”. Fellow artist Henri Matisse, bowing to conventional wisdom, agreed, supplying the impetus for the new movement’s name.

Picasso and Braque were introduced by Guillaume Apollinaire, a poet, art critic, and influential member of the Paris art scene, and soon became friends. Their collaborative leadership found support among contemporary artists like Juan Gris, Fernand Leger, and Robert Delaunay. Cubism swept the art world like wildfire, often provoking sharp criticism and political dissent among critics, artists, and patrons.

Exhibitions at the Salon des Independents in 1911 and the Salon d’Automne the following year marked the official beginning of the Cubist campaign, even though works of Picasso and Braque were absent, who were discouraged from controversy in exhibiting by Kahnweiler, their mutual dealer.

Cubist Theory and Influence

Cubists were not so much innovators as experimenters, challenging the laws of physics and representation. Blind to linear and atmospheric perspective, they focused on a less-than-beautiful world view as seen through the mind’s eye. Cubism broke the restrictive chains of 19th-Century art’s balanced structure and well-defined order. Picasso and friends painted density, not form.

Picasso saw the advent of the 20th century as a threat to art itself. An industrialized society dominated by mass production, poster art, and printing techniques changed the visual landscape of Paris seemingly overnight. He inspired an official reaction by imposing elements of formalism to paint a new form of visual art.

Cubism transformed itself through two distinct phases. Analytic cubism produced moody, monochromatic, figurative studies of geometric forms, with convergent planes and multiple points of view. After 1912, synthetic cubism followed, a more decorative period that advanced synthesized forms and introduced collage into Cubist canvases.

World Conflict and Cubist Decline

The developments of two World wars splintered the Cubist camp beyond repair. Braque joined the French Army, returning a wounded, changed man. Picasso’s compatriot Juan Gris suffered abject poverty and remained obscure until his death in 1927. Delaunay worked odd jobs before succumbing to cancer in 1941 while hiding from German forces.

Though the movement retains proponents even today, Cubist momentum dissolved after 1921 with the advent of Surrealism. In later years, Cubism was victimized by its politics, its critical reaction, and a fierce sense of nationalism. Regardless, the movement became a catalyst for modern art that further developed abstract and non-representational forms such as Neo-Plasticism, Constructivism, and to a lesser extent, the Abstract Expressionism of artists like Marc Chagall.

Only Picasso, who endured Nazi occupation in France during the 1940’s, remained true to Cubism’s ideal until his death in 1973 at the age of 91, father of four children and numerous artists who were, and continue to be, influenced by his work.

References:

Green, Christopher. Art in France, 1900 - 1940. CT: Yale University Press, 2000.

Moffat, Charles Alexander. The Art History Archive - Art Movements: Cubism. Available at: http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/cubism/ (2009).

The copyright of the article Cubism: Early Twentieth-Century Art Movements in Modern Art History is owned by Marc Zeale. Permission to republish Cubism: Early Twentieth-Century Art Movements in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.