This period of time was chaos with all of the conflict and war, so this era of art was pushed by artists who wanted to create art that represented order. They also wanted to make their art universal by making it enjoyable for all different types of people, which was new for the time. Art became more abstract and artists were trying to push the limits of art, which created the opportunity for all different types of art to be created. Grids were being used a lot more which is something that we are still using today, although it has progressed a lot. They didn’t have Figma or Illustrator, but done everything by hand, which I find very impressive.
Artists were taking things back down to the bare minimum, and pushing the limits using shapes and lines. One of the art pieces that we looked at was ‘The Black Square’ by Kazimir Malevich in 1915. I thought that it was quite funny that this piece was seen as so great back then.
De Stijl was a Dutch art movement founded in 1917. The main pioneer for this movement was Piet Mondrian. The style consisted of abstract, geometrical shapes, and mostly used primary colours. This art style to me is pretty boring as it only really uses primary colours and simple shapes, but I do appreciate the impact it had at the time, after all the horror of WW1.
‘Wee Bloo Coo’ by Piet Mondrian
Piet Mondrian
Russian Constructivism is another art movement that started in the early 20th century. It was most influential in Russia. The idea behind constructivism is that behind art should be a constructive mindset, as if creating art was like constructing a building. They took elements from construction and other industries such as fashion, textiles and photography, and implemented them into their art style. They wanted to try and bring together people of the working class society (proletariat) and target them for their art. One of the most famous artists from that adapted this art style is Alexander Rodchenko.
One of Alexander Rodchenko’s pieces
Alexander Rodchenko
The Bauhaus was a design school founded in 1919, made for designers and artists. It was famous for combining arts and crafts and fine arts, which was new at the time. The Bauhaus has had a monumental influence on lots of different form of arts. There is a reason why it is still talked about today. In the Bauhaus did a bit of everything, they weren’t just doing one style of art. They were doing graphic design, architecture, fine art etc. The reason why they done this was because they can learn new skills that they wouldn’t have if they didn’t do these different types of art. What I learnt from this is that it is important to try different things to learn skills and techniques that I can carry over to my work. We also were told about the importance of side projects, and how G-mail started as a side project, which shows that they can lead to big things.
They then started mixing technology and art, which was led by László Moholy-Nagy. He was famous for integrating technology into the arts industry. He was a painter, photographer, and then a professor in the Bauhaus school.
Point, Line, Plane was then kicked off by Vasily Kandinsky. He started experimenting with these elements and published a book called ‘Point and Line to Plane’ in 1926. He looked at how these elements are in nature, and wanted to carry it into art, which today we still use as a basic design starting point. In design point, line and plane are everywhere.
Vasily Kandinsky
I enjoyed learning about the Revolution and Bauhaus in todays class, and how this was the beginning of abstract art. Although I am not a huge fan of abstract art myself, I can appreciate. One thing I thought was cool from todays class is that students of the Bauhaus learnt a range of different design techniques and styles, which is something that doesn’t really happen today.