The Hidden Beauty of Cubism

It was Ralph Waldo Emerson who said: “Love of beauty is taste. The creation of beauty is art.”

GEORGES BRAQUE

Still Life with Fruit Dish, Bottle and Mandolin, 1930.

Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf.

© 2013 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York / ADAGP, Paris.

Courtesy of The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.

 However, there are many forms and styles of accepted ‘art’ which do not conform to conventional definitions of beauty. Take Cubism as an example. Many art enthusiasts, whilst acknowledging that the likes of Pablo Picasso and George Braque are masters of their craft, are confounded by Cubism. Abstract art may have this effect in the general sense, but there is something about Cubism which perplexes and befuddles the viewer.

Lovers of art for the sake of loving beauty were suddenly forced to confront a form of art which possessed a mathematical, geometrical, and almost dispassionately considered beauty. Arguments may be made that dispassion is not beautiful, or pleasing to the eye, and many critics and artists alike rejected this movement when it was first brought to public attention in the early 20th century.

Analysis as a form of art may be too academic for the most vocal critics of Cubism, but the process of identifying the key characteristics of a subject, breaking them down, and fitting them back together in an abstract sense is not without purpose. In a Cubist painting, the viewer is given a series of perspectives combined in one image, and the significance of the subject grows in consequence. This can be considered beauty in and of itself.

If the purpose of art is to inspire, and the cause of art is expression, then surely Cubism strongly deserves its place amongst the elite of the art movements. Nobody can deny that this genre provokes strong reactions from its audience – it intrigues, puzzles, raises questions, and is ripe for analysis. There is certainly no question that Picasso and Braque inspired a host of artists who followed in their wake, not only in art, but in music, dance, and literature.

PAUL STRAND

Georges Braque, Varengeville-sur-Mer, France, 1957.

Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Courtesy of The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.

If you follow the Cubist path, you may find yourself at The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. There, the exhibition George Braque and the Cubist Still Life, 1928-1945 will be running until the 1 September. Be sure not to miss it! And why not advance your Cubist knowledge still further with Guillaume Apollinaire and Dorothea Elimert’s Cubism?

- Fiona Torsch

Oh, If I Were a Symbolist

Symbolism: What is it when it’s at home? What was the point that the artists were trying to achieve? And how should it be interpreted?

Let’s start with the what. This was a technique brought into vogue by the young painters of the late 19^th Century, stemming from French literature (and later, Russian and Belgian); this is where many of the Symbolists gathered inspiration from. The aim was to portray the idea of a subject, to give the suggestion of the true meaning only; poetry in art.

 



Gaetano Previati
Creation of Light, 1913
Oil on canvas, 199 x 215 c,
Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna
Rome

 

They accomplished this by using line, colour, and composition (other elements include tone, texture, space, and shape) in their work, and adapted the use of certain images/icons to give their work more meaning and subtext.

Key examples of imagery and symbolism include biblical characters, representative of the emotions that the artists were looking to portray. The main themes were love, lust, death, fear, anger, and sorrow. Characters from mythology (such as Greek) were also employed. Amongst the characters, angels and the Madonna were commonly used to symbolise purity and innocence, whilst characters such as Salome and monsters (like the sphinx) symbolising the femme fatale, love scorned, and the wrath of a temptress. Borrowing also from classical art, the use of the symbolic butterfly (who represented the Greek goddess Psyche) could be interpreted as the mind or the soul.

 



William Degouve de Nuncques
Angels of the Night, 1894
Oil on canvas, 48 x 60 cm
Kröller-Müller Museum
Otterlo

 

Colours are also used for their symbolic characteristics: black may symbolise evil, power, sexuality, wealth, mystery, and mourning (amongst others); black and white combined may represent mourning; blue has been associated with peace, purity (when in association with the Virgin Mary), serenity, and loyalty; brown represents earth, home, and comfort; green can be representative of both nature and envy, as well as youth; orange represents energy and balance; pink may be used to indicate girlish purity and sexuality or childish innocence; purple represents royalty, spirituality, and wisdom; and red can symbolise strong emotions, such as passionate love, excitement, energy, danger, and aggression.

So, if I, in my imaginative Symbolist state, were to start painting some paintings in this style of contemporary stories, what might I be able to include? Well, if someone hired me to paint the most recent love-split of a certain Nashville-based twenty-three year old country singer.....ah, ok, you guessed it... Ms Swift, then I may have to paint a pink sphinx crushing a butterfly held by Eros. Or, for Jennifer Lawrence’s most recent awards win: Clymene (Titan of fame and renown) giving Nike (goddess of victory) a golden laurel crown, the ceremony being presided over by Dionysus (god of parties and festivals... and also wine, which could explain one particularly memorable shot of Jennifer after she accepted her award. You know what I’m talking about...), and applauded by Agon (spirit of contest).

I can see it now: the front pages of the morning’s newspapers would be educational. People would have to dig a little deeper to get to the story. The news would become poetry! I may be getting carried away, but at least consider it... At least one day a year, we should have International Symbolist News day. At least for the Celeb/Gossip magazines: there, I feel, we can use a little education.

To check out some Symbolist paintings for yourself, and truly get to grips with the painters’ meanings after all you have learned reading this article (open for debate), the Finnish National Gallery (Ateneum) is holding an In the Spirit of Symbolism exhibition until the 28^th of April. Should you wish to instead browse through some striking examples a little more locally, I recommend picking up a copy of Nathalia Brodskaya’s Symbolism.