Prequel to the Story of Postmodernisms: 1933 to 1950s

Question 1

Modernization

Answer 1

technological advances in production, transportation, communication, etc. during the Industrial Revolution (mid-18th - early 20th centuries)

Question 2

Modernity

Answer 2

everyday experience of those changes

Question 3

Modernism

Answer 3

representations of those experiences

Question 4

Realism

Answer 4

“a truthful, objective and impartial representation of the real world, based on meticulous observation of contemporary life”

Question 5

Socialism

Answer 5

ideal of classless society with equal distribution of goods for well-being of all

Question 6

Capitalism

Answer 6

free-market, profit-based control by wealthy class -1%-

Question 7

Communism

Answer 7

full government/totalitarian control of economy and people

Question 8

Colonialism

Answer 8

imperial power-based control of peoples/nations

Question 9

Socialist Realism

Answer 9

Mandated in Soviet Union in 1934 by Stalin; racial purity, sexual identification purity, emphasis on youth, mythology; proletarian (relevant and understandable to workers), scenes of everyday life, Partisan (aligned with the policies of the state and the party)

Question 10

“Degenerate Art”

Answer 10

“decadent byproduct of Bolshevist Jewish corruption… these artists should be treated as dangerous lunatics and handed over to the State for sterilisation” - Hitler; troops sent out to confiscate art showing qualities such as “decadence”, “weakness of character”, “mental disease”, and “racial impurity”

Question 11

Chinese Communist Social Policies

Answer 11

all art should reflect the life of working class and consider them an audience; art should serve Socialism

Question 12

Figuration

Answer 12

sculpture, outline/linear, body, symbolic

Question 13

Abstraction

Answer 13

no necessary relationship to figure, irregular, summary, transformative

Question 14

Trowell School

Answer 14

Uganda (1937-1949), Margaret Trowell taught silk screening (1945) at The School of Fine and industrial Arts; ‘allowed’ her students to connect with and embrace their culture

Question 15

Ruptura Group

Answer 15

(early 1950s) Waldemar Cordeiro & Luiz Sacilotto; married to the simplicity of form, the poignancy of materials, the vast possibility of materials

Question 16

Social Realism

Answer 16

naturalistic realism focusing specifically on social issues and the hardships of everyday life

Question 17

Madí

Answer 17

(1946-present) international abstract art movement initiated in Buenos Aires by the Hungarian-Argentinian artist and poet Gyula Kosice, and the Uruguayans Carmelo Arden Quin and Rhod Rothfuss; encompasses all branches of art , typically focus on the concrete, physical reality of the medium and play with the traditional conventions of Western art

Question 18

Concrete Art

Answer 18

non-representational geometric abstraction

Question 19

Grupo Frente

Answer 19

(1952-64) group of Brazilian artists originated in Rio de Janeiro led by Ivan Serpa and formed by artists such as Helio Oiticica, Aluisio Carvão, Lygia Clark, and Lygia Pape; geometric abstraction aka concrete art, pushed for neo-concrete art

Question 20

Neo-Concrete

Answer 20

Brazilian art movement developed by Grupo Frente; rejected the pure rationalist approach of concrete art and embraced a more phenomenological and less scientific art

Question 21

Spanish Civil War

Answer 21

(1936-39) fought between the Republicans, who were loyal to the democratic, left-leaning Second Spanish Republic, and the Nationalists, a falangist group led by General Francisco Franco; Nationalists won, and Franco then ruled Spain for the next 36 years

Question 22

COBRA

Answer 22

(1948-51) European avant-garde movement fomed by Karel Appel, Constant, Corneille, Christian Dotremont, Asger Jorn, and Joseph Noiret; evolved from the criticisms of Western society and a common desire to break away from existing art movements, including naturalism and abstraction; complete freedom of colour and form, as well as antipathy towards Surrealism, the artists also shared an interest in Marxism as well as modernism; believed experimentation was the symbol of an unfettered freedom, embodied by children and the expressions of children

Question 23

Abstract Expressionism

Answer 23

(1947-60s) post–World War II art movement in American painting, developed in New York; predecessor = surrealism, with its emphasis on spontaneous, automatic, or subconscious creation