1. Meaning of terms- 'Modern' and 'Modernity'
2. Modernity- Industrialisation, urbanisation and the city.
3. Modern artist's response to the city.
ART
*John Ruskin
Wrote about Pre-Raphaelites.
First started using the word 'modern'. The term meant more 'new' or 'different'.
*Modern- fundermentally better than before- progression, development and improvement.
When we attach 'modern' to art we carry a judgement- that this art is better than before, it has improved on old ideas and practises.
*At turn of 19th century Paris was the most important and influencial city- it was 'new'.
*(Trottoir roullant [electric moving walkway]. A good representaion of the rapid change and new ideas around at the time)
*Urbanisation
Changes peoples lives.
*E.g. New transport like the Railway. Allowed people to access different parts of their country- and the world so much quicker and easier. The world became smaller!
*Time was broken down into hours and standardised because of travel. People stopped relying on just posittion of sun.
*Urbanisation also brought along rationalised labour. Brought free time and work time. No more work from dusk till dawn.
*Enlightenment.
Period in late 18th century when scientific/ philosophical thinking made leaps and bounds. (process of ratrionality and reason)
*The city is the site of this new experience.
*The Eifell Tower is a good representation of modernity- new materials, undecorated, very different.
*Haussmanisation
Paris 1850's onwards= a new Paris.
Old Paris architecture is ripped out and Haussman (a city architect) redesigns Paris. New narrow streets. Easier to police= a form of social control. Paris becomes a place for the rich.
Distance. Alienation.
*Psychology- grew at the same time. Worried people would be distacted by modern technology.
*Fashion becomes very important around this time. Fahion showed how rich, important and elegant people were.
*Urbanisation brings labour, factory work and clear rich/poor divides.
*Kaiserpanorama 1883
The first public viewing experience. Start of alienation between people and the world? People begin to experience things through technology rather than first-hand. Technology keeping people sedate and controlled rather than improving lives. Locking us down rather than freeing us.
*Still the same- even more so through T.V. phones and internet etc.
*Max Nordau- Degeneration 1892.
(an anti-modernist) wrote about his worries on the modern world.
*Moving image cinema was created at this time. "The Lumiere Brothers". First films.
Shows how new everything was- people were constantly having to adapt and keep up with new tech.
*In period of modernity- painting followed photography. Painting and painters had to re-invent itself/themselves to keep up and make it more modern. Photography showed the world in a new, better way that painting couldn't.
*High-rise building gave people the opportunity to 'look down on the world'. This influenced modern paintings.
*Technology brought new understandings of biology, space and time. This really influenced art of the time.
DESIGN
*Anti-historicism (new, for the new world, progressive, not nostalgic)
*Truth to materials (increasingly using new materials [e.g. steel] and does not hide what it is)
*Form follows function. If it works- that is enough, that is it's beauty.
*Technology
*Internationalism (global language understood by all)
*"Ornament is crime"- Adolf Loos (1908)
*BAUHAUS. The Bauhaus art school totally changed design.
Led to idea modern life should be surrounded by new modern things. Things became simple and mass producable, therefore cheaper to make.
*Internationalism.
A language of design that could be recognised and understood world wide.
*Sans serif font was invented during modernist era.
*Herbert Bayer argued for all text to be in lower case. He invented a modern sans-serif type.
*Times New Roman font. Stanley Morison 1932.
Refernces Roman empire and its greatness. Trying to make the paper suggest Britain is great. A form of patriotim.
CONCLUSION
*Term modern is not a neutral term- it suggests novelty and improvment.
*'Modernity' (roughly 1750-1960)- social and cultural experience.
*'Modernism'- the range of ideas and styles that sprang from modernity.
*Importance of modernism.
1. A vocabularly of styles
2. Art and Design education
3.Idea of form follows function.
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