MUSIC 10
IMPRESSIONISM:
One of the periods in the 20th Century
Paintings
- Developed in France during the
1860s
- There were a group of artists
(Monet, Renoir, Pissaro) who
had an exhibition and the
people called it the “Exhibition
of Impressionists”
- Impressionist strove to retain on
canvas the freshness of their
first impressions
- Paintings were out of the studio
into the open air (environmental
factors affect the painting)
- They developed a technique
where they placed small dots of
color next to each other,
allowing the eye of the viewer to
“blend” them together
- The hero of their painting is
light.
- Imoressionists were obsessed
with water
- Using light pastel colors. They
depicted the ripples and waves
of the oceans and sailboats
MUSIC
Prelude to Afternoon of a Faun
- By Claude Debussy
- Debussy’s best known orchestral
work
- Considered as a turning point in
the history of music
- Considered as the beginning of
modern music
- Evokes the dreams and
fantasies of a pagan forest
creature (half man, half goat)
- While playing a long solo in his
flute the intoxicated faun tries to
recall
- Inspired by a pastoral of
Stephanie Mallarme
Characteristics of Impressionist
Music
- Used whole tone scales,
advanced chromatic and
dissonance
- Dissonance: There’s tension to
the sound. Different kind of
harmony ; there is a key in
between
- “Dreamy”
- “Hazy”
- Favored shorter musical forms
such as prelude, nocturne, and
songs.
- Claire De Lune by Claude
Debussy
- Conveys subtle emotion
- Absence of strict pulse and time
- Downbeats are no longer
accented
- Music is more fluid
NEOCLASSICISM
A return to order and rationality after
the flamboyant Baroque
A New Classic
 Architecture
A reaction to the excess Rococo style
A new taste for antique simplicity
Music
Marked by:
1. Emotional Restraint
2. Balance
3. Clarity
Composers turned away from Program
Music (instrumental but tells a story)
They preferred Absolute Music
Preferred Chamber Groups
Most were tonal - used major and
minor scales
They modeled their works after Bach’s
music
- Back to Bach
Pattern they got from the past:
- Polyphonic Texture (Imitation) :
Stylistic Feature
IGOR STRAVINSKY
- His ballet Pulcinella was based
partly on the music of Pergolesi
(an italian baroque composer)
- His opera, The Rake’s Progress
was modeled after Mozart’s
opera
“Stravinsky Sound”
Rhythm
- Beats are strong and
regular
- Changing and irregular
meters (sometimes
several meters are heard
at once)
Harmony
- Rich and novel harmonies
like the “Petrushka
Chord” (a combination of
C Major triad and F sharp
major triad)

What made it sound new:

- Changing Meters : Time
Signature
- Dissonant Harmony : Harmony

Use musical forms and stylistic

features of the earlier periods to
organize twentieth century rhythm
and harmony.

Introduction to Modern and

Contemporary Arts

- They differ in the time period

 - Modern Arts is introduced
earlier
- Contemporary Arts is the arts
we have today
Why do we have the present time in
the Modern Arts Era in the timeline?
Because we use modern art
techniques in the present times
Origin of Modern Art
- Started in the 19th Century
- Period where people are
rebuilding the nation
(Industrialization)
- People shifted how they are
living
- Europe and America became
friends. They focused on
aesthetics and beauty
Modern Art Techniques:
● Impressionism (1867-1886)
- Captures fleeting
moment
- Quick capture of the
movement movement on
the canvas
- Captures the temporary
scene with the
preparatory sketches and
modeling
- Focuses more on nature
- With exact details
● Post Impressionism (1880-1905)
- Beyond imitative style of
impressionism
- Adapted the
impressionist style and
combined it with
emphasis of geometric
forms, creation of
distortion for expressive
effect, and utilization of
unnatural and
indiscriminate colors.
- Vibrant colors
● Expressionism (1890-Present)
- Deep personal style in art
- Communicates personal
feelings about the subject
rather than just painting
what an artist sees
- It is characterized by thick
applications of paint
(IMPASTO)
● Cubism (1907-1922)
- Austere and challenging
type of painting
- Compositional system of
flat splintered planes as
an alternative to
Renaissance inspired
linear perspective and
rounded volumes
- Using cubes to show a
particular image
● Dadaism (1916-1924)
- Also referred to as Junk
Art
- Embrace a totally new
type of creativity
(performance art and
ready made)
- New material and themes
- Its seditious sense of
humor endured in the
surrealist movement
- Western artists
- Making an existing image
into a new one
- Distortion of reality
● Surrealism (1924-1966)
- Hallucination
 - Going beyond your
imagination
- Generate a refreshingly
new set of images
- Surrealist painters used
various methods
including dreams,
hallucinations, automatic
or random image
generation
- Dali: persistence of
memory
● Abstract Expressionism
(1947-1965)
- Demonstrates the
emotional impact of large
areas of color.
● Optical Art (1964-Present)
- Form of abstract painting
based on optical illusions