Expressionism

Power Point
By
Anna May Paredes

© 2005 Prentice Hall

 Expressionism is the tendency of an artist
to distort reality for an emotional
effect; it is a subjective art form.
Germany ( German Expressionism )
often implies emotional sorrow
refers to art that expresses intense emotion
the use of distortion and exaggeration for
emotional effect
a style of art in which the intention is not to
reproduce a subject accurately, but instead to
portray it in such a way as to express the inner
state of the artist...
© 2005 Prentice Hall
 Vincent van Gogh Edvard Munch

The Scream by
•One of the Edvard Munch
earliest and most (1893) which
famous
examples of
inspired 20th
Expressionism is century
Gogh's "The Expressionists
Starry Night."

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 "View of Toledo" by El Greco

has been pointed out to bear a particularly

striking resemblance to 20th century
expressionism. Historically speaking it is
however part of the Mannerist movement.

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 Abstract
Expressionism
Jackson Pollock In the mid-20th century
in which there is no subject
No. 5, 1948. at all, but instead pure
The painting was abstract form (developed
into an extremely influential
done on an 8' x 4' style in the United States).
sheet of fiberboard, Such works employ random
with thick amounts of naturalistic methods, with
brown and yellow deliberate and intelligent
paint drizzled on top designs and expressions—
of it, forming a nest- such that the work is
understood to be a creation,
like appearance. and not just an accident.

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 •Cubi VI (1963), Hans Hofmann The
Israel Museum, Gate, 1959–1960.
Jerusalem. Hofmann's presence
•David Smith was in New York City
one of the most and Provincetown
as a teacher and as
influential an artist was
American influential to the
sculptors of the development of
American painting
20th century. in the 1930s and
1940s.

© 2005 Prentice Hall

 In other arts
Sculpture
-Ernst Barlach
•The Magdeburger Ehrenmal
(Cathedral of Magdeburg),
which created a large
controversy about Barlach's
anti-war position

-Erich Heckel
•Portrait of a Man, hand
colored woodcut by Erich
Heckel, 1919.

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 Film
The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (original title:
Das Kabinett des Doktor Caligari) is a
1920 silent film directed by Robert Wiene
from a screenplay written by Hans Janowitz
and Carl Mayer.
It is one of the earliest, most influential and
most artistically acclaimed German
Expressionist films.

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 Literature
Expressionist
poetry also
flourished mainly
in the German-
speaking countries.
novels of Franz
Kafka are often
described as
expressionist.

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 Theatre
Georg Kaiser and Ernst Toller were the
most famous playwrights.
Expressionist plays often dramatize the
spiritual awakening and sufferings of their
protagonists.
modeled on the episodic presentation of the
suffering and death of Jesus in the Stations
of the Cross.

© 2005 Prentice Hall

 Oskar
Kokoschka's
Murderer, The Hope of
Women
often called the first
expressionist drama.
In it, an unnamed man and
woman struggle for
dominance. The Man brands
the woman; she stabs and
imprisons him. He frees
himself and she falls dead at
his touch. As the play ends,
he slaughters all around him
"like mosquitoes."
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 Music
sought to express the subconscious, the
'inner necessity' and suffering through their
highly dissonant musical language.
expressionist composers self-consciously
used atonality to free their artform from the
traditional tonality.

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 Architecture
Expressionist
architecture as a side
show in the development
of functionalism
1914 "Glass Pavilion" of
Bruno Taut
•prismatic glass dome
structure
•The structure was a brightly
colored landmark at the
exhibition, and was
constructed using concrete
and glass. The concrete
structure had inlaid colored Interior staircases and
glass plates on the facade waterfalls
that acted as mirrors.
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 The Einsteinturm or
Einstein Tower in
Potsdam, Germany
an astrophysical observatory in
the Albert Einstein Science
Park in Potsdam, Germany
designed by architect Erich
Mendelsohn
It is still a working solar
observatory today as part of the
Astrophysical Institute
Potsdam. Light from the
telescope is brought down
through the shaft to the
basement where the
instruments and laboratory are
located.

© 2005 Prentice Hall