Visual Arts Subject Overview
Modernism in the visual arts is a complex term and currently the subject of much academic debate. However, this project demanded that we set boundaries…
Search Results 1 - 25 of 51
Cravan, Arthur (1887–1918)
Born Fabian Avernius Lloyd in Lausanne, Switzerland to expatriate English parents, Arthur Cravan was a self-styled ‘poet-pugilist,’ nephew of Oscar Wilde, and husband of British…
Aragon, Louis (1897–1982)
French author Louis Aragon was a member of the surrealist movement until he split with André Breton and began to devote more of his energy…
Loy, Mina (1882–1966)
Mina Loy, born Mina Gertrude Lowry, (1882–1966), was a British artist, designer, model, novelist, nurse, playwright and poet, with ties to the Dadaist, Futurist and…
Cunard, Nancy (1896–1965)
A poet, journalist, publisher, radical intellectual, and political activist, Nancy Cunard operated at or near the centre of multiple modernist discourses. Her early poetry, especially…
Tati, Jacques (1907–1982)
Jacques Tati (born Jacques Tatischeff) was a French director and actor. Despite a very small output—only six feature films and three shorts—he is considered one…
Höch, Hannah (1889–1978)
Hannah Höch was a German painter and photomontagist who also worked in modern domestic handicraft, fabric and fashion design. She is primarily known for the…
Richter, Hans (1888–1976)
Hans Richter was a German painter, graphic artist, and experimental filmmaker associated with a number of the European avant-garde movements, most notably Dadaism. After 1940…
Schwitters, Kurt (1887–1948)
Kurt Schwitters is most commonly associated with Dada, but his relationship to that movement’s aesthetic, political, and philosophical rebellion was ambivalent. Although he was friends…
Der Sturm
Der Sturm (Storm) was the fulcrum of the international avant-garde in Berlin from 1910 to 1932. Herwarth Walden (born Georg Levin, 1878–1941) founded the journal…
Werefkin, Marianne (1960–1937)
Werefkin was born into an aristocratic family and herself a baroness. Her mother, Elizabeth Daragan, was an artist; her father, an army general decorated by…
Manifesto
A manifesto is an articulation of a particular (sometimes numerically or hierarchically ordered) set of theses that correspond to a political or aesthetic movement. In…
Nihilism
Most broadly, Nihilism is the rejection of meaningful moral or religious values. Nihilism is often associated with moral Relativism, extreme Skepticism, and Pessimism. First used…
White Savages Group
The White Savages Group (Baek-man Heo) was founded in 1930 when Kim Yong-jun (1904–1967) published his manifesto “Upon Founding the White Savages Group” in a…
Burroughs, William S. (1914–1997)
Born in St. Louis, Missouri, William S. Burroughs was a major figure of the Beat Generation. He is known primarily for his controversial novel Naked…
Segal, Arthur (1875–1944)
Arthur Segal was a Romanian artist born as Aron Sigalu to Jewish parents. He shifted his attention away from post-impressionist modernism around 1900 to focus…
Ball, Hugo (1886–1927)
Born in Pirmasens on February 22, 1886, the German writer Hugo Ball is best known as the co-founder, with Tristan Tzara, of the Cabaret Voltaire…
Avant-garde
The term “avant-garde” has a double meaning, denoting first, the historical movements that started in the late nineteenth century and ended in the 1920s and…
Duchamp, Marcel (1887-1968)
Duchamp was one of the most influential and original artists of the 20th century. He rejected the constraints of painting and believed (both as an…
Satie, Erik Alfred Leslie (1866–1925)
Erik Satie’s compositions, writings, and humor played an important role in many modernist movements of the twentieth century. Experimenting with simple forms, neoclassicism, mysticism, satire,…
Fondane, Benjamin (1898–1944)
A primarily francophone Jewish poet and writer of Romanian origin, Fondane became known as a critic, poet and dramaturge in Romania before leaving Bucharest for…
Die Novembergruppe [The November Group] (1918–1934)
Founded in December 1918 in response to the November Revolution in Germany, The November Group was an association of radical and politically engaged artists, including…
Taeuber, Sophie (1889–1943)
Artist Sophie Taeuber’s career spanned a variety of movements, including Dada and Constructivism, and media, such as textile arts, interior design, architecture, painting, and sculpture.…
Clair, René (1898–1981)
Filmmaker, novelist, and critic René Clair (original name René-Lucien Chomette) was one of the foremost French film directors of the 1920s and 1930s. His first…
Gutai
Gutai Art Association [Gutai Bijutsu Kyōkai] [具体美術協会] was an influential post-World War II Japanese avant-garde collective with an outward-looking mindset. Founded in 1954 in Ashiya,…