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Modernism: To Stand on the Shoulders of Giants

Just as night turns into day, the dawning of a new century brings about a sense of thrill
and excitement similar to the hope of a brand new day. The 20th century brought about change.
It challenged the way individuals viewed and experienced the world through technology, social
media and the mind (Kienle 3). This essay will examine three different Icons of Modernism,
compare them to a related design work and how their avant-garde movements, using two or more
lenses, responded to the changes taking place during the 20th century. The essay will discuss C.
R. W Nevinson's Returning to the Trenches (1914), Piet Mondrian's De Stijl painting
Composition No. 12 with Blue (1936-42), and Gala and the Angelus of Millet Immediately
Preceding the Arrival of the Conic Anamorphoses (1933) by Salvador Dali.
Modernism is the general term that described the movement of art created during the
early 20th century. It celebrated experimentation and exploration and rejected Academicism and
Naturalism (Little 98). The avant-garde movements emerged and were used as vehicles of
expression to the many changes with regards to urban life, technology and the way of thinking
that the new century has brought (Kienle 3). The following will discuss the three modernist
movements of Futurism, De Stijl, and Surrealism.
This first section will discuss the Futurist painting Returning to the Trenches (1914) by
C. R. W. Nevinson. Futurism is an Italian movement that is distinguished by new technology,
dynamic forms, speed, aggression, energy, lines, progress and movement (Little 108). Led by
Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, most of the ideals upheld by the Futurists were heavily influenced
by the late, in comparison to Germany and Britain, coming of Industrialization (Woodham 159).
The advent of Industrialization in Italy led to the "Futurists [rejecting] the art and culture of the
past: they wanted to destroy everything old and venerated to make way for everything new and
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vital" (Little 108). Furthermore, Futurism was used a tenant for change as it challenged the ideas
of the conservative and academic world (Bhaskaran 80). Because industrialization was late, the
changes it brought were readily apparent; therefore, new technology, like racing cars, was
embraced whole heartedly by the country (Woodham 159). The change in transportation and
technology allowed Futurism to capture the feel of progress, the movement of machines and the
rapidly changing lifestyle of the people in Italy.
Returning to the Trenches captures the feeling of Futurism through the soldiers uniformly
marching towards a direction and through the soldiers moving in a "powerful energy that
characterizes these soldiers marching into combat - a war machine devoid of any human
emotion" (Kienle 8). The strong influence of the industrialization is apparent in the painting as it
exhibits the characteristics of a machine age; which, Futurism embraces.
What makes the War Party (20th century) tapestry by Fortunato Depero relate closely to
Nevinson's Returning to the Trenches is the use Futurism as a medium to communicate the
atrocities of war. Even though War Party shows dynamic movement and strongly defined edges
similar to Returning to the Trenches, the united feel of one machine that Nevinson's painting
gives forth is absent. The way the characters are spaced out in the tapestry creates a sense of
separate entitles, thereby losing the feel of one whole machine. However, both pieces are closely
related as they incorporate the influence of technology by creating a machine like objects of
their subjects, while at the same time presenting a commentary on the war movement.
This next section will discuss Piet Mondrian's De Stijl painting Composition No. 12 with
Blue (1936-42). De Stijl, also known as Neo-Plasticism, is a movement that is distinctively
identified by "a harmonious balance between verticals and horizontals, was elemental in its
reliance on abstract forms and restricted palette of the primary colors of red, yellow, and blue,
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together with black and white and was symbolically attuned to the methods of modern mass-
production technology" (Woodham 403). In short, De Stijl is a movement that takes forms into
geometric abstraction, straight lines and basic primary colors.
At the beginning of the 20th century, a shift towards abstraction existed. Neo-Plasticism
reacted to the shift by becoming the vessel, stripping away everything but the essential forms and
colors, in which universal harmony is achieved (Kienle 15). Because of World War I (WWI),
Neo-Plasticism became a part of De Stijl as one of its founders, Mondrian, was stranded in
Holland to begin its inception (Duncan 133). Fortunately, the creation of De Stijl movement
came at the right time, bringing about order to the chaos created by WWI (Bhaskaran 108).
Composition No. 12 with Blue is composed of a series of vertical and horizontal lines
crossing each other with no focal point. A blue square is placed in the lower right corner of the
painting to balance the composition. The painting adheres to the characteristics of De Stijl
through its solid color, abstraction, and horizontal and vertical elements.
There are three reasons that relates Gerrit Rietveld's Berlin Chair to Composition No. 12
with Blue. First, the strong horizontal lines and vertical lines, a prominent De Stijl attribute,
defines the structure of the chair; second, the colors of the chair are basic and solid, following the
restricted color palette of De Stijl; and third, the simple abstraction of the chair makes it able to
be mass reproduced. The Berlin chair's predecessor was designed on a ten centimeter grid as the
first three-dimensional interpretation of De Stijl (Duncan 136-138). In summary, there is no
obvious difference between the chair and the painting as characteristically it is the direct
manifestation of the De Stijl movement in the real world.
In this last section, Gala and the Angelus of Millet Immediately Preceding the Arrival of
the Conic Anamorphoses (1933) by Salvador Dali will be discussed. Surrealism is a movement
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that consists of unveiling the truth of the unconscious and how the Surrealist interprets the world
he or she envisioned (Bernard 92). The central theme of the movement is to create things that
are unfiltered by the mind, "that it had emerged directly from the unconscious without being
shaped by reason, morality or aesthetic judgments" (Little 118). In a way, Surrealism explored
the boundaries of creativity as it tries to sought out things hidden in the mind, that would
occasionally only appear in dreams, and bring them into the light of day.
At the end of WWI, economic crisis, deaths, and general negativity in the air led to a
need for escape and denial of the world (Bernard 84). Emerging from a literary construct,
Surrealism usurped the Dada movement in providing answers for escaping reality (Bernard 88).
Surrealism provided the individual a gateway into the unconscious and to forget the harsh
realities of the real world. Furthermore, the new discoveries of Freudian ideology aided in
pushing Surrealism's validity and development (Kienle 14). Frued's theory lets the individual
manifest whatever comes to him or her without restraint as it is "founded on the belief that the
subconscious be expressed free from esthetic or moral preoccupations" (Bhaskaran 132).
Gala and the Angelus of Millet Immediately Preceding the Arrival of the Conic
Anamorphoses resembles a Surrealist painting because it offers a view into Dali's unconscious
mind; for example, his two obsessions: his wife, Gala, and Jean-Francois Millet's painting, The
Angelus (1857-59). Because of the vivid and stark color quality , the crisp photo-like painting of
Dali's Gala and the Angelus of Millet Immediately Preceding the Arrival of the Conic
Anamorphoses lures the viewer deeper into the painting as it evokes a feeling of a dreamlike
state.
Man Ray's Object to be Destroyed (1923) is a metronome with an eye attached on the
pendulum. The eye looks at the observer as it moves back and forth with the needle. Its similarity
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with Dali's painting is the unsettling feeling it evokes to the viewer as it draws him or her deeper
into some sort of trance. Also, the metamorphosis, which is consistently seen in Surrealism, of
the object is what ties the metronome to movement.
All three icons of modernism has a significant impact in the world that we know today.
The futurist has helped us to appreciate the machine aesthetic and recognize the importance of
social media as a way of pushing products. While stripping away all none essentials, De Stijl has
shown us abstract in its purist form, our sense of perception is challenged through Surrealism.
Each avant-garde movement had different ways of dealing with the changes that the new century
brought. How the movements dealt with the discoveries of the 20th century forced society to
question, change and adapt itself with emerging cultures borne from the experimentations of
modernism. The basic formula of the movements was to embrace what was forward and question
what was behind. Without the will to question, experiment and abandon all it has learned before,
our society today would not have progressed to where we are right now. Someone once said,
"The cup cannot be filled if it is already full."







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Works Cited
Bernard, Edina. Modern Art: 1905-1945. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2004.
Print.
Bhaskaran, Lakshmi. Designs of the Times: Using Key Movements and Styles for Contemporary
Design. Hove: Rotovision SA, 2005. Print.
Dali, Salvador. Gala and the Angelus of Millet Immediately Preceding the Arrival of Conic
Anamorphoses. 1933. Painting. National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa. Web. 29 Mar.2012.
Duncan, Alastair. Modernism: Modernist Design 1880-1940. Minneapolis: Norwest Corporation,
1998. Print.
Depero, Fortunato. War Party. Tapestry. n.d. Painting. n.d Designs of the Times: Using Key
Movements and Styles for Contemporary Design. By Lakshmi Bhaskaran. 83. Print.
Kienle, Anabelle. "Icons of Modernism from the National Gallery of Canada." Ottawa: National
Gallery of Canada, 2012. Print.
Little, Stephen. ...Isms: Understanding Art. New York: Universe Publishing, n.d. Print.
Mondrian, Piet. Composition No. 12 with Blue. 1936-42. Painting. National Gallery of Canada,
Ottawa. Web. 29 Mar.2012.
Nevinson, Christopher Richard Wynne. Returning to the Trenches.1914. Painting. National
Gallery of Canada, Ottawa. Web. 29 Mar.2012.
Ray, Man. Object to be Destroyed. 1923. Metronome. n.d. Web. 29 Mar. 2012.
Rietveld, Gerrit, and Gerard A. van de Groenekan. Berlin chair. 1923. Chair. Minneapolis
Institute of Arts, Minneapolis. Web. 29 Mar.2012.
Schmalenbach, Werner. Masterpieces of 20th- Century Art. Munich: Prestel-Verlag, 1990. Print.
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Woodham, Jonathan M. Oxford Dictionary of Modern Design . Oxford: Oxford Press, 2006.
Print.