Expressionism

IN THIS EXPRESSIONISM WILL BE DEFINED

AND YOU WILL LEARN ABOUT ITS
C R E AT I O N A N D M O V E M E N T T H R O U G H
VA R I O U S C O U N T R I E S
 • Expressionism, artistic style in which the artist seeks to
depict not objective reality but rather the subjective
emotions and responses that objects and events arouse
within a person. The artist accomplishes this aim through

Expressionism distortion, exaggeration, primitivism, and fantasy and

through the vivid, jarring, violent, or dynamic application
of formal elements. In a broader sense Expressionism is
one of the main currents of art in the late 19th and early
20th centuries, and its qualities of highly subjective,
personal, spontaneous self-expression are typical of a wide
range of modern artists and art movements.
Expressionism can also be seen as a permanent tendency
in Germanic and Nordic art from at least the European
Middle Ages, particularly in times of social change or
spiritual crisis, and in this sense it forms the converse of
the rationalist and classicizing tendencies of Italy and later
of France.
Origin and History of Expressionism

The term “Expressionism” was coined in 1910 by Czech art historian Antonin Matejcek. Matejcek
pointed to the fact that Expressionism was a direct reaction to the aesthetic principles and social
values linked to the Impressionist movement. Expressionism emerged in 1905 in the city of Dresden,
Germany, when four students Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Fritz Bleyl, Erich Heckel and Karl Schmidt-
Rottluff who joined forces to form Die Brücke (“The Bridge”), as a reaction to Naturalism and
Impressionism. Expressionists were much more interested in emotional depth and the complex effects
of industrialization on the human psyche. While it did not receive the same initial critical backlash as
Impressionism did, Expressionism still suffered from being banned by the Nazis who deemed it
‘degenerate’ art, too far removed from the beloved Neoclassicism style, and considered to be
dangerous to the notion of the Aryan race.
 • The roots of the German Expressionist school lay
Starry Night By in the works of Vincent van Gogh,
Edvard Munch, and James Ensor, each of whom
Vincent Van Gough in the period 1885–1900 evolved a highly
personal painting style. These artists used the
expressive possibilities of colour and line to
explore dramatic and emotion-laden themes, to
convey the qualities of fear, horror, and the
grotesque, or simply to celebrate nature with
hallucinatory intensity. They broke away from
the literal representation of nature in order to
express more subjective outlooks or states of
mind.
 • The second and principal wave of Expressionism began about 1905, when a

Dance Around The group of German artists led by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner formed a loose
association called Die Brücke (“The Bridge”). The group included
Erich Heckel, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, and Fritz Bleyl. These painters were

Golden Calf By Emil in revolt against what they saw as the superficial naturalism of academic
Impressionism. They wanted to reinfuse German art with a spiritual vigour
they felt it lacked, and they sought to do this through an elemental, highly

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personal and spontaneous expression. Die Brücke’s original members were
soon joined by the Germans Emil Nolde, Max Pechstein, and Otto Müller.
The Expressionists were influenced by their predecessors of the 1890s and
were also interested in African wood carvings and the works of such
Northern European medieval and Renaissance artists as Albrecht Dürer,
Matthias Grünewald, and Albrecht Altdorfer. They were also aware of
Neo-Impressionism, Fauvism, and other recent movements.
 • The German Expressionists soon
developed a style notable for its
harshness, boldness, and visual intensity.
They used jagged, distorted lines; rough,
rapid brushwork; and jarring colours to
depict urban street scenes and other
contemporary subjects in crowded,
agitated compositions notable for their
instability and their emotionally charged
atmosphere. Many of their works express
frustration, anxiety, disgust, discontent,
violence, and generally a sort of frenetic
intensity of feeling in response to the
ugliness, the crude banality, and the
possibilities and contradictions that they
discerned in modern life. Woodcuts, with
their thick jagged lined and harsh tonal
contrasts, were one of the favourite

Indian And Woman By media of the German Expressionists.

Max Pechstein
 • The works of Die Brücke artists stimulated Expressionism in
Prone Young Woman other parts of Europe. Oskar Kokoschka and Egon Schiele of
Austria adopted their tortured brushwork and angular lines, and

With A Black
Georges Rouault and Chaim Soutine in France each developed
painting styles marked by intense emotional expression and the
violent distortion of figural subject matter. The painter

Stocking Max Beckmann, the graphic artist Käthe Kollwitz, and the
sculptors Ernst Barlach and Wilhelm Lehmbruck, all of
Germany, also worked in Expressionist modes. The artists
belonging to the group known as Der Blaue Reiter (“The Blue
Rider”) are sometimes regarded as Expressionists, although their
art is generally lyrical and abstract, less overtly emotional, more
harmonious, and more concerned with formal and pictorial
problems than that of Die Brücke artists.
 • Impressionism and Expressionism
both shook the world of traditional
painting and heavily influenced the
course of art history. They emerged as a
reaction against conservative institutions
and traditional artistic practices and as
every artistic movement, they were a
reflection of their time. Impressionist
painters were fascinated by real-world
subjects and individuals, such as
everyday life for common people in Paris

Introduction to
and rural areas. Expressionism emerged
as a criticism of urban society and
materialism, addressing feelings of
anxiety and alienation. Rather than being

Impressionism and concerned with objectivity and real-life

subjects, Expressionist painters
represented subjects navigating the

Expressionism dehumanizing effects of modern, urban

life.
Main differences between
Impressionism and
Expressionism

• As opposed to Impressionism, Expressionism is less

concerned with depicting real-life subjects. Instead, this art
movement is directly focused on the heightened, excessive
emotional response of the artist to the dehumanizing effects of
industrialization.

• Impressionist painters depicted outdoorsy scenes as if they

had only glanced at it for a brief moment, conveying a
spontaneous, ‘on-the-spot’ feel.

• Expressionist painters used exaggeration, disproportionate

sizes, distortions and preferred intense, showy and clashing
colors as opposed to Impressionists, who preferred vibrant,
pure and complimentary colors in an effort to accurately
mirror the changing quality of sunlight.
Similarities between
Impressionism and
Expressionism

• Both the Impressionism and Expressionism movements originated in Europe. The

Impressionist movement was born in France while the Expressionism movement
started in Germany and Austria.

• Both art movements were a rejection of classical art traditions. They are considered
to be avant-garde in their portrayal of modern life.

• Both the Impressionism and Expressionism Art Movements were a reaction to the
rapidly changing urban landscape of their time.

• Both movements share the use of innovative techniques. Impressionism departed

from the strict codes imposed by the traditional Realist and Romantic styles, which
valued “blended brush strokes” and “muted color through the use of golden
varnishes” (source: Erin Hansen). Instead, Impressionist painters depicted subjects
using small, thin and visible brushstrokes of bright colors. Expressionism was a
reaction to Positivism and Naturalism. They painted characters and environments
with an element of mysticis, using bright colors, angular lines, distortions
 • Several expressionist artists lost their lives during World
War I, or as a result of the war due to traumas and
illness. Franz Marc fell in 1916; Egon Schiele died
during the 1918 influenza epidemic, and many others
took their own lives after breaking down under the
traumas of the war. Finally, the era of German
Expressionism was extinguished by the Nazi
dictatorship in 1933. Countless artists of the time,
among whom were Pablo Picasso, Paul Klee, Franz
Marc, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Edvard Munch, Henri
Matisse, Vincent van Gogh, and Paul Gauguin, were
labeled as “degenerate artists” by the Nazis and their
Expressionist artworks were removed from museums
and confiscated.

The end of
• Yet Expressionism continued to inspire and live on in
later artists and art movements. For example, Abstract
Expressionism developed as an important avant-garde
movement in the post-war United States in the 1940s
and 1950s. The Abstract Expressionists renounced

Expressionism, and its

figuration and instead explored color fields, gestural
brushstrokes, and spontaneity in their art. Later, in the
late 1970s/early 1980s, Neo-Expressionism started
developing as a reaction against the Conceptual art and

continuation
Minimalist art of the time. Neo-Expressionist artists
were greatly inspired by the German Expressionists who
came before them, often depicting their subjects in a raw
manner with expressive brushstrokes and intense colors.
Famous Neo-Expressionist artists include Jean-Michel
Basquiat, Anselm Kiefer, Julian Schnabel, Eric Fischl,
and David Salle.