Edvard Munch: the Ghosts of Vampires and Victims

'I don't paint what I see but what I saw': detail from Edvard Munch's The Sick Child, 1907 version. Photograph: TateNorwegian artist Edvard Munch (1863-1944) created some of the most psychologically compelling paintings in the history of art. His own life was riddled with tragedies--and he articulated them dramatically--and eloquently.

“Like Van Gogh, he [Edvard Munch] wanted to make passionate images of human beings and nature for a secular world, to replace the old religious images....Munch's is a world full of the ultimate human things – sickness, death, sex, fear, desire, hatred and destruction.”

AS Byatt of “The Guardian” has written an excellent piece on how Munch’s work, featured in an exhibit at the Tate Modern, has affected her--and will undoubtedly affect others. It’s an insighful, “don’t miss” article.

Max Beckmann - The Power of Symbolic Commentary

Max Beckmann, Temptation - 1936-37 - Oil on canvas - triptych, center panel 78 3/4 X 67" - side panels each 85 X 39 3/8" - Bayerische Staatsgemaldesammlungen, Munich (click photo for larger image)

One of the most important German artists of the 20th century--Max Beckmann (1884-1950) was a painter, draughtsman, printmaker and teacher. Like many of his contemporaries, Beckmann was initially influenced by traditional styles in art. However, during WWI he rejected classical rules, in favor of a more expressive objective art--known as “the New Objectivity”. Beckmann was persecuted by the Nazis in the 1930s but continued to work. Among his most celebrated works are his secular triptychs of the late 1930s and the 1940s. For some critical text on the painting featured here, click here...

Marc Chagall: The Poetic “Folk” Artist

Marc Chagall, I and the Village. 1911. Oil on canvas. 191 x 150.5 cm. The Museum of Modern Arts, New York, NY, USA.Marc Chagall, The Green Violinist. 1923/24. Oil on canvas. 198 x 108.6 cm. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY, USA (click photo for larger image)Russian-Jewish born French artist, Marc Chagall (1887-1985), developed emotional and surreal works of art, well before Surrealism, as a movement, emerged. Although Chagall’s work reveals an awareness of early modern movements--his style also embodies the Russian folk art tradition, references to his Jewish heritage, and the artist’s own particular take on the world. Chagall’s reperatory of images was broad in subject and scope--and his works are among the first expressions of psychic reality that emerged in the Modern era. Although some scholars find his artistic production to have uneven moments in it--Chagall is also highly regarded for the greater part of his oeuvre. His work is simultaneously moving and delightful.

Marc Chagall. The Watering Trough. 1925. Oil on canvas. 99.5 x 88.5 cm. The Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA, USA (click photo for larger image)

Ilya Bolotowsky - Verticals, Horizontals and Primaries

Ilya Bolotowsky - Diamond Blue, Black, Red, White, 1971 - Acrylic on linen 50 1/2 x 51 1/8 in. (128.3 x 130.0 cm) - The Joseph H. Hirshhorn Bequest, 1981, Smithsonian, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (click photo for larger image)Russian-born American painter, Ilya Bolotowsky (1907-1981), was a practitioner of Neoplasticism--a Dutch movement founded (and named) by Piet Mondrian. Neoplasticism is a rigid form of abstraction, which dictates that a canvas must be sectioned into rectangles, by horizontal and vertical lines, and colored using a very limited palette. Neoplasticists believed that art should not be the representation of real objects, but the expression of the absolutes of life. Their “absolutes” of life were vertical and horizontal lines and the primary colors.  To this end neoplasticisist only used planar elements and the colors red, yellow, and blue.

Marc and Macke: Pioneers of Expressionism

Tuesday Afternoons - 12:30-3:30pm - 7 sessions - July 10 - August 21 - at the Palos Verdes Art Center

Franz Marc, Tiger, 1912; Oil on canvas, 111 x 111.5 cm; Stadtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich (click photo for larger image)August Macke, Our Street in Gray (Unsere Strasse in Grau), 1911, oil on canvas, Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich (click photo for larger image)Franz Marc and Auguste Macke were good friends--and major trailblazers of Expressionism. Marc--a German artist best known for the intense mysticism of his paintings of animals--was a pioneer in the birth of abstract art. French painter Macke's interests were directed toward gentle figurations of women, children, and the landscape--resulting in painted expressions of feelings and moods, rather than objective realities. Tragically, both of these artists’ lives were cut short by WWI. But their legacies significantly impacted modern art--and live on to the present day. On this fascinating journey--we’ll explore the lives and art of Marc and Macke--along with those artists who significantly influenced their work. We’ll also examine their enduring contributions to the history of art. Space is limited so register now! Click here for more info and to register.