History of Modern Art

Elizabeth C. Mansfield is Vice President for Scholarly Programs at the National Humanities Center in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. She has taught art history at New York University and the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee . A scholar of modern European art and art historiography, her publications include books and articles on topics ranging from the origins of modernism to Picasso’s Demoiselles d’Avignon to the contemporary performance and body art of Orlan. Her 2007 book Too Beautiful to Picture : Zeus, Myth, and Mimesis was awarded the College Art Association’s Charles Rufus Morey book prize.The late H.H. Arnason was a distinguished art historian, educator, and museum administrator who for many years was Vice President for Art Administration of the Solomon Guggenheim Museum in New York. He began his professional life in academia, teaching at Northwestern University, University of Chicago, and the University of Hawaii. From 1947 to 1961, Arnason was Professor and Chairman of the Department of Art at the University of Minnesota.

• In this Section: Brief Table of ContentsFull Table of ContentsBRIEF TABLE OF CONTENTS: Chapter 1: The Origins of Modern ArtChapter 2: The Search for Truth: Early Photography, Realism, and ImpressionismChapter 3: Post-ImpressionismChapter 4: Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau, and the Beginnings of ExpressionismChapter 5: The New Century: Experiments in Color and FormChapter 6: Expressionism in Germany and AustriaChapter 7: CubismChapter 8: Early Modern ArchitectureChapter 9: European Art after CubismChapter 10: Picturing the Wasteland: Western Europe during World War IChapter 11: Art in France after World War IChapter 12: Clarity, Certainty, and Order: De Stijl and the Pursuit of Geometric AbstractionChapter 13: Bauhaus and the Teaching of ModernismChapter 14: SurrealismChapter 15: American Art Before World War IIChapter 16: Abstract Expressionism and the New American SculptureChapter 17: Postwar European ArtChapter 18: Nouveau Réalisme and FluxusChapter 19: Taking Chances with Popular CultureChapter 20: Playing by the Rules: Sixties AbstractionChapter 21: Modernism in Architecture at Mid-CenturyChapter 22: Conceptual and Activist ArtChapter 23: Post-Minimalism, Earth Art, and New ImagistsChapter 24: PostmodernismChapter 25: Painting through HistoryChapter 26: New Perspectives on Art and AudienceChapter 27: Contemporary Art and Globalization FULL TABLE OF CONTENTS: Chapter 1: The Origins of Modern Art Making Art and Artists: The Role of the CriticThe Modern ArtistWhat Does It Mean to Be an Artist?: From Academic Emulation toward Romantic OriginalityMaking Sense of a Turbulent World: The Legacy of Neoclassicism and RomanticismChapter 2: The Search for Truth: Early Photography, Realism, and Impressionism New Ways of Seeing: Photography and its InfluenceOnly the Truth: RealismSeizing the Moment: Impressionism and the Avant-GardeFrom Realism to ImpressionismNineteenth-Century Art in the United StatesChapter 3: Post-Impressionism The Poetic Science of Color: Seurat and the Neo-ImpressionistForm and Nature: Paul CézanneThe Triumph of Imagination: SymbolismAn Art Reborn: Rodin and Sculpture at the Fin de SièclePrimitivism and the Avant-Garde: Gauguin and Van GoghA New Generation of Prophets: The NabisMontmartre: At Home with the Avant-GardeChapter 4: Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau, and the Beginnings of Expressionism “A Return to Simplicity”: The Arts and Crafts Movement and ExperimentalArchitectureExperiments in Synthesis: Modernism beside the HearthWith Beauty at the Reins of Industry: Aestheticism and Art NouveauNatural Forms for the Machine Age: The Art Nouveau AestheticPainting and Graphic ArtToward Expressionism: Late Nineteenth-Century Avant-Garde Painting beyond FranceChapter 5: The New Century: Experiments in Color and Form Fauvism“Purity of Means” in Practice: Henri Matisse’s Early Career“Wild Beasts” Tamed: Derain, Vlaminck, and DufyReligious Art for a Modern Age: Georges RouaultThe Belle Époque on Film: The Lumière Brothers and LartigueModernism on a Grand Scale: Matisse’s Art after FauvismForms of the Essential: Constantin BrancusiChapter 6: Expressionism in Germany and Austria From Romanticism to Expressionism: Corinth and Modersohn-BeckerSpanning the Divide between Romanticism and Expressionism: Die BrückeThe Spiritual Dimension: Der Blaue ReiterExpressionist SculptureSelf-Examination: Expressionism in AustriaChapter 7: Cubism Immersed in Tradition: Picasso’s Early CareerBeyond Fauvism: Braque’s Early Career“Two Mountain Climbers Roped Together”: Braque, Picasso, and theDevelopment of CubismConstructed Spaces: Cubist SculptureAn Adaptable Idiom: Developments in Cubist Painting in ParisOther Agendas: Orphism and Other Experimental Art inChapter 8: Early Modern Architecture “Form Follows Function”: The Chicago School and the Origins of the SkyscraperModernism in Harmony with Nature: Frank Lloyd WrightTemples for the Modern City: American Classicism 1900—15New Simplicity Versus Art Nouveau: Vienna Before World War ITradition and Innovation: The German Contribution to Modern ArchitectureToward the International Style: The Netherlands and BelgiumChapter 9: European Art after Cubism Fantasy Through Abstraction: Chagall and the Metaphysical School“Running on Shrapnel”: Futurism in Italy“Our Vortex is Not Afraid”: Wyndham Lewis and VorticismA World Ready for Change: The Avant-Garde in RussiaUtopian Visions: Russian ConstructivismChapter 10: Picturing the Wasteland: Western Europe during World War I The World Turned Upside Down: The Birth of Dada“Her Plumbing and Her Bridges”: Dada Comes to America“Art is Dead”: Dada in GermanyIdealism and Disgust: The “New Objectivity” in GermanyChapter 11: Art in France after World War I Eloquent Figuration: Les MauditsDedication to Color: Matisse’s Later CareerCelebrating the Good Life: Dufy’s Later CareerEclectic Mastery: Picasso’s Career after the WarSensuous Analysis: Braque’s Later CareerAusterity and Elegance: Léger, Le Corbusier, and OzenfantChapter 12: Clarity, Certainty, and Order: De Stijl and the Pursuit of Geometric Abstraction The de Stijl IdeaMondrian: Seeking the Spiritual Through the RationalVan Doesburg, de Stijl, and ElementarismDe Stijl Realized: Sculpture and ArchitectureChapter 13: Bauhaus and the Teaching of Modernism Audacious Lightness: The Architecture of GropiusThe Building as Entity: The BauhausThe Vorkurs: Basis of the Bauhaus CurriculumDie Werkmeistern: Craft Masters at the BauhausFrom Bauhaus Dessau to Bauhaus U.S.A.Chapter 14: Surrealism Breton and the Background to Surrealism“Art is a Fruit”: Arp’s Later CareerHybrid Menageries: Ernst’s Surrealist Techniques“Night, Music, and Stars”: Miró and Organic—Abstract SurrealismMethodical Anarchy: André MassonEnigmatic Landscapes: Tanguy and DalíSurrealism beyond France and Spain: Magritte, Delvaux, Bellmer, Matta, and LamWomen and Surrealism: Oppenheim, Cahun, Maar, Tanning, and CarringtonNever Quite “One of Ours”: Picasso and SurrealismPioneer of a New Iron Age: Julio GonzálezSurrealism’s Sculptural Language: Giacometti’s Early CareerSurrealist Sculpture in Britain: MooreBizarre Juxtapositions: Photography and SurrealismChapter 15: American Art Before World War II American Artist as Cosmopolitan: Romaine BrooksThe Truth about America: The Eight and Social CriticismA Rallying Place for Modernism: 291 Gallery and the Stieglitz CircleComing to America: The Armory ShowSharpening the Focus on Color and Form: Synchromism and PrecisionismThe Harlem RenaissancePainting the American Scene: Regionalists and Social RealistsDocuments of an Era: American Photographers Between the WarsSocial Protest and Personal Pain: Mexican ArtistsThe Avant-Garde Advances: Toward American Abstract ArtSculpture in America Between the WarsChapter 16: Abstract Expressionism and the New American Sculpture Mondrian in New York: The Tempo of the MetropolisEntering a New Arena: Modes of Abstract ExpressionismThe Picture as Event: Experiments in Gestural PaintingComplex Simplicities: Color Field PaintingDrawing in Steel: Constructed SculptureTextures of the Surreal: Biomorphic Sculpture and AssemblageExpressive Vision: Developments in American PhotographyChapter 17: Postwar European Art Re-evaluations and Violations: Figurative Art in FranceA Different Art: Abstraction in FrancePostwar Juxtapositions: Figuration and Abstraction in Italy and Spain“Forget It and Start Again”: The CoBrA Artists and HundertwasserThe Postwar Body: British Sculpture and PaintingMarvels of Daily Life: European PhotographersChapter 18: Nouveau Réalisme and Fluxus “Sensibility in Material Form”: KleinFluxusChapter 19: Taking Chances with Popular Culture “This is Tomorrow”: Pop Art in BritainSigns of the Times: Pop Art in the United StatesGetting Closer to Life: Happenings and Environments“Just Look at the Surface”: The Imagery of Everyday LifePoetics of the “New Gomorrah”: West Coast ArtistsPersonal Documentaries: The Snapshot Aesthetic in American PhotographyChapter 20: Playing by the Rules: Sixties Abstraction Drawing the Veil: Post Painterly AbstractionAt an Oblique Angle: DiebenkornForming the Unit: Hard-Edge PaintingSeeing Things: Op ArtNew Media Mobilized: Motion and LightThe Limits of Modernism: MinimalismComplex Unities: Photography and MinimalismChapter 21: Modernism in Architecture at Mid-Century “The Quiet Unbroken Wave”: The Later Work of Wright and Le CorbusierPurity and Proportion: The International Style in AmericaInternationalism Contextualized: Developments in Europe, Latin America, Asia, and AustraliaBreaking the Mold: Experimental HousingArenas for Innovation: Major Public ProjectsChapter 22: Conceptual and Activist Art Art as LanguageConceptual Art as Cultural CritiqueThe Medium Is the Message: Early Video ArtWhen Art Becomes Artist: Body ArtRadical Alternatives: Feminist ArtErasing the Boundaries between Art and Life: Later Feminist ArtInvisible to Visible: Art and Racial PoliticsChapter 23: Post-Minimalism, Earth Art, and New Imagists Metaphors for Life: Process ArtBig Outdoors: Earthworks and Land ArtPublic Statements: Monuments and Large-Scale SculptureBody of Evidence: Figurative ArtAnimated Surfaces: Pattern and DecorationFigure and Ambiguity: New Image ArtChapter 24: Postmodernism Postmodernism in Architecture“Complexity and Contradiction”: The Reaction Against Modernism Sets InIn Praise of “Messy Vitality”: Postmodernist EclecticismIronic Grandeur: Postmodern Architecture and HistoryWhat Is a Building?: Constructivist and Deconstructivist ArchitectureStructure as Metaphor: Architectural AllegoriesFlexible Spaces: Architecture and UrbanismPostmodern Practices: Breaking Art HistoryChapter 25: Painting through History Primal Passions: Neo-ExpressionismSearing Statements: Painting as Social ConscienceIn the Empire of Signs: Neo-GeoThe Sum of Many Parts: Abstraction in the 1980sTaking Art to the Streets: Graffiti and Cartoon ArtistsPainting Art HistoryChapter 26: New Perspectives on Art and Audience Commodity ArtPostmodern Arenas: Installation ArtStrangely Familiar: British and American SculptureReprise and Reinterpretation: Art History as ArtNew Perspectives on Childhood and IdentityThe Art of BiographyMeeting Points: New Approaches to AbstractionChapter 27: Contemporary Art and Globalization Lines That Define Us: Locating and Crossing BordersSkin Deep: Identity and the BodyOccupying the Art World Globalization and Arts Institutions

"This is a significant and usable text for all undergraduate students of art history, and a very good source book for graduate students. It is an excellent source book for students studying the late nineteenth to the twenty-first centuries." - -Caterina Pierre, Kingsborough Community College CUNY "It demonstrates a strong commitment to writing a history of modern art that is inclusive of women and artists of color. It is clearly written and works toward thorough consideration of a topic rather than superficial analysis. The best text for a course on Modern Art." - Cynthia Fowler, Emmanuel College "Comprehensive, in-depth study of respective stylistic developments in history of modernism; high-quality photographic reproductions; fundamental investment in discussing objects through its own evidence; willingness of text and author(s) to adjust with the times." - Mysoon Rizk, University of Toledo "I am pleased with the inclusion of more women and artists of color and with the context, technique and source boxes. As well, I am pleased with the increased quality of reproductions." - Prudence Roberts, Portland Community College