Clement Greenberg, Abstract Art, 1944

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Clement
Greenberg, Abstract Art, 1944 1. Gothic and
Byzantine hierarchy, fixedness, flat earth
FLATNESS, picture plane 2. Renaissance -
discoveries, growing world and knowledge, round
earth, science, humanism DEPTH 3. Tempera
v. oil disappearance of picture plane
characteristics of the medium sacrificed for
illusionism 4. Earth, knowledge not limitless
specialization, positivism, photography,
Japanisme impressionists (the most faithful
visual representation of reality must be
2-dimensional as sensations of 3-dimensionality
come through movement and touch, not sight sight
gives only color) - FLATNESS 5. Reinforcement of
flatness the physical nature of the medium, the
materialism of art - Cezanne, fauvism, cubism
(turns back), non-representation (primacy of the
picture plane) 6. Illusion no longer possible in
humanity and society (wars) illusion no longer
attractive the artist can no longer imitate
nature modern imagination is numbed by visual
representation 7. Painting approaches the
condition on music
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Duccio di Buoninsegna, Rucellai Madonna, 1285,
Uffizi, Florence, tempera on panel
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Cimabue, Madonna Enthroned with Angels, tempera
on panel, 1290-95
Giotto, Madonna Enthroned, Ognissanti Church,
tempera on panel, 1305-10
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Giotto di Bondone
frescoes, Scrovegni (Arena) Chapel,
Padua (1303 1305)
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Giotto di Bondone, Fresco of The Lamentation,
Scrovegni (Arena) Chapel, Padua (1303 1305)
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Jan van Eyck, Portrait of Giovanni Arnolfini (?)
and his Wife, 1434, oil on wood panel, 33 x 22
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Jan van Eyck, Portrait of Giovanni Arnolfini (?)
and his Wife, 1434, oil on wood panel, 33 x 22
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Leonardo, The Last Supper, Convent of Santa Maria
delle Grazie, Milan, 1495-97, oil and tempera,
15 x 29
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Velazquez, Las Meninas, 1656, oil on
canvas, 10'5" x 9'1"
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John Constable English Landscape Painting
The rural past, nature as refuge
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E. Manet
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Utamaro, Midnight The Hours of the Rat Mother
and Sleepy Child, (Edo period), ca.
1790Polychrome woodblock print, 14 x 9
Mary Cassat, Maternal Caress, 1891Drypoint and
soft-ground etching, printed in color, 14 x 10
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CLAUDE MONET
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Picasso, Ma Jolie, 1911-12, Oil on canvas, 19 x
25 cm
Georges Braque, Le Portugais (The
Emigrant) autumn 1911-early 1912, Oil on canvas ,
46 x 32 in.
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Piet Mondrian
Composition with Red, Yellow and Blue1921, Oil
on canvas, 39 x 35 cm (15 x 13)
Composition with Large Blue Plane, Red, Black,
Yellow, and Gray, 1921, Oil on canvas, (23 x
19)
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Harold Rosenberg, 1952 Painting an event,
action Not pure art not an aesthetic
question but a revelation, a tension Painting
does not REPRESENT life, it IS life - end of
distinction between art and life (work
biographical, personal) End of political or
social engagement, end of values, end of art
for arts sake - just ACTION (pistol
shot) End of art criticism as judging
in terms of schools or styles new criticism
needs vocabulary of action (inception, duration,
etc)
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Autumn Rhythm (Number 30), 1950, enamel on
canvas 105 x 207
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Meyer Schapiro, 1957 Past 50 years - 2
requirements 1) every work of art has an
individual order
2) emotional power of
color and line Rise of primitive art
reinforced end of representation and also end of
restraint of expression
more emotional states are allowed
(widening) Image less important construction,
expressiveness, inventiveness more
important Art individual v. mass production
spontaneous and intense v. mechanical and
repetitive world fragility of the self v.
industry, state, economy In the absence of real
values cultivate your own garden
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Robert Motherwell, 1944
We should value the art of the past in what it
has of eternal values (aesthetic form,
confrontation with death) Modern art also should
look for eternal values, therefore reject
bourgeois values (social, political values of
the middle classes) Modern world spiritual
breakdown/collapse of religion Property is the
historical base of contemporary freedom
property creates the unfreedom of the majority
of men Artists isolation a spiritual being in
a property-loving world (artists paint for each
other) Art values the eternal, the pure, the
universal, the aesthetic (abstract art art
without a Self)
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March 1951 The
Realists Statement Abstract artists make a
fetish of form private world, above criticism,
without responsibility cult of the
irrational instinctual and primitive
drives HOLLOW art Art should reaffirm
human values be directed to the people
1955 Reality A Journal
of Artists Opinions Texture and accident are
only a means to the larger end of depicting
people in this world Today art world presents
textural novelty as the only mark of art art
has become the property of an esoteric
cult - contempt for the publics
intelligence - incomprehensible jargon
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Philip Evergood
Roadbuilders, 1956
Jobs Not Dimes, 1946
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Barr, What is Modern Painting, 1943
Language of art is not scientific or matter of
fact it is metaphor, parable, myth, dream

Art is a lie that makes us realize
the truth Fr that, it needs freedom Why do
dictators hate modern art? Because modern art
stands for freedom, inner freedom that
speaks of an inner truth USA more subtle
censoring of modern art ignorant, indifferent
public, timid museum officials and buyers,
malice of conservative artists Artists should
have freedom of expression, from want and from
fear Why is the artists freedom important?
Because it symbolizes the freedom wed
all like to have but cant due to social rules
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Ben Shan, Still Music 1948, Casein on fabric on
plywood panel, 48 x 83
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Litograph, 20 x 28
The Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti,
1932-32Tempera on canvas, 84 1/2 x 48 in.