Early%20Modernism

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Early Modernism

• 1910-1935

By Kerstin Ricca
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Early Influences

• Early Modernism was a movement characterized by
  its deliberate break from design patterns and
  traditions of the past.
• Reacting against Victorian sensibilities, and
  distraught by political and social upheavals
  across the globe, these artists sought to create
  a new concept of design through experiments in
  simplicity, geometry, color, and photography.
• Early modern designers drew inspiration from
  modern art movements, and frequently traveled
  through Europe to draw inspiration from each
  other as well.

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Early Influences

• Early pioneers of Modernism began to experiment
  with geometric forms.
• A major player in the early days of Modernism,
  Peter Behrens designed for the Allgemeine
  Elektrizitats-Gesellschaft (AEG). (Top)
• This cover for the Berlin Electric Works Magazine
  (bottom right, 1908) demonstrates his geometric
  approach to design problems.
• Edward Johnston contributed an exclusive typeface
  for the London Underground, in addition to this
  revised symbol (bottom left) which was used until
  1972.

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Modern Art Influences

• Around the world, modern art was in a constant
  state of change. Pressing economic and political
  turmoil pushed artists to find new ways of
  expression, resulting in a series of modern art
  movements that went on to influence graphic
  design.

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Cubism

• Cubism began to appear in the first part of the
  20th century. Cubist art often displayed its
  subject using a series of geometric planes,
  allowing the viewer to see multiple angles in one
  piece.
• The geometric abstraction present in Cubist
  paintings became a pivotal influence on modernism.

Left Woman with a guitar, by Georges Braque,
1913 Right Le Guitarist Pablo Picasso 1910
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Futurism

• Futurism was a movement launched by Filippo
  Marinetti, designed to express the speed and
  noise of 20th century life.
• Futurist artwork used typography and writing as
  its own expressive means. Words used color,
  character attributes, and position to express
  what images could not.

Top Carlo Carra, Guerrapittura (War-Painting),
1915. Bottom Cover and page design for Zang
Tumb Tumb Adrianopoli Ottobre 1912 by Filippo
Marinetti.
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Dada

• Dada was a short-lived movement reacting to the
  horrors that fell on society during and after
  World War I.
• Dadaists sought to destroy tradition through the
  use of shock and nonsense, and the movement
  became a means for protest with a deep underlying
  negativity.

Left Dada 6 (Bulletin Dada), Tristan Tzara
1920 Right John Heartfield, Hitler tells fairy
tales II, INSCRIPTION ...and then the poor
German Michel screamed so long, that finally the
whole world believed him Help, help, I'm
surrounded!
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Surrealism

• Artists found a means of expressing fantasy and
  intuition through Surrealism.
• Surrealist works often included dream-like
  images, unexpected juxtapositions, and
  non-sequiturs.

Top The Difficult Crossing by Rene Magritte,
1926. Bottom Left The Red Tower by Giorgio de
Chirico. 1913. Bottom Right Salvador Dali.
(Spanish, 1904-1989). The Persistence of Memory.
1931.
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Expressionism

• Expressionism extended beyond its subject to
  depict emotions and personal responses using
  color, line and proportion.
• Images were often exaggerated or distorted in
  symbolic representation.

Top Woman with Dead Child by Kathe Kollwitz,
etching, 1903 Bottom Left On White II by
Wassily Kandinsky, 1923. Bottom Right Henri
Matisse. Portrait of Madame Matisse. (The green
line). 1905
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Photography
Left Man Ray (Rayograph) Untitled, Center
Alvin Langdon Coburn, Vortograph, 1917 Right Man
Ray, Le Violon d'Ingres, 1924

• Although not a new medium, photography was
  rapidly developing during this time period.
  Artists began to explore photographic options
  such as multiple exposures, and differences in
  light and shadow.
• Often these photographic discoveries intersected
  with surrealism, resulting in dream-like images.

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Art Nouveau

• Art Nouveau was a movement characterized by its
  simplification of objects.
• Subjects were drawn with very little detail, and
  little or no tonal variation. Modernists expanded
  on this idea, simplifying objects even further.
• The result was a mechanized, often geometric
  representation of subjects that embodied the
  cultural shift toward reliance on technology and
  industry.

Left Folies-Bergere, Jules Cheret Right
Ambassadeurs, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec
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Plakatstil (Poster style)

• Early expressions of modernism are evident in the
  simplistic and flat-colored Plakastil (poster
  style) design school. Plakatstil artists often
  included nothing more than a single background
  color, a large simple image, and the product
  name.
• The Sachplakat movement in Switzerland was
  closely related to the Plakatstil, sharing
  characteristics of minimalism.

Left Ludwig Hohlwein, Gaba (bookplate),
1926 Center Otto Baumberger, Hotel St. Gotthard
Zurich, 1917 Right Lucian Bernhard,
Breisgau-Perle, 1914
13
Political Social Climate

• The political and social climate during the first
  part of the century was a major catalyst for
  modernist ideas.
• Starting before World War I, many countries were
  facing growing tensions and unrest in the social
  order.
• These tensions became evident in the design world
  as modernists sought to break from past
  ideologies, and experiment with new forms that
  echoed their dissatisfaction with tradition.

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World War I

• With the onset of World War I in 1914, applied
  art took on a new role as a means of propaganda.
• Countries seeking to justify their involvement in
  the war to end all wars launched poster
  campaigns to acquire resources necessary for the
  conflict, and to garner support from the public.
• Modernist ideals of simplistic form and geometric
  expression are evident in these examples of
  propaganda from various countries.

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The Nazi Rising

• The National Socialist German Workers (Nazi)
  Party, led by Adolf Hitler, rose to power during
  the economic and political turmoil in Germany
  that followed World War I.
• Hitler and the Nazi party launched a massive, and
  psychologically powerful propaganda effort in
  order to advance their views and gain power.
• These posters, like propaganda used during World
  War I, embody the ideals of modernist theory.
  Even the swastika symbol of the Nazi party
  (right) embraces the pure geometric form loved by
  modernists.

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The Russian Revolution and the Spread of Socialism

• Like Germany, Russia was facing serious political
  and economic turmoil following the war.
• Political and social upheavals resulted in the
  overthrowing of Czar Nicholas II and the end of
  Russias Romanov dynasty.
• Shortly after, the Bolshevik party led by
  Vladimir Lenin, gained power, establishing rule
  in what was to become the Soviet Union.
• Under the new socialist regime, the artists sole
  purpose was to advance socialist theory. Art for
  arts sake was denounced, and artists who refused
  to comply were severely punished. Unable to
  express themselves, many artists and designers
  perished in the Gulags (Soviet prison and labor
  camps).

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Constructivism

• A result of changes in Russia (USSR), a new
  movement of art and architecture called
  Constructivism was born.
• Constructivists believed that pure art had no
  purpose in society, and that arts only
  application was to serve the new socialist
  regime.
• Dominant motifs in constructivist art include
  minimal use of colors (generally red, black, and
  white), and a strong geometric element.

Klutsis, Gustav, Millions of qualified workers
for the 518 new factories, 1931
Advertising poster for the state airline
Dobrolet. 1923. A. Rodchenko and V. Stepanova
Archive, Moscow
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Constructivism

• Constructivist artists, such as El Lissitzky,
  experimented with photomontage and abstraction in
  shapes.

Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge, 1919 El
Lissitzky
Proun 12E, El Lissitzky, 1923
Top Photomontage study Bottom Exhibition
poster, El Lissitzky, 1929
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De Stijl
Composition with Yellow, Blue, and Red,
1939-1942, Piet Mondrian

• De Stijl was a short, yet influential, movement
  launched in the Netherlands in summer 1917.
• De Stijl artists sought universal harmony and
  order through the use of pure abstraction.
  Subjects were reduced in form and color.
• Characteristics of classic De Stijl design
  include strong horizontal and vertical
  components, and the use of primary colors with
  black and white.
• Proponents of De Stijl include its founder, Theo
  van Doesburg and Piet Mondrian.

Arithmetische Compositie, 1924, Theo van Doesburg
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Bauhaus

• At the height of the Modernist movement emerged
  one of the most influential design schools of all
  time, the Bauhaus.
• The Bauhaus was opened in 1919 in Weimar, and
  closed in 1933 as a result of Nazi persecution.
• Even after its closing, the Bauhaus continued to
  leave its mark on the world, through influences
  on graphic design, architecture, and furniture
  design.

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Bauhaus

• Faculty and students from all over the world
  united at the Bauhaus to combine new design
  approaches using elements from a variety of
  movements.

Bauhaus Ausstellung Poster, Fritz Schleifer, 1922
Staatliches Bauhaus, Weimar, 19191923, 1923,
Walter Gropius
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Die Neue Typographie

• Jan Tschichold became an advocate of Modern
  design after attending the first Bauhaus
  exhibition in Weimar.
• By applying modernist principles to everyday
  design problems, Tschichold introduced a new
  approaches to a wide audience.
• His 1928 book, Die Neue Typographie, outlined
  these new approaches and condemned all but sans
  serif fonts. Though he later denounced this work
  as being too rigid, Die Neue Typographie remains
  a classic.

Der Berufsphotograph Poster, Jan Tschichold, 1938
We do not know why, but we can demonstrate that
a human being finds planes of definite and
intentional proportions more pleasant or more
beautiful than those of accidental
proportions. Jan Tschichold, The Form of the
Book, 1975
Konstruktivisten Poster, Jan Tschichold 1937
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Modernism in Furniture Design

• Modernist ideals became a pivotal influence in
  other areas of design as well.
• These examples show how furniture reflected
  modernist principles.

Nonconformist Chair, Eileen Gray
Red and Blue Chair, Gerrit Rietveld, 1917
The Barcelona Chair, Mies van der Rohe
The Barrel Chair, Frank Lloyd Wright
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Modernism in Architecture

• These examples show modernisms influence on
  early and present day architecture.

The Bauhaus Gropius House in Lincoln,
Massachusetts, Walter Gropius
I.M. Pei, Architect - Herbert F. Johnson Museum
of Art at Cornell University
The Berlin Holocaust Memorial, Peter Eisenman.
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References

• Elam, Kimberly. Geometry of Design. Princeton
  Architectural Press, 2001.
• Meggs, Philip B and Alston W. Purvis. Meggs
  History of Graphic Design. John Wiley Sons,
  Inc., 2006.
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  om Online.
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