Aaron Siskind (American

1
Aaron Siskind (American Abstract Expressionist
Photographer, 1903-1991) (left) New York, 24 x
20, gelatin silver print, 1951 (right) compare
Franz Kline, Siskind, oil on canvas, 1959
2
Aaron Siskind, Boys Playing with Toy Swords,
Harlem, New York, 1930s
3
Siskind, Chicago 25, 1957
"For the first time in my life, subject matter,
as such, had ceased to be of primary importance.
Instead, I found myself involved in the
relationships of these objects, so much so that
these pictures turned out to be deeply moving and
personal experiences." Siskind moved from
Social Realism to de-politicized formalist
abstraction of the Chicago Institute of Design
and second generation Abstract Expressionism
(1950s)
4
European Postwar Existentialism
1949 a founding feminist text rooted in
existential doubts about the true nature of
Being.
1943
Jean-Paul Sartre Simone de Beauvoir 1938 Paris
5
Jean Fautrier (French, 1898-1964) Art Informel,
Head of a Hostage, 20," oil on panel, 1944, one
of over thirty hostage paintings and sculptures
that he made during the occupation of Paris
alluding to the Nazi atrocities.
These paintings addressed the most important
issue of their time, epitomizing a 'new human
resolve' against the horrors of war." (Fautrier)
6
Jean Fautrier, Large Tragic Head, bronze, 1943
7
Germaine Richier (French, 1904-1959) , Crucified
Christ, 1950, Notre-Dame de Tour Grâce d'Assy,
France. Post-humanist? (lower right)
Richiers teacher, Emile-Antoine Bourdelle,
Hercules, 1909
8
Richier, The Shepherd of Landes, 1951 (right) Le
Griffu, 1952Bronze, 98 x 94 x 74 cm
9
Alberto Giacometti (Swiss, 1901-1966), (left)
City Square, 1948, bronze, c. 8 x 25 x
17(right) Giacometti, Portrait of a Seated Man
(Diego), 1949, oil on canvas, 80 x 64 cm.
2 of 5 casts. Guggenheim collection photo, lower,
shows preferred viewpoint (eye-level, close up)
which alters the viewers perception of scale
Portraits are the stopping point of an agonized
struggle with perception as proof of existence
10
Giacometti, The Palace at 4 a.m., 1932,
construction in wood, glass, wire, and string, 25
x 28 x 15 in. Prewar Surrealist work
Artists sketch, 1932
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Giacometti, Woman with Her Throat Cut, bronze,
1932, prewar Surrealist work drawing from the
artists dreams and imaginings
MoMA New York, 2005
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(left) Poseidon, Greek, c. 575 BC, bronze, found
in the Aegean Sea in 1926 god as powerful
warrior male(right) Giacometti, Man Pointing,
1947, bronze, 70 inches high, Existential man
thrown naked into the void (Heidegger, German
WWII era existential philosopher). The Poseidon
was a source for Giacometti
Sac State Student, 2005
13
Jean Dubuffet French, 1901-1985 Art Brut,
Large Sooty Nude, 1944, o/c, 64H (right) Tree
of Fluids, 1952 compare (center) Willem de
Kooning, Woman I, 1952Art addresses the mind,
not the eyes. (Dubuffet)
14
Jean Dubuffet, Art Brut, Fleshy Face with
Chestnut Hair, 1951, Oil mixed-media, 28H
15
Brassai, (Gyula Halasz, French b. Romania, 1899 -
1987)(left) Swastika Graffiti (right) Passion
Graffiti, both Paris, 1939
16
Francis Bacon (British, 1909 -1992), (left)
Painting, 1946, oil and pastel on linen, 6' 6" x
52 (right) Head Surrounded by Sides of Beef,
oil on canvas, 1954
Black umbrella was the symbol of British Prime
Minister Neville Chamberlains policy of Nazi
appeasement
17
Francis Bacon, Study after Velazquez's Portrait
of Pope Innocent X, 5 x 4 ft, 1953(right top)
source Velazquez, Pope Innocent X, 1650 (right
below) Still from Sergei Eisensteins 1925 The
Battleship Potemkin, Odessa steps sequence
NOTE Study for Portrait II, 1956, from Bacons
series of papal portraits sold at Christies
February, 2007 auction for 27.51 million
18
Francis Bacon, Three Studies for Figures at the
Base of a Crucifixion, 1944, oil and pastel on
canvas, triptych on wood fiberboard, each 37 x 29
inches. The crucifixion was for Bacon a symbol
of humanitys sadism(lower right) source
Picasso, On the Beach (La Baignade), 1937
Aeschylus The Eumenides the kindly ones, The
Furies, the dark hidden side of the human
psyche, with Orestes
19
(left) Francis Bacon, Three Studies of figures on
Beds, 1972, oil and pastel on canvas, triptych,
each panel 66 x 4 10(right) source Eadweard
Muybridge, photograph from The Human Figure in
Motion, 1887
Exhibition photo of Bacons Two Figures Lying on
a Bed with Attendants, 1968