Symbolism: Fin de Si

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• Symbolism Fin de Siècle Europe
• Flight from modernity, Primitivist critique of
  European culture, reaction against 19th century
  mechanistic Positivism the dominant faith in
  science and technology.
• Objective optical realism" of Impressionism is
  rejected for the representation of personal
  symbols, memory, imagination, and dreams to
  evoke a sympathetic understanding of the artist's
  Idea in the viewer as music does.
• "Art has gone through a long period of
  aberration caused by physics, chemistry,
  mechanics, and the study of nature....Artists,
  having lost all their savagery, went astray on
  every path."
• Gauguin

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Symbolism and Decadence Subjective
vision CORRESPONDENCES (a literal translation
from the French) Charles Baudelaire,
1857 Nature is a temple whose living columns
sometimes allow confused words to escape man
passes through these forests of symbols, Which
regard him with familiar looks. Charles
Baudelaire's Theory of Correspondences in which
objects become signs for the artist's personal
ideas and feelings includes the idea of
"Synesthesia" in which the 5 senses yield
equivalent and concomitant responses, so that a
line can be "noble" or "false (Gauguin), a shade
of yellow, "sour" and clanging (Kandinsky).
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Paul Gauguin, Mallarmé (Nevermore), lithograph
for publication in artists magazine,1891
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Paul Gauguin, Where Do We Come From? What Are We?
Where Are We Going? Oil on burlap, 139 375 cm,
18971898Symbolism and Primitivism
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(left) Paul Sérusier, Talisman, 1888, oil on
cigar box lidNabis, Pont Aven School of
Gauguin (Studio of the North)(right)
Sérusier, Portrait of Paul Ranson Dressed as a
Prophet (Nabi)1890, oil on canvas, 60 x 45 cm
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Maurice Denis (French Nabis and Symbolist
painter, 18701943), Muses in the Sacred Wood,
oil on canvas, 1893

• Remember that a picture, before being a battle
  horse, a nude, an anecdote or whatnot, is
  essentially a flat surface covered with colors
  assembled in a certain order.
• Maurice Denis, Definition of Neo-Traditionalism
  , 1890

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James Ensor (Belgian Symbolist, 1860-1949), Self
Portrait with Masks, 1899
. . . and my suffering, scandalized, insolent,
cruel, malicious masks. . . I have joyfully shut
myself in the solitary milieu ruled by the mask
with a face of violence and brilliance.
James Ensor
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James Ensor, Entry of Christ into Brussels in
1889, 1888, 99 x 169, oil on canvas, The
GettyCompare Dostoyevsky's The Grand Inquisitor
from The Brothers Karamazov
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James Ensor, detail of Entry of Christ into
Brussels in 1889 Compare with (right) Hieronymus
Bosch (Netherlandish c. 1450-1516) Christ
Carrying the Cross, ca. 1515-1516, oil on wood.
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James Ensor, The Intrigue, 1890, oil on
canvasCompare Francisco Goya (Spanish,
1746-1828), The Witches Sabbath (detail) 1820-23,
fresco transferred to canvas Hieronymus Bosch,
Christ Carrying the Cross, ca. 1515-1516, oil on
wood.
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Odilon Redon (French Symbolist painter and
graphic artist (1840-1916), The Eye Balloon,
charcoal, 1878 (right) Redon, The Smiling
Spider, 1881, charcoal, 49.5 x 39 cm
The prince of mysterious dreams (Huysmans)
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Odilon Redon, Silence, 1911, oil on paper /
Symbolist

• My sole aim To instill in the spectator, by
  means of quite unexpected allurements, all the
  evocations and fascinations of the unknown on the
  boundaries of thought.
• Redon

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Edvard Munch (Norwegian Symbolist-Expressionist
1863-1944)Self Portrait with Cigarette, 1895,
oil on canvas,110.5 x 85.5 cm. Munch lived off
and on in Paris between 1889-1892
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Edvard Munch, The Vampire, oil on canvas, 1893
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Munch, Puberty, 1895, oil on canvas, 60 x 43
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Munch, The Dance of Life, 1899-1900, oil on
canvas, 49 1/2 x 75, National Gallery, Oslofrom
the series, The Frieze of Life, which contained
most of Munchs major paintings
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• Munch, The Lonely Ones, woodcut, 1894, and
  painting, 1935

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Edvard Munch, The Scream, 1893, Casein/waxed
crayon and tempera on paper (cardboard), 35 7/8 x
29, National Gallery, Oslo(Left) Munch, The
Scream, 1893, woodcut
As he walked across a bridge with friends at
sunset he was seized with despair and felt a
great, infinite scream pass through nature.
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• This version of The Scream was stolen from the
  Norwegian National Gallery in 1994.

August, 2004 thieves escaping with another
version of The Scream from the Munch museum in
Norway. Recovered August, 2006 with minor damage.
Two paintings are valued at 15 million dollars.
Madonna, 1894-95
Recovery CBS news
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Gustav Klimt (Austrian Symbolist / Secessionist,
1862-1918) Death Life, 1916 (Arnason seems to
be in error)
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Klimt, Idyll, 1884, Oil on canvas, 49.5 x 73.5
cmVienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum
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Klimt, Love, 1895, Oil on canvas, 60 x 44 cm,
Vienna Art Historical Museum
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Klimt, Pallas Athene, 1898, Oil on canvas, 75 x
75 cm
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Joseph Maria Olbrich, (Austrian,
1867-1908)Vienna Secession building, 1898,
Jugendstijl (Austrian Art Nouveau)
Above the entrance To every age its art and to
art its freedom
Gustav Klimt was a founder of the Vienna Secession
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Klimt, Beethoven Frieze The Hostile Powers,
1902, Casein paint on stucco, 220 x 635 cm,
Vienna Secession building, lower floor
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Klimt, Beethoven Frieze Praise to Joy, the
God-descended, 1902Casein paint on stucco, 220 x
470 cm
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Vienna Secession Building, Jugendstijl details of
front. Designs attributed to Koloman Moser
(Austrian Painter and Designer, 1868-1918)
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Koloman Moser, Bookcase, 1903, made by Caspar
Hrazdil, Vienna, Thuya and Lemon Wood, Brass, and
Glazed Glass, 57 x 39 x 16 in.(right) Moser,
cover design for Ver Sacrum (Rite of Spring),
international Jugenstijl magazine of Vienna
Secession, published from January 1898 to October
1903
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Koloman Moser, Stained glass window for St.
Leopolds Church (Kirche Am Steinhof), 1905-7,
the church of Viennas psychiatric hospital, Otto
Wagner, architect.
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The Wiener Werkstätte (Vienna Workshop), an Arts
Crafts Movement, established in 1903, brought
together architects, artists and designers
committed to design (primarily jewelry, fabrics
for clothing, ceramics and pottery, and
furniture). (right) the Stoclet Palace,
Brussels, Belgium, designed by Josef Hoffmann and
built by the Weiner Werkstätte, 1905-11, This
integration of architects, artists, and artisans
makes it an example of Gesamtkunstwerk the first
aim of the Vienna Workshop.
Wiener Werkstätte logo
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Auguste Rodin, Gates of Hell, 1880-1917, with
detail (left)Symbolist
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Detail of Rodins Gates of Hell Fugit
AmorModernist aesthetics of fragmentation and
theissue of originality (vs. the copy /
reproduction) as a modernist myth
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Sculpture exhibition Paris World Fair 1900
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(left) Auguste Rodin (French Sculptor, 1840-1917)
in studio with collection of antique sculptures
fragments with Balzac study (right) artist among
his fragments
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Rodin, Detail of Gates of Hell with The Thinker
and sourcesMichelangelo and Durer
Michelangelo, Last Judgment, 1535
Night, Michelangelo, 152034
Durer, Melancholia, 1515
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Rodin, Gates of Hell, Three Shades, with tourist
photo (center) in Paris and single Shade at the
Atlanta High Museum
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Constantin Brancusi (Romania, 1876-1957) (left)
Vitellius, 1898(right) Brancusi in Paris studio,
1933The Saint of Montparnasse
Brancusi was an admirer of 17th c. Tibetan monk
and poet, Milarepa of the Himalayas
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(left) Brancusi, Sleep, 1908(right) Medardo
Rosso (Italian 1858-1917) Ecce Puer, 1896We are
nothing but a play of light (Rosso)
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Brancusi, Child Supplicant, bronze 1906 and
Newborn, 1915 (right)
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Brancusi, Sleeping Muse, life-size, bronze, 1910
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Brancusi, The Origin of the World, 1924
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Matisses (modernist) quest for the essential
(true) sign is shared by Brancusi Constantin
Brancusi, clockwise from upper left Supplicant
Child, 1906, Sleeping Muse 1910 Newborn, 1915
and two versions of The Origin of the World, 1920s
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Constantin Brancusi, The Kiss, 1907 version
(left) and the Memorial park at Tîrgu Jiu,
Romania showing the The Gate of the Kiss, 1937
and part of contemplation group
The Kiss, which symbolizes the marriage of the
material and the spiritual, life and death, and
in general the dialectical unification of the
dualities of human experience
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Brancusi, Table of Silence, Memorial Park at
Tirgu Jiu, Romania, 1937
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Brancusi, Endless Column, Memorial park at Tirjiu
Jiucast iron with copper coating, 1937
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Brancusi, Endless Column, (left) under
reconstruction, 1999(center) Segments of Endless
Column(right) Donald Judd, Untitled, 1970
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Brancusi, Bird in Space, 1925, marble, stone, and
wood Brancusis Paris studio 1927 photographs
by artistAll my life I have sought the essence
of flight. Dont look for mysteries. I give you
pure joy. Look at the sculptures until you see
them. Those closest to God have seen them
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Brancusi studio, Pompidou Center, Paris