2015 Western Art ca. 1600–1900

The report is devoted to the impact of the scientific views of I. Goethe and M. Faraday on William Turner’s (1775–1851) work and methods in art.
Practical use of knowledge and science theories in the artist’s experience presents the main interest in the context of this report.
Theory of colours by Goethe including his views on the nature of colours and how these are perceived by humans had a great influence on Turner’s fascination with science and his views on art. Turner was interested in some ideas when he worked on translation of Goethe’s tractate, which was focused on the issue of color perception in art.
Inspired by these theories Turner experimented with colours, also he decided that visual impressions that occur upon reflection, dispersion, refraction of light could be a worthy art challenge. He stu­died these effects with optical experiments using prisms and lenses, tried to understand and use phenomena such as coloured shadows, refraction, chromatic aberration.
In his art he studied different colours and colour groups watching their influence on each other, their perception in various combinations. Light and color effects on his canvases allow suggesting: Turner’s art “not only represented the light, but also symbolized its nature”. So, “Light and Colour” (exhibited 1843) could be claimed as a manifesto of artist’s experiments with colours.
Physicist and chemist Michael Faraday was never bored of watching the sky like Turner himself and was fascinated by the artist’s works. As friends they had long talks, and Faraday was an excellent scientist who conveyed his ideas in clear and simple language. His ideas and views could have influence on Turner, the artist also asked Faraday about chemical structure and properties of different colours.
In Turner’s art one can see scientific theories presented on the canvas, new ideas and even technologies of his time. Nowadays he may be called a “popularizer of science”.

 PDF

The article proposes to consider the question of intersections and parallels оf works of Ferdinand Hodler (1856–1918) and the art of the Renaissance. Artistic practice of the outstanding Swiss master had obvious humanist and anthropocentric focus. A deep interest in the achievements of the Renaissance had a fruitful influence on his formation and on the development of principles of the mature works.
In the article we will analyze the aspects of the teaching practice of B. Menn, Hodler’s teacher, whose humanistic content awakened in the young artist the natural science interest and the desire for the knowledge of the objective laws of the nature. Also the article will consider Hodler’s universal theory of parallelism in the context of his works. It will highlight the actual and indirect influence and the intersection with the works of A. Dürer and H. Holbein, Giotto and other “Italian primitives”, Mantegna and Michelangelo in terms of perception, composition, technological and decorative methods. Analysis of linear-spatial constructions in Hodler’s symbolist figure compositions is carried out, and issues concerning the use of line, color and light by the artist in relation to the Renaissance aspirations are discussed.
Hodler’s diversifying study of a person that can be observed in a number of compositions relating to the theme of “death — life”, and the theme of “body — motion — emotion” is also the subject of this article. The body is considered by the artist as a natural phenomenon in the dialog between the realistic depiction of a motion, including dance motion, and the inner emotion. Plato’s eurhythmie meets here with the renewed vision of the symbolist. The features of the creative method of F. Hodler as a scientific approach and art expression, the search of beauty and the conscious combinatorics of figures, fresco allusions and update of the oil technology is considered in the context of the European Art Nouveau and Symbolism.
The artist appears to be a “renaissance” identity in the paradigm of art of the late 19th — early 20th centuries. Hodler’s response to the challenges of the time: the study and presentation of the new “psycho-physical” person as space within its inner self which is inextricably linked to the great mystery of the nature beyond the grasp of mind. In the work of Hodler the harmony between man and nature is found in the paradoxical convergence of individual realistic visual language of art and symbolist latent meanings.

 PDF

The first resort on the southern coast of the Baltic Sea appeared in the late 18th century, and the late 19th century — early 20th centuries witnessed true flowering of resort life. During the 19th century architectural typology, which met the requirements of leisure and treatment at the sea was formed: warm and cold baths, hotels, private houses, cafes, restaurants, music halls, viewing pavilions, boardwalks and piers, etc. Most spa buildings were built of wood, in the technique of open fachwerk or logs and blocks. At the end of the 19th century there was a true “renaissance” of this building material, which can be explained by the appeal to people’s roots and national traditions, and the speed and ease of construction, the possibility of using standardized parts to create original architectural compositions. At the resorts of the Baltic Sea numerous wooden houses have survived, which were built on individual projects or model. Different catalogs of wooden buildings issued by individual architects or firms, such as Wolgast’s “Society of American imports of wood” were very popular. Comparative analysis of individual villas that have survived on the island of Rügen (Germany), on the coast of Kaliningrad region (former East Prussia), in Palanga (Lithuania) shows not only originality, but also common architectural decisions determining the unique cultural landscape of the Baltic resorts.

 PDF

There weren’t only Imperial Easter eggs and elegant flowers which made Fabergé workshop so famous. Production of stonecutting figures, made in the technique of volume mosaic, was very popular at the same time.
For a long time the invention of this technique was attributed to Fabergé. However, it would be fair to remember many monuments, created at the end of the Italian Renaissance in the workshop of Great Duke of Medici and by its followers from German states in the time of the Baroque style.
Again the interest to this very expensive, but so attractive technical method arose in the last quarter of the 19th century. Along with Fabergé workshop in Saint Petersburg, where between 1908 and 1916 about fifty figures were made, there was another atelier which belonged to Alexis Denissov-­Uralsky where craftsmen created some polychrome stone sculptures.
At the same moment, European artists started to produce volume mosaic. For instance, in Italy there was Paolo Ricci at Opificio delle pietre dure (Florence) who made three figures in this technique between 1873 and 1881. In France (Paris), we should note Auguste Alfred Vaudet who created a bust of Ajax (1881), and the mosaic relief “Vers l’inconnu” (1902) by Emile Felix Gaulard.
It is interesting to mention that one more French artist — Georges Henri Lemaire — started to produce the volume mosaic figures at the end of the 19th century. His numerous sculptures are dated between 1892 and 1914.
All mentioned artists took part in the most important international and Universal exhibitions. It enables us to talk about revival of technique of volume stone mosaic not only as Russian, but also as a European movement in the decorative arts of the beginning of the 20th century.

 PDF

Modern science addresses the works of decorative and fine arts not only as objects of culture, but also as carriers of historical information. Researching them allows us to understand more clearly the history of daily life, cultural requirements and reference points, as well as the essence of those concepts and images which still exist today.
Decorative and fine arts collections of Russian museums, including the Saratov state museum of fine arts named after Radishchev, are poorly explored today.
The subject of this research is a historicism epoch jug from the funds of Radishchev Art Museum with images of “drinking” scenes on it. The sketch of this jug was created in the 1840s by L. Folts (1809–1876). The jug was made in the 1880s.
The purpose of research is to reveal common and special features of L. Folts’s model and its Saratov version: technique of production, design, contents of images.
Methods of research include comparative and hermeneutic analysis, art analytical description within interdisciplinary approach.
The research shows that the 1840s jug is made of brown stoneware by method of free rotation, the relief decor is imposed by means of matrixes. Elements of Gothic decor are organically combined with the Renaissance principles of composition — uniformity, harmony, symmetry.
The jug from Radishchev museum is made of gray-blue stoneware (decoration is made by cobalt oxides), by plaster cast method. Its basic lines of form and decor remain, but through a number of methods the gothic “component” is accentuated. Using possibilities of plaster cast, the interpreter applies a relief ornament more widely, changes some substantial details of the image, weakens a plot component and increases decorative effect.
The interpreter doesn’t just copy a sample, using new technical capabilities and ideas of taste and values, he creates an original version.

 PDF

Special aspects of the development of artistic and cultural environment of the second half of the 19th century in Sweden stemmed from the historical and cultural processes and events associated with the rise of the national movement. Announced in 1811 in a session of the Swedish Society in Stockholm the idea of cultural community of northern countries and that the creative elite needs to turn to the art of the past, to their origins, finds manifestation in various forms of art in Sweden. The birth of “Movements of the North”, which followed it, revived interest in authentic old periods of Scandinavian history. To a large extent it determined the nature of artistic imagery in visual, monumental and applied arts of the “Nordic French”. In the Swedish porcelain production these trends can be traced in several stages, from historicism with its emphsis on perception and new reading of the literature and material monuments of the Vikings to a completely new imagery, subjects and forms of Swedish Art Nouveau.

 PDF

Jorge Semprun (1923–2011) was a Spanish, politically active writer who lived in France most of his life. He served as minister of culture in Spain’s socialist government from 1988 to 1991.
His interest which manifested itself in the extensive and recurring references, made in his works, to three pain­tings from 17th century Holland, Italy and Spain lies mainly in the renovation, the new life that he attributes to them by integrating baroque works in the history of modern Europe. Three famous paintings, Johannes Vermeer’s View of Houses in Delft, the Judith Slaying Holofernes of Artemisia Gentileschi and Diego Velasquez’s Las Meninas find a new place in history of art as their initial “life” in Delft, Rome and Madrid respectively is imbricated, on multiple levels, with persons and events of the contemporary era.
Further, the views of the writer connected with his ideas on how to exhibit baroque works in today’s museums, his self-awareness as a citizen of Europe and a sense of responsibility related to his institutional position as minister of culture in Spain, greatly contribute to the actual debate on the interaction between the 21st and the 17th century.

 PDF