World War I and the Rise of Modernism Exhibition Examines War’s Impact on Art
“War is one of the most evil things to which we sacrificed ourselves.” –Artist Franz Marc, d. 1916, Battle of Verdun
In commemoration of the World War I centennial, this exhibition tells the story of Modernist art and artists and the war that changed the world forever. On view in World War I and the Rise of Modernism are paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculptures and decorative arts that chart the course of this turbulent era, presented in three parts: before, during and after the Great War.
Before the War
The pre-war years were marked by dramatic philosophical, social, political, scientific and technological shifts. In a blink, agricultural economies gave way to urban industries, and horse-drawn carriages to speeding automobiles. Electric lights replaced gas lanterns. X-rays made the invisible visible. The radio, telegraph and telephone connected the world in previously unimagined ways. In the process, the social fabric was torn, as many, including children, moved from farms and villages to cities to work ungoverned hours for paltry wages in factories that often robbed them of limbs, choked their lungs and left them feeling like dispirited cogs in the machine.
During these same years, artists abandoned long-established art academies in favor of experimentation and fresh vision. Rather than simply depicting the world around them, Expressionist artists like Egon Schiele, Wassily (Vasily) Kandinsky and Emil Nolde invested their art with emotional intensity expressed through vivid color, strong line and bold brushwork. In his book, Concerning the Spiritual in Art, Kandinsky envisioned art as the forerunner to a world on the brink of a new spiritual era.
In contrast, French Cubist, Italian Futurist and British Vorticist artists like Georges Braque, Umberto Boccioni and Alvin Langdon Coburn fixed their eyes and minds on new ideas about space and time, seeking to reveal, in their art, the truth of life—not in static images, but in those that were alive with moments in motion.
During the War
The June 28, 1914, assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, sparked the outbreak of World War I. While no one could have imagined it at the time, this event, augmented by a series of mutual defense treaties, would lead Europe into the chaos of expanding war. The United States entered the conflict in 1917. Fighting ended with the Armistice of November 11, 1918, and the Versailles Treaty of June 28, 1919 officially concluded the war. In its wake, the war left millions dead and gravely wounded. The sweeping influenza pandemic that followed took the lives of millions more.
The Great War shattered the internationalism of the art world, as artists found themselves in opposing military camps. Among the dead artist/soldiers were Franz Marc (Germany), Umberto Boccioni (Italy), Schiele (Austria), Henri Gaudier-Brzeska (France) and Isaac Rosenberg (Great Britain). Others lost beloved children, suffered mental collapse and endured horrific physical wounds.
Some artists continued to work. American artist Marsden Hartley, whose 1914–1915 painting, Himmel (Heaven) captures the explosive energy and heartbreak of the war, returned from Berlin to the United States. Kandinsky returned to Moscow, where he experienced his homeland as the newly-formed Soviet Union. Other artists obtained conscientious objector status and moved to neutral Switzerland. In the United States, Childe Hassam’s swiftly drawn lithographs depicting New York streets and small-town homes displaying the stars and stripes documented the patriotic fervor of a nation newly at war.
After the War
From the exhausted, post-war nations, two main artistic directions emerged. While Dadaists like Kurt Schwitters, Man Ray and Marcel Duchamp, in Zurich, Berlin and New York mocked and mourned the irrationalism of the war by embracing absurd antics, Surrealist artists like Yves Tanguy and Andre Masson, employed Freudian psychology to reveal and understand those irrational forces. In contrast, architects, artists and designers like Margarete Heymann-Löbenstein at the Bauhaus in Weimar, and later in Dessau, were dedicated to building anew. Guided by spirit and reason, they advocated efficiency, economy and quality as principles for modern living.
World War I and the Rise of Modernism
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
December 16, 2014–July 19, 2015
–By Jan Schall, Sanders Sosland Curator, Modern Art, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art
