Quart

Od Redakcji

Romuald Kaczmarek — 2024-10-07

Od Redakcji

Romuald Kaczmarek — 2024-10-07

Counter-colonial unfoldings of cubism in Latin America: The works of Wifredo Lam, Fernando de Szyszlo, and Francisco Matto

Elena O’Neill — 2024-10-07

The exceptional cubist configuration is often thought of as a French movement. Nevertheless, beneath the geographical label lies a hidden truth: an art that arises in Paris but relies on the cooperation of artists, critics, and art historians of various nationalities. On the one hand, the channels by which cubism established transatlantic dialogues and exchanges in different moments were diverse and in other periods. For example, by direct contact of Modern Latin American artists with the movement, art students and painters that attended the French academies, and distinguished visitors related to the movement. On the other, as in other regions, cubism circulated in Latin America, catalyzing different artistic approaches and practices that, despite sharing the same origin, resulted in a manifold of proposals and plastic forms.

The cubist influence in Latin America was not strong enough to break with previous cultural traditions. In a similar way to how Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque assimilated the lesson of African sculpture, Latin American artists also dialogued with the so-called primitive cultures of their regions, maintaining and resizing their original symbolic and mythical value.

Artists such as Tarsila de Amaral (Brazil), Cándido Portinari (Brazil), José Cúneo (Uruguay), Emilio Petorutti (Argentina), Diego Rivera (Mexico), among many others, assimilated its morphological aspect. But other artists understood cubism as a way of thinking. They assimilated its structural dimension, such as Wifredo Lam (Cuba), Francisco Matto (Uruguay), Joaquín Torres García (Uruguay), and Fernando de Szyszlo (Peru), among others.

With a theoretical frame following the considerations of Carl Einstein, Daniel- Henry Kahnweiler, and Vincenc Kramář, three art theorists who tackled cubism from different angles and in terms of man’s active participation in the creation of a new, more dynamic view of the world, this paper approaches the works of Wifredo Lam, Fernando de Szyszlo and Francisco Matto, privileging the way they deal with space and their dialogue with local ancestral traditions in the context of modern societies.

Cubism in America: Modernist explorations and domestic concerns

Herbert R. Hartel — 2024-10-07

American artists started to become aware and knowledgeable of cubism around 1910 through the galleries of Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler and Alfred Stieglitz, exhibitions like the Armory Show, private collections like Leo and Gertrude Stein and Arthur Jerome Eddy, and publications like The Rise of Cubism and Camera Work. Some of the best and earliest American cubists were Max Weber, Marsden Hartley, Lyonel Feininger, Charles Demuth, H. Lyman Säyen, Stuart Davis and Charles Sheeler. American cubists were very interested in the so-called “salon cubists” or “Puteaux cubists”, such as Fernand Léger and Albert Gleizes. Weber and Hartley developed personally distinctive styles that combine aspects of expressionism and cubism for social observation and personal revelation. American cubism developed two interconnected stylistic tendencies that are particularly American: billboard cubism and precisionism. They are characterized by sharp contours, flattened, emphatically geometric and abruptly juxtaposed forms, smooth and bright surfaces, clear mechanical and industrial references, and references to advertising, packaging, logos and labels. This extremely American sensibility is seen in the work of Davis, Demuth and Sheeler.

Transnationality and stylistic ideology in semi-cubist Finnish art between 1914 and 1923

Timo Huusko — 2024-10-07

The article focuses on the changes in Finnish modern art and artistic discourse caused by World War I and Finnish Independence in 1917–1918. World War I changed artistic networks radically, because travel to France was no more possible, and Independence of Finland changed the art world with the ideas of national modernism. These changes centred in Finland around the role of cubism – seen as a logical continuation of Paul Cézanne’s art – and were expressed in both formal language and artistic discourse. Questions of “primitive” in art and its connection to cubism and to what is national in art were also essential in defining Finnish modernism and avant-garde in around 1917–1920. There was small exhibition of French cubism in Helsinki in 1915, but otherwise knowledge of cubism came via second-hand sources, such as lectures, art magazines and Der Sturm Gallery’s exhibitions. Norwegian art historian Jens Thiis had a strong impact on notions of cubism in Finland.

It is in my interest to show that there were transnational connections between Scandinavia, Russia and Finland, and also more or less between Finland and oth- er “new states”, which were born after Austro-Hungarian, German and Russian empires collapsed. These connections can be seen in formal elements and iconography of kind of cubo-expressionism, which was a kind of fusion of cubist structuralism and expressionist emotion. This “semi-cubism” seemed to serve as stylistic ideology or ideological tool for those who had thoughts of national modernism in countries like Poland (formists), Latvia (artists like Jēkabs Kazaks), Estonia (artists like Jaan Vahtra and Märt Laarman) and Finland (art of the so called November Group). It is obvious that artists in Finland were not conscious of what happened on the southern side of the Baltic Sea, but there are so many parallels which were born by shared general views of the role of new art, that it is possible to see not only France, Norway or Russia, but also Poland, Latvia and Estonia as artistically close to Finland, when one tries to map the topography of Finnish semi-cubism in late 1910s and early 1920s.

Cubism in Sweden – from experimental to moderate

Margareta Wallin Wictorin — 2024-10-07

In this article, examples of various forms of cubism practiced by Swedish artists are described and analyzed regarding form, content and reception in the field. A certain emphasis is placed on female artists, since there is a need for differencing the narrative of modernism regarding women’s contributions, often disregarded in their own contexts as well as in the writing of art history. Attention has also been paid to changing notions of cubism in the field of art.

In the early years of cubism, from the 1910s, a considerable number of Swedish artists experimented enthusiastically with prismatic and other cubist effects in their paintings. Many of them went to Paris, Berlin and Copenhagen to see the new art, and brought new ideas to Sweden. For most of the artists who experimented with different kinds of cubism, it was a temporary activity, although many of them felt they had acquired new insights concerning artistic form. Some of them further developed their findings into new directions of modernist art, such as post-cubism, purism and concrete art. Women artists were active in all of these movements.

The art market in Stockholm thrived in the 1910s and 1920s. Several of the art critics and large parts of the art audience had difficulties understanding cubism, and rejected the non-figurative art exhibited at the Stockholm exhibition in 1930. However, most Swedish cubism proved to be of a moderate sort, such as the works by Georg Pauli. On the other hand, Agnes Cleve, Siri Derkert, Gösta Adrian-Nilsson (GAN), and Otto G. Carlsund never ceased to generate bold forms and compositions. Regardless, it took a long time for Swedish art audiences to accept this form of visual art.

Mauzoleum Hoymów w Brzegu Dolnym – wybitna realizacja klasycystyczna czy typowy produkt epoki?

Agata Kubala — 2024-10-07

The paper is a contribution to the discussion on the mausoleum of the Hoym family in Brzeg Dolny, which was sparked by Jerzy Kos’s article published in “Quart” No. 1 in 2023. The author argues that the mausoleum should be regarded as a specimen of the Greek revival style. The edifice is a typical product of its times and one of the multiple park buildings based on the then-fashionable British models. Its uniqueness lies in that it is the oldest preserved structure in the Greek revival style deliberately designed for sepulchral and commemorative ends.

„Zlata Praha”? Praskie „city” przebudowane w XIX i XX wieku

Agnieszka Zabłocka-Kos — 2024-10-07

Prague’s Old Town was thoroughly rebuilt and modernised over the two previous centuries. What one can see today is the shape the historic centre was given in the second half of the 19th c., during the Belle Époque, in the interwar period and, partly, after the World War II. The story of this metamorphosis is related in the monumental Město v bouři. Urbanismus a architektura historického centra Prahy 1830–1970 by Richard Biegel, a Czech historian of art from the Charles University in Prague (2022). The large-format, superbly illustrated book is a treasury of knowledge on the formation of Prague’s “city” and the disappearance of its prior picturesque architecture. It shows that, like in Vienna and Paris, demolition was massive in the centre of Prague, where streets were straightened, new traffic routes were laid out, and huge houses were erected alongside new department stores. The article discusses the content of Biegel’s study, offering numerous comments and research recommendations. With its precious, multifarious exploration of Prague’s “city”, the volume gives a fresh impulse to the comparative study of Central European towns.

Interplay of art and faith in women’s communities: Developing a heightened awareness of research perspectives and evolving methodologies

Anna Markowska — 2024-10-07

The Lost and Found: Revising Art Stories in Search of Potential Changes marked the inaugural conference of a collaborative initiative between the University of Wroclaw, Universidade Nova de Lisboa and the Polish Institute for World Art Studies in Warsaw. This unique meeting brought together university researchers and artists, creating a stimulating atmosphere. The collaborative artistic endeavours undertaken aimed to build community and explore alternative knowledge production rooted in affectivity and openness to surprise, rather than an immediate quest for success. The focus was on a shared experience of being together and learning about each other’s roles beyond the conventional boundaries of scholars and artists. At the heart of the conference was the project Residua of Pre-Modern Relations with Art in Selected Contemporary Convents in Lesser Poland and Lower Silesia, supported by the National Science Centre in Warsaw. Although the residues and anachronisms discussed during the meeting did not explicitly refer to religious orders, they provided insights into the significance of faith and the evolving nature of the sacred in contemporary art. The project’s premise challenged the distinction between the religious and the spiritual, emphasizing the roles of community, respect, and care. It was hypothesized that female religious orders maintain these values in relation to the place of art in everyday life. Consequently, if an art historian wishes to study the relationship between women’s art and the sacred in everyday life, they should learn from nuns and female artists, not merely study them.