Synthetic Cubism
History, Characteristics of Cubist Painting,
Collage, Papier Colles.
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Synthetic Cubism |
 Still Life with Guitar (1922) by Pablo Picasso. |
Synthetic Cubism (1912-14)• Introduction:
History & Characteristics |
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BEST MODERN PAINTING TWENTIETH
CENTURY ARTISTS ABSTRACTION |
Introduction: History & Characteristics Following the phases of Early Cubist Painting and Analytical Cubism, the third and final act of the Cubist collaboration between Georges Braque (1882-1963) and Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) occurred during the period 1912-14. Known as Synthetic Cubism, this symbolic style of art is more colourful than the earlier analytic form of Cubism, incorporates a wide variety of extraneous materials, and is particularly associated with Picasso's novel technique of collage, and Braque's papier colles. The Spaniard Juan Gris (1887-1927) was also a major contributor to the new style. If analytical Cubism provided a revolutionary painterly alternative to single point linear perspective, synthetic Cubism was equally innovative in its use of collage and papier colles, both of which bridged the gap between life and art by inserting pieces of the real world onto the canvas. They also highlighted the fact that a painting is a two dimensional flat object and blurred the line between painting and sculpture. It had a notable influence on later movements such as Dada (c.1916-24) Surrealism (1924 onwards) and Pop Art (c.1960-75). Picasso's synthetic Cubism coincided with his move from Bohemian Monmartre to Montparnasse, and ended with the outbreak of war in Autumn 1914, shortly after which Braque left to fight and Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler (the duo's main art dealer) fled to Switzerland. As a Spanish neutral, Picasso was free to continue his painting career in Paris. |
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EVOLUTION
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From Analytical to Synthetic Cubism This new synthetic form of Cubist art reversed the compositional principle of analytical Cubism. Instead of breaking down an object into fragments and then re-assembling them (analytical Cubism), the image was being built up (synthesized) from new elements and shapes. The two main techniques they used were collage (from the French "coller", meaning to stick) and papier colles (from the French, meaning pasted paper). The new type of modern art emerged in two particular works. In The Portuguese (1911, Kunstmuseum, Basel), Braque had introduced the use of stencilled lettering, and in the following year he began to experiment with mixing materials such as sand and sawdust with his paint, in order to create interesting textures. Picasso produced his first collage (Still Life with Chair-Caning, 1911-12, Musee Picasso, Paris), in which he incorporated a piece of oilcloth and a length of rope whereupon Braque responded by pasting pieces of printed or decorative colour paper onto his paintings in much in the same way as a collage, except the shape of the pasted papers were objects themselves. He first used papier colles in Fruit Dish and Glass (1912, private collection). Synthesis to Create Modern Art This process of incorporating scraps of everyday materials (newspaper cuttings, tickets, tobacco wrappers etc) into their paintings, marked a move away from the austere intellectualism of analytical Cubism, towards a more relaxed and whimsical aesthetic. The theory was that, by introducing physical elements of real life, paintings would become more 'real'. In addition, the use of commonplace bits and pieces of daily rubbish was a deliberate attack on the superior image and high-mindedness of fine art. The inclusion of these items suggested that art could be made with scissors and glue as easily as with brushes and paint - a liberating and most unconventional approach for those days. The chosen genre was, for the most part, still life, and one overt consequence of their concern with greater surface richness, was that Braque and Picasso (and especially Juan Gris) reintroduced colour to their painting. |
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Both artists were delighted with their fake textures and surfaces. Picasso in particular used collage to amuse spectators with witty transformations of everyday objects, and took full advantage of the whimsicality of the medium. Although he had co-invented Cubism to make a serious point, one feels that his puckish sense of humour prevented him from taking the movement as seriously as (say) Apollinaire, or Albert Gleizes and Jean Metzinger, whose books had established Cubism as an ultra-intellectual type of art. After all, simply pasting bits of rubbish onto a painting did not inevitably make it more real. Indeed many materials were used to create an illusion of reality, the very thing that Picasso and Braque had criticized traditional fine art for, in its reliance on single point perspective. In general, however, most art critics treat synthetic Cubism very seriously and read enormous significance into its use of non-art materials. They see the style as the starting point for a number of junk art movements and anti-art schools such as Dada. Greatest Synthetic Cubist Paintings Here is a short list of some of the best synthetic Cubist works by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque. Pablo Picasso: Georges Braque: For works by other Cubists, like Fernand Leger (1881-1955), Robert Delaunay (1885-1941), see Cubist Painters. |
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