A piece of Art never stands on its own - written by Daantje

An essay on the exchange between various forms of art, specified on photography and kubism and minimalism in connection to the artists: Ugo Malas and Alexandre Calder

The inventions and the great discoveries have opened up whole continents to reciprocal communication and interchange, provided we are willing.

-          Ava Myrdal

In my previous posts I discussed the exchange of thought between the artist Ugo  Malas and Alexander, who were both grasped by the sense of simplicity in the arts. Both were heavily influenced by the abstract minimalistic art of Piet Mondriaan who’s influence can be felt throughout bold shapes and especially colours of his work. Alexander Calder, mainly worked in architecture and three-dimensional (street) art. One can say that both were products of their own period and time in the arts.

Just to show the striking resemblance between for instance Alexander Calder and Piet Mondriaan, one should observe the images posted below. The use of highly pigmented and rather simple colours and shapes are quite noticeable. Also, this simplicity translates itself to the work of Ugo Malas.

Of course photography is quite a new medium, compared to mediums such as paintings, sculpture and architecture. Nonetheless, when photography was invented in the 18th century, one could immediately feel its influence in the realm of painting. Most obviously, one can direct their attention to the vast amount of paintings made of ballet performances. In photography, it often happened a foot or another body part was cut of from the picture. This was never the case in painting, due to extremely strict rules on composition and overall taste. However, as we approach the 19th century, people began to break free of artistic dogma’s. Most known figures are for instance van Gogh and Manet etc. Below you can clearly observe an example, in this case a marvelous painting of Degas, of a painting influenced by the new technique of photography;

To truly illustrate the incredibly paradigm shift in the arts in the early 19th century I would like to share the following story with you:

Paris in the beginning of the 1900 up until the 1960, experienced their years of glory in the field of the modern arts. All the artists all over the world all wanted the same thing; to Paris, since that’s where it was all happening. Picasso, Salvador Dali, they all hastened themselves towards Paris. It is no coincidence that now in 2011, we still marvel at that period. Moreover, the new film: ‘midnight in Paris’, concerns itself with a character that goes to contemporary Paris, but dreams of the Paris as it was one hundred years ago, hence the starry sky of van Gogh, that fills the sky:

Everyone wanted to know what was going on in Paris, also the great Piet Mondriaan, the inspiration of Ugo Malas and Alexander Calder. He was incredibly curious about the developments in Paris, most particularly, ‘kubism’. Since in those days they didn’t have internet, the only way he could gather information about it was through friends and acquaintances who went there. The most significant principle of kubism is the desire to paint, on a 2-dimensional item, all the various perspectives of an object or an subject, to make it 3-dimensional almost. He, completely missed the point; Mondriaan set out to make his own version, which of course had nothing to do with kubism, but he thought, if I put down the most weird figures and colours it shall be kubism. Naturally, it was more expressionism than anything else:

He even went a little bit further by painting an object, of which he was convinced: ‘this is kubism’

However, when he eventually did set sail for Paris, he discovered the true spirit of kubism. The most significant piece, that influenced him on his turn was: the violin, by Brague Georges.

You can truly see the various sides of a violin.

Now Mondriaan understood the concept and he made a remake of his painting: ‘stilleven met gemberpot’

 Afterwards, Mondriaan developed himself with the abstract shapes we all know of him.

One can see there's a long line of influencing going on until we finally get to Ugo Malas: Braque Georges - Piet Mondriaan - Alexandre Cadras - Ugo Malas. Of course, this is an ovre simplification and there were many many more artists that inspired one another, but it just goes to show how much everything is interwoven.

We can conclude that we are all part of one great narrative, a narrative of art, of which the literature develops itself in pieces of art, be it sculptures, architecture, paintings or photography. In all, a piece of art never truly stands on its own. The real question becomes, who do you include in your story of art?

* inspiration from: De wereld draait door. 19th of Oktober 2011