Early Modern Art.

 Introduction to Dada and Surrealism:

In the wake of the First World War, many were left broken emotionally and mentally turning their attention to the arts as a way of escape for the horrors endured. Veterans of the Western Front especially saw the worst of the fighting from their dark, damp, and cramped trench networks which spanned miles of once beautiful countryside into an artillery hammered, muddy hell of which there seemed to be no escape. Largely caused by unchecked nationalism and saber-rattling that fueled the war, dada and surrealism acted as a reaction towards those them by often depicting the senselessness of endeavors. Dada being German for 'yes yes' but with a nihilist sub tone and surrealism drawing from a dream-like nature, even nightmares.

 Indeed many of the most well-known artists and writers of the 1920s and 30s were veterans of the Great War using their sorrow to fuel their passion of the arts, not only to help them escape from the hell on earth they had been dragged through but to help others as well along with showing to the public the futility that war had become far removed from the glory and honor that generals and statesmen proclaimed it wars.  

The Lovers - Rene Margritte (1928)

 A hallmark feature of surrealism is not just something unusual or odd, seemingly out of place, but a sense of unnerving. Rene Margritte is probably the most well-known and well-regarded surrealist artists who's work defined the genre, his style is very normal but with a twist that often comes off as a bit unsettling. Here is a couple in the park or some wooded area but they have sheets over their faces completely hiding them from sight, and that's why I find some of his work unsettling or at least uncanny: something is wrong, you know its wrong, but you will never know what is causing things to be wrong.

Margritte loved to put a mystery in his art and loved to have that sort of uncanny-ness to his work, always refusing to give direct explanations only ever adding more intrigue and mystery to his already unusual works. His influence has become characteristic of surrealism, things that shouldn't act or move in a certain way, things that are out of place, or just seem a bit off. Its probably why Rene Margritte is one of my favorite artists of all time since his work is fairly simple in its nature such as a couple in the park or a man with a suit and bowler hat but with a slight twist to it which gives it that bigger impact. You do not see their faces, you never will see them, but that only makes you want to look into it more. 

Stormtroopers Advance Under a Gas Attack - Otto Dix (1924)

 

Stormtroopers Advance under Gas Attack is an etching by German artist Otto Dix depicting a group of German soldiers on the move through No Man's Land reflecting the jagged and desolate terrain covered with barbed wire and the remains of trees that are still standing despite the constant barrage the regions that saturated the Western Front. Dix was a veteran of the First World War serving as an artilleryman and served from 1915 until war's end in 1918, he had witnessed much of the conflict and had suffered injury many times which would later color his future artworks. Dix's work would become of the most well-known artwork of the Great War in Germany, being even shown posthumously on a celebratory Euro coin for his 125th birthday.

It was apart of a larger series of works known as 'Der Krieg' (The War in English) where he put his thoughts and memories of the war to the canvas. A sort of dark realism in its imagery of the entire conflict which had scared him dramatically. The soldiers are something out of a nightmare, the gas masks make them seem less human and more animalistic just as many other artists and writers of the era had shown the brutality and loss of humanity from it all. It has been a piece about WW1 that has been ingrained in my head since I first saw it years ago during my high school years as apart of a documentary about the Lost Generation.

Drought Stricken Area - Alexander Hogue (1934)

A piece made by Alexander Hogue not only during the height of the Great Depression during the first Dust Bowl droughts which had ravaged must of the Mid-Western United States which made an already terrible tragedy even worse. This was made when American Regionalism was in vogue, depicting things currently ongoing in America or things Americans thought as traditional to the country. Hogue spent the majority of his life living in places like Oklahoma and Texas, two of the states hit hardest by the Dust Bowl and had decimated much of their economies since at the time livestock made up a much large share of the Southern economy along with the oil we often associate Texas with today. 

From what was once a humble ranch in Texas is now left desolate, buried in sand with no hope in sight. Its reflective of how dire Dust Bowl era America had become as the Depression had wiped out peoples' savings and confidence in money as they could not afford to get supplies to fix and restore their property and being forced to move on to somewhere more promising. The late 20s and early 30s were a time of great uncertainty, influencing more than just art and into literature such as The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. Indeed a lot of the artwork from this early is often bleak, hopeless, or seemingly without any semblance of sense.

Conclusion:

The early modern era was characterized with great conflict and strife, the world war had consumed millions of lives and left millions feeling lost, followed by the Great Depression which then destroyed the financial security of millions more. This was a period of despair, the culture of the Roaring 20s was driven from the urge to trying and move on from the bleakness that had followed in the wake of the First World War where many had lost their families or belongings. 

References:

Otto Dix: An Artist’s Life Shaped By War

Alexander Hogue - Drought Stricken Area

American Regionalism Overview

Dada Movement Overivew and Ideas

Dadaism - Art and Anti Art

The Lovers 1928, Rene Magritte

Otto Dix, Stormtroopers advance under gas attack