Task 3 - Avant-Garde.

Adbusters - unswooshing, Nike Running - 2011
www.adbusters.org/content
Avant-gardism is a movement within art and design that aims to redefine traditional and well known conventions within artistic practice in order to pave the way for other like minded artists and designers to follow. This can be for purposes of progressing design or with a political or social agenda, however the term avant-garde has been over used and neutralised. Here I have chosen an adbusters piece which caught my eye because of its use of a very strong political message. This piece is not particularly avant-garde in its design or technique, however the delivery of its message is in such a way to attempt to change peoples opinions on a social situation. This is clever in the way that it mocks Nikes actual advertisements by almost copying the exact style in which they would be produced. By being unoriginal, it is in turn becoming original in its use of an existing style as a negative to push their message.


www.typographicposters.com

Here is a second piece of design that I would consider to be avant-garde and I think its avant-garde qualities are much more evident when you realise that this is a typographic poster. It shows a movement away from clearly legible type and communicating the message simply to a much more abstract type style. It challenges traditional conventions of both type and communication by moving completely away from legibility in favour of an entirely abstract and image based poster. Possibly an attempt to change design and progress from current type and layout conventions to much more aesthetically based pieces. The avant-garde element in this piece however is based entirely in its appearance and it doesn't appear to mock other art styles or portray any deep social message.

Formative Feedback.

tasks completed but need publishing on the blog.

continue with retyping lecture notes so as to gain best understanding.

Essay - Q2
research constructivism
tate modern catalogue - Rodchenko and Popova.

Structure 
- define socio cultural context  1917
- constructivism as a response.
-two examples.

working from this feedback and

Defining the 'Avant-garde'

dictionaries link term avant-garde with terms like innovation in the arts or pioneers.
Term 'Avant-garde' is in popular discourse but is neutralised because of its frequent use.

MARCEL DUCHAMP

Authentically 'Avant-garde'
-mocking art
-mocking elitism
-looks at what art is...
and challenges conventions surrounding what art is.

 Makes people re-assess conventions of art.
'Fauves'
Wild beasts
Grounded in the real - aggressive
Seeking to redefine conventions by which art is defined.
does something new, trying to redefine the use of technique within art.

Classical art and established conventions were based in fantasy scenes.
Avant-garde seeks to do something new.
ALL ABOUT CHALLENGING CONVENTIONS.

takes a romantic philosophy - idealising individual geniuses.  
Rooted in the myth of the Avant-garde.

Artists are above society or outside.
people shouldn't understand them as they're too edgy.
Kurt Cobain?


CHATTERTON 
People didn't understand him
Tortured genius

A painting of him having killed himself as society didn't make the effort to understand him...

Designers- not necessarily original when faced with certain briefs.

art academies.
-assigned to a master
-copy his work & style.
-do background work for them until accomplished

therefore they weren't original themselves

Art is socially important
Work for money!

Revolutionary- comminade of Paris - political gesture
-why is it challenging/shocking
-raise the working class.

against conventions by painting the poor... something people didn't do.


AVANT-GARDE
military term
vanguard - paved the way for others to follow
both politically and aesthetically.

"Art for art's sake"
Autonomous.
-above the world
-normal beings will not understand

gap between what the artist thinks they are doing and how the public perceive it.
which is why they would not understand if the work made no sense.
Because the artist was being so avant-garde

Significant art
CLIVE BELL

"the relations and combinations of lines and colours, which when organised give the power to move someone aesthetically."

Aesthetically pure.
-sense that you improved as people just from looking at it, and trying to understand them

often claimed that people weren't clever enough to recognise significant form, inventing reason for arts importance.


Clement Greenberg.
Abstraction became art distilled to its purest form.
Greenberg's pinnacle of art.
Pollock's Lavender mist
-symbol of decadence in western culture
-pretentious, snobby and elitist.

Beatrice Ward
The crystal goblet.
"The good graphic designer is invisible"

Jock Kinnear (1963)
for example road signs, and the typeface created and so on... created solely for communication.

Stephen Sagmeister (1997)
communication is secondary to experimentation in his spreads.

Fails or doesn't adhere to taste & says there is a society that does adhere to taste and works.
making a value judgement.

What is kitsch?
idea that it is inferior
-lower quality
-bad taste
-patronising loveability

Kitsch aspires to be art but somehow fails to be taken seriously.
Constables Hay Wain is not kitsch.

This certainly is. Kitsch takes into account cultural standards.
The place for art is in galleries.

The last supper on a coaster...
"the last pub lunch"
trying to use a modern style on a classic piece by Da Vinci

commemorative plates cups and goods for royal events.
-sense of kitsch
-supposed to be moved by art not china sets.

animal themes are definitely kitsch. 

Graphic design is not seen in galleries so is not viewed as art.
viewed differently.

Jeff Koons Michael Jackson & bubbles the monkey
Art because it was made by a famous artist.
would be seen as kitsch if it weren't for the recognisable name that produced it.

Pop art
inserting design into galleries as a political point. 

Thomas Kinkade. 
(painter of light) 
fictional chocolate box past. 
selling his works on QVC


Graphic design aims to be meaningful to everyone, whereas art seems to aim to a select few. 


Damien Hirst
"wow, fabulous shark in a box..."
people buy works like these as status symbols as they are produced by artists.
when they know nothing about them.


'For the love of Gold'
simply about monetary value. 

avant-garde's trying to out avant-garde each other.
corrupt money laundering!
Adbusters.
possibility that design is avant-garde.

Lenin...

"This struggle must be organised, according to “all the rules of the art”, by people who are professionally engaged in revolutionary activity."

Lenin, What Is To Be Done?, “The Primitiveness of the Economists and the Organization of the Revolutionaries” (1901)

Essay Feedback

Issues discussed
lots of research done so far.
quotes to back up points!
try to find quote from Lenin about the importance of art and its new role.
400-socio cultural context
400-construction as a response
500-2 examples

make sure to reference all research sources.


Student action
have done by 25th Jan

Communism!

com·mu·nism 

n.

1. A theoretical economic system characterized by the collective ownership of property and by the organization of labor for the common advantage of all members.

2. Communism

a. A system of government in which the state plans and controls the economy and a single, often authoritarian party holds power, claiming to make progress toward a higher social order in which all goods are equally shared by the people.

b. The Marxist-Leninist version of Communist doctrine that advocates the overthrow of capitalism by the revolution of the proletariat.

Definition from :
www.thefreedictionary.com, (accessed 11th January 2011)

Essay Research

THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION.
The Russian Revolution is the collective term for a series of revolutions in Russia in 1917, which destroyed the Tsarist autocracy and led to the creation of the Soviet Union. The Tsar was deposed and replaced by a provisional government in the first revolution of February 1917 (March in the Gregorian calendar; the older Julian calendar was in use in Russia at the time). In the second revolution, during October, the Provisional Government was removed and replaced with a Bolshevik (Communist) government.

A period of dual power ensued, during which the Provisional Government held state power while the national network of Soviets, led by socialists, had the allegiance of the lower-class citizens and the political left. During this chaotic period there were frequent mutinies and many strikes. When the Provisional Government chose to continue fighting the war with Germany, the Bolsheviks and other socialist factions campaigned for the abandonment of the war effort. The Bolsheviks formed workers militias under their control into the Red Guards (later the Red Army) over which they exerted substantial control.

In the October Revolution (November in the Gregorian calendar), the Bolshevik party, led by Vladimir Lenin, and the workers' Soviets, overthrew the Provisional Government in St Petersburg. The Bolsheviks appointed themselves as leaders of various government ministries and seized control of the countryside, establishing the Cheka to quash dissent. To end the war, the Bolshevik leadership signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany in March 1918.

Civil war erupted between the "Red" (Bolshevik), and "White" (anti-Bolshevik) factions, which was to continue for several years, with the Bolsheviks ultimately victorious. In this way the Revolution paved the way for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). While many notable historical events occurred in Moscow and St Petersburg, there was also a broad-based movement in cities throughout the state, among national minorities throughout the empire, and in the rural areas, where peasants took over and redistributed land.
(www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Revolution_(1917)) 

THE WINTER PALACE

The Winter Palace  in Saint Petersburg, Russia, was, from 1732 to 1917, the official residence of the Russian Tsars. The present and fourth Winter Palace was built and altered almost continuously between the late 1730s and 1837, when it was severely damaged by fire and immediately rebuilt. The storming of the palace in 1917 became an iconic symbol of the Russian Revolution.
(www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_palace)

CONSTRUCTIVISM
Constructivism was an artistic and architectural movement that originated in Russia from 1919 onward which rejected the idea of "art for art's sake" in favour of art as a practice directed towards social purposes. Constructivism as an active force lasted until around 1934, having a great deal of effect on developments in the art of the Weimar Republic and elsewhere, before being replaced by Socialist Realism. Its motifs have sporadically recurred in other art movements since. (Franz Ferdinand?)

The technique of constructing sculpture from separate elements, as opposed to modelling or carving, was developed by Pablo Picasso in 1912, extending the planar language of Cubism into three dimensions. This method was elaborated in Russia, initially by Vladimir Tatlin from 1914 onwards and then by his many followers, who, like him, made abstract sculptures that explored the textural and spatial qualities of combinations of contemporary materials such as metal, glass, wood and cardboard.

Russian artists did not begin to call their work ‘constructions’ and themselves ‘constructivists’ until after the Revolution of 1917. Coining the latter term, the First Working Group of Constructivists, also known as the Working Group of Constructivists, was set up in March 1921 within Inkhuk (Institute of Artistic Culture) in Moscow. The group comprised Aleksey Gan (1893–1942), Aleksandr Rodchenko, Varvara Stepanova, Konstantin Medunetsky, Karl Ioganson (1890–1929) and the brothers Georgy Stenberg and Vladimir Stenberg.

‘Construction’ was seen to have connotations of technology and engineering and therefore to be characterized by economy of materials, precision, clarity of organization and the absence of decorative or superfluous elements.

In order to give their work the quality of ‘construction’, the artists increasingly renounced abstract painting in favour of working with industrial materials in space. Sculptures they showed displayed a strong commitment to the materials and forms of contemporary technology. The Stenbergs, for instance, created skeletal forms from materials such as glass, metal and wood, evoking engineering structures such as bridges and cranes. Rodchenko showed a series of hanging constructions based on mathematical forms; they consisted of concentric shapes cut from a single plane of plywood, rotated to create a three-dimensional geometric form that is completely permeated by space.

As much as involving itself in designs for industry, the Constructivists worked on public festivals and street designs for the post-October revolution Bolshevik government. Perhaps the most famous of these was in Vitebsk, where Malevich's UNOVIS Group painted propaganda plaques and buildings, the best known being El Lissitzky's poster Beat the Whites with the Red Wedge (1919). Inspired by Vladimir Mayakovsky's declaration 'the streets our brushes, the squares our palettes', artists and designers participated in public life throughout the Civil War. A striking instance was the proposed festival for the Comintern congress in 1921 by Alexander Vesnin and Liubov Popova, which resembled the constructions of the OBMOKhU exhibition as well as their work for the theatre. There was a great deal of overlap in this period between Constructivism and Proletkult, the ideas of which concerning the need to create an entirely new culture struck a chord with the Constructivists. In addition some Constructivists were heavily involved in the 'ROSTA Windows', a Bolshevik public information campaign of around 1920. Some of the most famous of these were by the poet-painter Vladimir Mayakovsky and Vladimir Lebedev.

As a part of the early Soviet youth movement, the constructivists took an artistic outlook aimed to encompass cognitive, material activity, and the whole of spirituality of mankind. The artists tried to create works that would take the viewer out of the traditional setting and make them an active viewer of the artwork. In this it had similarities with the Russian Formalists' theory of 'making strange', and accordingly their leading theorist Viktor Shklovsky worked closely with the Constructivists, as did other formalists like Osip Brik. These theories were tested in the theatre, particularly in the work of Vsevolod Meyerhold, who had set up what he called 'October in the theatre'. Meyerhold developed a 'biomechanical' acting style, which was influenced both by the circus and by the 'scientific management' theories of Frederick Winslow Taylor. Meanwhile the stage sets by the likes of Vesnin, Popova and Stepanova tested out Constructivist spatial ideas in a public form. A more populist version of this was developed by Alexander Tairov, with stage sets by Aleksandra Ekster and the Stenberg Brothers. These ideas would go on to influence German directors like Bertolt Brecht and Erwin Piscator, as well as the early Soviet cinema.
(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_%28art%29)

Vladimir Tatlin
Vladimir Yevgrafovich Tatlin (December 28 [O.S. December 16] 1885 – May 31, 1953) was a Russian and Soviet painter and architect. With Kazimir Malevich he was one of the two most important figures in the Russian avant-garde art movement of the 1920s, and he later became the most important artist in the Constructivist movement. He is most famous for his attempts to create the giant tower, The Monument to the Third International.

The Monument is generally considered to be the defining expression of architectural constructivism, rather than a buildable project. Even if the gigantic amount of required steel had been available in revolutionary Russia, in the context of housing shortages and political turmoil, there are serious doubts about its structural practicality.

The Constructivists' main political patron early on was Leon Trotsky, and it began to be regarded with suspicion after the expulsion of Trotsky and the Left Opposition in 1927-8. The Communist Party would gradually come to favour realist art over the course of the 1920s (as early as 1918 Pravda had complained that government funds were being used to buy works by untried artists). However it wasn't until around 1934 that the counter-doctrine of Socialist Realism was instituted in Constructivism's place. Many Constructivists continued to produce avantgarde work in the service of the state, such as in Lissitzky, Rodchenko and Stepanova's designs for the magazine USSR In Construction
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Tatlin)

RODCHENKO & POPOVA

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/rodchenkopopova/

The Bolshevik Revolution aimed to transform an entire civilisation, and artists were among the first to show their support. There was already a distinct strain of utopianism in the Russian avant-garde – a determination to reinvent art, as if from zero. Kasimir Malevich's abstract paintings freed art from what he called 'the dead weight of the real world'. Equally radical were Vladimir Tatlin's Counter-Reliefs, made by assembling real materials, such as wood, glass and metal into three-dimensional constructions.

Following these examples, the Constructivists rejected all ideas of illusory representation. Rodchenko focused on faktura, the physical qualities of the painting: the use of different paints and different textures, and how these related to other elements such as the painting surface, or the choice of colour. His experiments led to the 'Black on Black' series, in which the elimination of colour focused attention on the texture of the painting's surface, and its interaction with light. In these works, Stepanova wrote, 'nothing but painting exists'.

Popova's Painterly Architectonics respond to some of Malevich's ideas, but push them further. Geometric shapes jostle together, overlapping,intersecting, their edges pressing beyond the frame. A dynamic sense of instability and movement is matched by her use of strong colour. As the title suggests, Popova was already looking beyond painting, into architecture and three-dimensional structures, yet cramming that expansive energy onto the flat surface of a painting.

Rodchenko made his first freestanding abstract sculptures in 1918, and later suggested that these geometric constructions, made using everyday materials, 'signified the abandonment of painting for the move toward real space'. While Tatlin’s Counter-Reliefs were mounted on the wall, he noted, his own Spatial Constructions could be looked at from all sides. Their extravagant configuration of geometric forms in space would be echoed in his architectural designs.