Here's how art history was taught to me:
Academic art ruled at the start of the nineteenth century, but because it was bad - for reasons which no one ever explained - and brown, it was up to Impressionism to save the day with colour. Post impressionism came next and evolved into Cubism, when Cezanne paved the way for Picasso's demolition job. Then along came Dada and Surrealism, plus Vorticism and some other ugly, spiky stuff. Abstract Expressionism was the next big thing, followed by Pop Art, and a bunch of other movements no one remembers, and Photorealism.
Then everybody got tired of thinking up names and they just called all the new art Post Modernism but still kept writing reams of guff about it.
And that brings us up to date. This version of art history cherry picks its facts, imposes an evolutionary narrative, and leaves out those artists who don't fit. It's dishonest.
Realist figurative painting didn't just stop in all that time. It was just marginalized by art critics, and sneeringly condescended to.
Academic art ruled at the start of the nineteenth century, but because it was bad - for reasons which no one ever explained - and brown, it was up to Impressionism to save the day with colour. Post impressionism came next and evolved into Cubism, when Cezanne paved the way for Picasso's demolition job. Then along came Dada and Surrealism, plus Vorticism and some other ugly, spiky stuff. Abstract Expressionism was the next big thing, followed by Pop Art, and a bunch of other movements no one remembers, and Photorealism.
Then everybody got tired of thinking up names and they just called all the new art Post Modernism but still kept writing reams of guff about it.
And that brings us up to date. This version of art history cherry picks its facts, imposes an evolutionary narrative, and leaves out those artists who don't fit. It's dishonest.
Realist figurative painting didn't just stop in all that time. It was just marginalized by art critics, and sneeringly condescended to.
'This denigration of academic art reached its peak through the writings of art critic Clement Greenberg who stated that all academic art is "kitsch". References to academic art were gradually removed from histories of art and textbooks by modernists, who justified doing this in the name of cultural revolution. For most of the 20th century, academic art was completely obscured, only brought up rarely,...for the purpose of ridiculing it and the bourgeois society which supported it, laying a groundwork for the importance of modernism...'
Wikipedia
Wikipedia
The only trustworthy version of art history is the one you write for yourself. Exposure to art you might never have had the chance to see can only help you expand your view of what art matters. So here's a different version of art history for you to explore using Google Image Search.
It's no more 'true' than the official Modernist version, but it contains many more good paintings and is thereby more satisfying. There is no one true version of art history. When an intellectual mafia try to tell you otherwise, it's because they have a political agenda which they are crafting a story to support.
The only true judge of any art is your eye. To look at art through the lens of art criticism or the frame provided by exhibition organisers, with their selections and omissions, and carefully worded texts with their implicit baggage of disdain and prejudice, is to be misled. You are unwittingly co-opted into a world view you do not share.
You are impoverished by their choices.
Here is the only test you need apply to any art you see:
'Would I like to hang that on my wall?'
The only true judge of any art is your eye. To look at art through the lens of art criticism or the frame provided by exhibition organisers, with their selections and omissions, and carefully worded texts with their implicit baggage of disdain and prejudice, is to be misled. You are unwittingly co-opted into a world view you do not share.
You are impoverished by their choices.
Here is the only test you need apply to any art you see:
'Would I like to hang that on my wall?'
