Man Ray, An American in Paris - Ciel de Paris

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Minimalism: Specific Objects and Experienced Variable

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By Alexandra A Jopp Analyses of the Minimalist artists Donald Judd and Robert Morris generally focus on their three-dimensional work. The aesthetics of both artists are based on the principles of geometrical abstraction, the placement of simple geometric forms in non-illusionistic space, combined into non-objective compositions. Morris and Judd doubted the value of the compositional norms of European art, praised Pollock and moved artistic sculpture in the direction of architecture. Michael Fried’s essay “Art and Objecthood,” first published in 1967 in Art Forum , though, criticizes Minimalism, specifically mentioning Judd and Morris, whose work, Fried writes, showed a tendency toward objecthood, a term that contains the antitheses to art. Carl Andre. American, born 1935. Steel-Aluminum Plain, 1969. Donald Judd, Untitled, 1965 Donald Judd, Untitled , 1968 In Specific Objects (1965), Donald Judd introduces the idea of a new kind of art th...
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Tina Modotti (1896-1942) and Edward Weston's Nudes

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Though best remembered as Edward Weston’s model, Tina Modotti was a fine 20th century photographer and activist who fought on behalf of Mexican peasants in the 1930s. She was a woman who "chose to identify herself with the arts, with the poor, and with the solidarity of the revolution." By Alexandra Jopp In Tina Modotti: A Fragile Life , Mildred Constantine describes Modotti as: “Tina Modotti was many things: a gifted photographer, passionate companion of artists and revolutionaries. Fighter for the cause of humanity, "Maria" (her nom de gnerre) who succored the children and wounded in Spain, the tempestuous beauty of unabashed sensuality. Who was she? Dead, she is a legend poeticized and victimized by conjecture, anecdotes and, where fact is lacking, imaginative embellishments.” Looking for clues in Modotti’s early life, that might have led to her artistic development, the art critics cite her youthful identification with the class struggle. Following h...
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Edward Hopper: Nighthawks, 1942- the loneliness of a large city

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Edward Hopper (1882–1967), Nighthawks, 1942, AIC Edward Hopper said that Nighthawks was inspired by a "restaurant on New York's Greenwich Avenue where two streets meet." T he “empty triangular lot” where Greenwich meets 11th Street and Seventh Avenue, otherwise known as Mulry Square. But  the image - with its carefully constructed composition and lack of narrative - has a timeless, universal quality that transcends its particular locale. One of the best-known images of the twentieth-century art, the painting depicts an all-night diner in which three customers, all lost in their own thoughts, have congregated. Hopper's understanding of the expressive possibilities of light playing upon the simplified shapes gives the painting its beauty. Fluorescent lights had just come into use in the early 1940s, and the all-night diner emits an eerie glow, like a beacon on the dark street corner. Hopper eliminated any reference to an entrance, and the viewer, drawn to the lig...
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