Women Artists and the Rise of Modernism

Hannah Hoch,
Pretty Maiden,
1920

The rise of the modernism is difficult to describe in words, but I'll try best to keep things going in that way. Modernity meant a direct embrace in experimentation; when speaking of the rise and power of the individual, the body, and the self, the wave of modernism now meant the emergence of a timely analysis of the self, means of criticism, expression and rejection of nineteenth-century limitations. Rejecting conventional academia and philosophy, modernism, by its nature, forced a mandate of innovation into virtually every realm of society and contemporary culture. Its mastery, however, was not restricted to any specific style or subject. Rather any of its visuals and exemplification labeled as ‘modernist’ likely ranged from the realistic to surrealistic to utter abstraction. In many respects, modernism represented the certain lack of usual social or even ethical standards for nineteenth turning into twentieth-century civilization and culture and viewed modern life as ambiguously as one could imagine when a wealth of individualistic, barrier-breaking perspectives are fashioned instead of the safe coherence of one critical perception.

Among the social tribulations of the era, women, specifically the modern woman, had embodied modernism itself by way of her appearance in public, her contradictions of nineteenth-century stratifications and a longed awaited break from the past and her previously acceptable representation in art. Their advocacy for innovation, expressing the difficulty or obliqueness from to exact from the present an accurate representation or even illustration of their energy in a palpable social dynamic. But then there’s always attention to be paid to women as not only the matters of modernism but also as the modernists themselves, as women were acting as the actual practitioners of modernism through art and style. Contemporaries of the era recognized players like O’Keeffe as being among the wave of feminine forerunners in the distinctly male controlled atmosphere of art. We must ask ourselves, however, a question that will help to shape a thorough understanding of the movement as a whole: who were these amazing women and what the hell did they do? When looking at the lives of modernist women artists during the turn of the century, one cannot ignore the pervasive elements of "criticism, sexism, patriarchy, and discrimination [that] have been and continue to be major themes in the lives of [these] female artists" and their art (Guerrilla Girls 59). 

Sonia Delaunay,
Simultaneous Contrasts,
1912

Sonia Delaunay,
appliqued coat,
1920s 

During the time when the ease a primacy of color were both seen as a distinct movement and expressive medium for both painting and decoration, Ms. Sonia Delaunay (1885-1979), "a Russian artist who move to Paris in 1905 [and] married cubist Robert Delaunay in 1910, synthesized post-impressionism, early Matisse, and Russian folk" in some of her early works such as Portrait of Tchoouiko (1906) and Young Finnish Woman (1907) (Chadwick 260). Although mastering these interconnecting facets not only through her own work but also as inspiration for her husband, Delaunay then turned her skill to decoration, where we find her earliest, most distinctly abstract forms. The artwork, a pieced quilt, (image left), developed from many sources, including her husband's knowledge of Cubist painting. Her intensive work with textiles had led Delaunay to further break down and emphasize surface structure, which became most prevalent in her 1912 painting, Simultaneous Contrasts, as it produced objects through which Robert's theory of color was submitted to "the play of actual light [which] reveals the dynamics of surface design" instead of Robert's obsession with spatial design (Chadwick 261). Then in 1913, Delaunay found herself experimenting with dresses in lieu of "the drabness of current fashions" (Chadwick 262). Her patterns of abstract form were quickly transitioning the female body and fashion into new and bold ways of visualizing "principles of abstraction to, and defined modernity for, a broad public" (Chadwick 262). For more of Ms. Delaunay art, her relationship with abstraction, fashion, and color, see her EY exhibition at the Tate Britain. 

Kathe Kollwitz,
Portraits of Misery III,
1890-93

Delaunay's relationship with color, surface, fashion, and Abstraction is relatively simple to describe as a revolt against the mundane fashions and seemingly limited applications of the early 20th century; however, our next woman artist, Ms. Kathe Kollwitz (1867-1945), and her relationship to the emergent German Expressionism, is, in the words of Whitney Chadwick, "much more difficult to elucidate" (279). Kollwitz's intentional clash between modernist ideology and the reality of her society embodied perfectly the distinctive poles of each experience. Kollwitz had been "unrivaled in her day [with her] graphic realism as a style, her exclusive use of printmaking in media, and her production posters" (Chadwick 286). Unfortunately, as art historians studied her work, her style was quickly dismissed as illustrations or propaganda. Kollwitz replaced the archetypal imagery "of female abundance with the realities of female bodies marked by a poverty," which later was seen as a woman's "prevent[ed] nourishing of their child and enjoying motherhood" (Chadwick 290).  Her lithograph, Portraits of Misery III, like many of her other works, showed pregnancy "without material support [being] a cause for grief rather than rejoicing" (Chadwick 290). 

Kathe Kollwitz, "Attack", The Weaver's Revolt, 1895-97

Unlike her contemporary Modershon-Becker's robust and lofty depictions of motherhood featuring elements of happiness and sanity, Kathe Kollwitz's imagery is marked by a distinctive element of sadness and dark gloom. Being influenced by Max Klinger's engravings, Zola's realism, and the passionate appeal of a working woman, Kollwitz turned the social conditions around her into an expressive new take on engravings and lithography. With her success in producing The Weaver's Revolt (1895-97), Kollwitz had proven her ability to create eerily realistic political effectiveness when the piece was exhibited in 1898; however, Kaiser Wilhelm refused to award her the gold medal she had won for the piece. More on Ms. Kollwitz's life and her work can be found at her website archive.

Hannah Hoch,
DADA-Dance, 
1919-21

Moving even further from the confines of Abstraction and the realism of German Expressionism, Ms. Hannah Hoch (1889-1978), pioneering with photomontage made way for the bold and never-before-seen style of Dada-ism. Dada helped to "sever the photograph from its existence as an autonomous artifact and emphasized its role in ideological production" of ideas and art (Chadwick 270). Hoch's claim was to exhibit a rejection of conventional social norms such as femininity and the commodification of the female body in relation to mass-produced goods. Her DADA-Dance (1919-21) puts machine parts in conjunction with the ever evolving dynamic of the female dancer juxtaposed next to an elegantly dressed and posed female body, whose head is that of a black man. Her "violent distortions of scale" helped to illuminate the nature and relationship of objects, bodies, and ideas in society: moving fluidly but never in sync or accordance with one another. Hannah Hoch was the only female artist to show at the First International Dada fair in 1920 and, as said by Leah Dickerman of the NY National Art Gallery, "one of her primary preoccupations was the representation of the 'new woman' of the Weimar Republic, whose social role and person identity were in a complex process of redefinition in the postwar period. ... Juxtaposing photographs and text to both endorse and critique existing mass-media representations, Höch parodied elements bourgeois living and morals and also probed the new, unstable definitions of femininity that were so widespread in postwar media culture." (2005)

Although Modernism encompasses more styles and areas of art than just the three described above, Abstraction, German Impressionism, and Dada all gave power to the idea of not only a radically new definition of art but also of a 'new woman' ready and able to take on the face pace of the twentieth century. The marginalization of women artists did, of course, extend well into the twentieth century, but new forms and styles of expression and interpretation quickly challenged the preconceptions of a distinctly male-dominated culture. Modernism shaped the woman in the eyes of men as radically as it changed virtually every facet of art, media, communication, style, expression and overall sensation and vibrancy with a new type of living, socially, politically, and culturally, in the twentieth century. 


Works Cited: 

Chadwick, Whitney. 2012. Women, Art, and Society. 4th ed. New York, NY: Thames and Hudson

Guerrilla Girls. 1998. The Guerrilla Girls' Bedside Companion to the History of Western Art. NewYork, NY: Penguin Books