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The art of the first decades of the 20th century deviated from the tradition in both its form and content in search of a new vision of the world. Avant‑garde artists took the reins. The need for originality prevailed; experimentalexperimentexperimental, rebellious and even iconoclasticiconoclasticiconoclastic activities were of paramount importance. A number of new trends were created: expressionismexpressionismexpressionism, FauvismfauvismFauvism, cubismcubismcubism, futurismfuturismfuturism, constructivismconstructivismconstructivism, suprematismsuprematismsuprematism, neoplasticismneoplasticismneoplasticism, dadaismdadaismdadaism and surrealismsurrealismsurrealism. Most of them contravened contemporary aesthetics based on the value of objective beauty and propounded an extension of artistic boundaries. The creators were fascinated by the achievements of science and technology. Some people worshipped machines while others were fascinated by geometry, theosophy or psychoanalysispsychoanalysispsychoanalysis. Artistic and moral freedom prevailed.

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Czarno-biała fotografia portretowa Francisa Picabii. Zdjęcie w ujęciu od pasa w górę, mężczyzna w średnim wieku z czarnymi włosami zaczesanymi do tyłu, ubrany w marynarkę, białą koszulę i muchę.

Francis Picabia (1879–1953) – A Frenchman of Cuban descent, a painter, poet, one of the most important representatives of Dadaism and was considered the author of the first abstract painting (Caotchouc, 1909). During World War I he stayed in New York, where he co‑edited the literary magazine „291”, and then published magazine „391”, which gathered the majority of the participants of the Dada movement. Works like poems, cartoons of Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray as well as Picabia's sarcastic and ironic remarks on the art of writing were published therein. Picabia's work cannot be subjected to simple classification. He was an independent artist, full of invention with considerable intelligence and an unbridled temperament; at the same time he became a precursor of the anti‑art movement, propounding the destruction of all “funny” values. His most famous works include: Match Woman (1920), Trois Clowns (c. 1925) and Hera (1928).

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Grafika przedstawia dzieło Francisa Picabii. Znajduje się nad nim maszyna przypominającą tłoki. Podpisano ją "Parade Amoureuse".

Love parade is a so‑called mechanistic picture, ironically referring to the idea of technical progress and the machine as its symbol. It was glorified by Italian futurists but for Picabia, however, it was not at all a measure of modernity. A complicated construction composed of pistons, pumps and gears, placed in an empty abstract space is therefore deliberately inoperative and absurd in its uselessness. The strange machine, in which you can find erotic allusions, says more about the hidden instincts and drives of a human than about the development of civilization. The artist, probably against all his instincts, created a beautiful painting whose aesthetics has its source in precise, technical drawing and economical, refined, cool colours.

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Grafika przedstawia plakat. W jego centrum znajduje się zabawkowa małpa. Wokół niej umieszczono następujące napisy: Portrait de Cezanne // portrait de Renoir // Natures Mortes // portrait de Rembrandt. The graphic shows the poster. In its center there is a toy monkey. Around it is the following inscriptions: Portrait de Cezanne // portrait de Renoir // Natures Mortes // portrait de Rembrandt.

Portrait of Cézanne is a mockery of works dedicated to the great masters of the past. Described usually as Hommage à ... („Tribute to ...”), they expressed admiration of and deference towards the geniuses or virtuosos of art, often referring to the forms of expression and applied techniques developed by them. In Portrait of Cézanne, Picabia violated all the rules of such performance. Creating his assemblage, he used trivial and cheap materials – a cardboard box on which, in the form of irregular circumscription he „hand‑wrote” the inscription with an ink, and a plush toy playing the role of an ambiguous symbol. It constitutes a dadaistic „ready object” (so‑called * ready made*), and at the same time a mocking figure of traditional painting – figurative art, representing and mimetic, and thus imitating nature. In colloquial language, however, „aping” is a pejorative expression, meaning a mindless, malicious or caricatural repetition of a pattern, face or behaviour. The artist therefore mocked the styles and authority of eminent painters. The „still life” he created is a virulent attack on the traditional painting genre.

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Czarno-biała fotografia portretowa. Przedstawia Giorgio de Chirico w ujęciu od pasa w górę. Jest ubrany w szarą marynarkę, białą koszulę i czarny krawat. Spogląda w lewą stronę.

Giorgio de Chirico (1888–1978) – An Italian painter, writer and author of theoretical and critical texts about art. An expert and admirer of Friedrich Nietzsche. A supporter of traditional painting craft. His mysterious works, which belonged to the pittura metafisica movement, full of quotations from Mediterranean culture and antiquity, captured the imagination of the surrealists. His works influenced such artists like Salvador Dali, Max Ernst and René Magritte. The most famous works of de Chirico include: The Enigma of the Oracle (1910), The Uncertainty of the Poet (1913), Red Tower (1913), The Anxious Journey (1913), The MysterymysteryMystery and Melancholy of the Street (1914) and Hector and Andromache (1917).

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Dzieło autorstwa Giorgio Chirico. Przedstawia trzy postaci, które wyglądają jak połączenie rzeźb greckich z manekinami. W tle znajduje się miasto.

Giorgio de Chirico created non‑existent worlds: he placed known forms and ostensibly ordinary objects in peculiar contexts. The unnatural state of the suspension emanating from the picture The Disquieting Muses is the effect of the perception of space disturbance due to the application of a number of movements and the lack of logical convergence points in the composition. Here we are dealing with a mysterious situation which does not refer to an everyday experience of a man. Although individual elements of the performance can easily be recognized and described, they create a vision beyond physical reality. Expression and anxiety are intensified by multiple disturbances in the proportions and sizes of forms, especially monuments or sculptures that are substitutes for people. The whole image is penetrated by contrasting light creating visible shadows. The colours are saturated and applied as a flat stain within the shapes depicted in the black contour.

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Dzieło sztuki. Na dole znajduje się plaża, w tle widać zielone tereny. Nad wodą znajdują się trzy uformowane z chmur symbole: krzesła, tuby, to jest instrumentu muzycznego, oraz nagiego torsu kobiety. Work of art. At the bottom there is a beach, in the background you can see green areas. Over the water there are three symbols formed of clouds: chairs, tubes, that is, a musical instrument, and a naked torso of a woman.

René Magritte (1898–1967) – a Belgian surrealist painter, creating in the convention of onirismonirismonirism (captivating reality in the shape of a dream or a nightmare). Author of brilliant and mysterious works, depicting realistically painted, ostensibly ordinary objects arranged in unusual, often absurd or paradoxical compositions. Distinguishing features of Magritte's creativity are: intellectual provocation, resentment of logic, humour and effective baffling through enigmatic or metaphorical titles as well the application of the painting within a painting effect. His most famous works include: The Human Condition (1935), The Therapist (1937), The Rape (1945), The Philosophy in the Bedroom (1947), Golconda (1953), The Castle of the Pyrenees (1957) and The Son of Man (1964).

Keywords

dadaism, surrealism, metaphysical artmetaphysical artmetaphysical art, assemblage, collage, photomontage

Glossary