2. The “Fauves”
• The group is not homogeneous and lacks of a
defined programme,
• They share
– their opposition to the Art Nouveau decoration and
– opposition to the formal consistence of the Symbolism.
• Members of this group are:
– Matisse,
– Marquet,
– Dufy,
– Derain,
– Braque, and
– Vlaminck.
3. Phylosophy
• They conceived the art as a vital impulse
• They started depicting some subjects in a
critic way.
• Far from Cezanne’s synthesis there was just
one possibility: to solve the dualism between:
– the feeling –the colour –
– and the construction –the plastic form, the
volume, the space –putting special strength on
the colour
4. Technique
• Their main objective is the pursue of colour with a
plastic-constructive aim, as a structural element of
the vision.
• Some of them dissolved the image, following Van
Gogh or Signac
• They tend to make evident
– the additive process,
– the structure of the image and
– they use spare brushstrokes, evident, distributed with a
certain order and rhythm that give sense to the mater,
the colour and the material construction of the image
5. Characteristics
• The group appeared in France between 1903
and 1907.
• Their style is vigorous, far from any academic
principal.
• Their characteristics are:
– lyric and expressive character expressed through
the colour;
– attempt to conciliate real and interior world;
6. Characteristics
– they look for the essential and simple;
– among the subjects there are:
• landscapes, f
• luvial scenes and
• lyric scenes with an important weight of imagination;
7. Characteristics
– they represent reality in a subjective way;
– they emphasize the colour with pure colours,
saturated, mainly flat, underlined by the line of
the contours and without any reference to the
subject or the image;
– formal synthesis;
– elimination of spatial perspective;
8. Characteristics
– suppression of the definition of forms based on
the chiaroscuro;
– references to exotic and primitive cultures;
– they created pictorial spaces based on decorative
motives taken from wall papers or crafts’ pieces
9. Influences
• Their influences come from different
movements:
– Fromthe impressionist:
• theory of colour,
• chromatic joy,
• daily life subjects,
• landscapes,
• interiors,
• portraits
• and still-lives.
10. Influences
– From the Post-impressionism they took:
• the division in zones,
• the plenitude of colour,
• Gauguin’s decorative sense,
• Van Gogh’s vivid nature.
11. Influences
– From the German Expressionism they assumed:
• the pure and vigorous colour,
• the lack of modelling,
• the strong and direct line,
• the dynamic sensuality and the subjective
interpretation of the artist.
12. Influences
– From exotic cultures they took:
• the richness of colour
• and formal references.
– They had an influence on other Avant-Garde
movements.
13. Matisse
• Matisse used pure colors and the white of
exposed canvas to create a light-filled
atmosphere in his Fauve paintings.
• Matisse used contrasting areas of pure,
unmodulated color.
• His use of color and pattern is often
deliberately disorientating and unsettling.
14. Matisse
• Matisse was heavily influenced by art from other
cultures: Asian art, and having traveled to North
Africa, he incorporated some of the decorative
qualities of Islamic art, the angularity of African
sculpture, and the flatness of Japanese prints into
his own style.
• Matisse once declared that he wanted his art to be
one "of balance, of purity and serenity devoid of
troubling or depressing subject matter," .
• The human figure was central to Matisse's work
both in sculpture and painting.