Art 200x: Explorations in Art

The Harlem Renaissance (1920's - 1930's) was a period of cross-disciplinary artistic revolution among African Americans following the end of World War I and into the onset of the Great Depression. Originally referred to  as the "New Negro" movement, a nod to Alain LeRoy Locke's  The New Negro  (1925), an anthology which sought to inspire an African-American culture based in pride and self-dependence.  With an emphasis on black identity, a rising consciousness of social inequality and discrimination, and the rapid  technological  innovations of the age, the artists of the era would heavily influence visual arts, music, dance, theater and literature.  First occupied by Native Americans and settled by the Dutch in the early 1600’s, Harlem was originally farmland that was developed for large estates and settlements until the late 19th century.  Although African Americans have lived in Harlem since the 1630’s, the early 20th century saw the Great Migr...

Romanticism Gaining momentum in France and Britain in the early decades of the nineteenth century, R omanticism emerged as a response to the disillusionment with the Enlightenment values in the aftermath of the French Revolution.  Prior to its arrival , Neoclassicism dominated 18th-century European art, having a focus on classical subject matter, an interest in aesthetic austerity, and ideas in line with the  Enlightenment , a movement that placed high emphasis on the individual through a more objective lens. Romanticism would, in turn, view and capture (or  more so , idealize) the human experience with more emotional undertone. Morning by  Philipp Otto Runge , 1808 Runge's Morning  is perfectly symmetrical in the positioning of the cherubs around the soul of the child lying in the centre foreground. The scene is animated by a wide range of color and light contrast. These are used to communicate the recent arrival of the soul, as if it were...