Stravinsky and Primitivism - Essay Example

Stravinsky and Primitivism Introduction Art is wide expanded range of activities by humans and the product ofthose same activities. There are many different forms of arts; music is one of the arts that a great person by the name Stravinsky practiced in the early 20th century. Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky was a Russian composer, pianist and also a conductor. He is considered to be one the most important composers during the early 20th century. His great reputation pushed through revolutionary boundaries of the musical design. His works and the works of other people from that period, mostly made use of traditional music forms. An example of this is the concerto Grosso, symphony and fugue (Bell 25). This was often to pay tribute to the form of music of the earlier masters like Tchaikovsky. Stravinsky’s professional life, which was at most in the 20th century, included many of the modern classical styles of music. Most composers who existed during his lifetime and those after were greatly influenced by him. He has the great desire to learn art, literature and life (Bell 25). Stravinsky was named as one of the truly epochal innovators of music. Aside from the technical innovations, which consisted of rhythm and harmony, the “changing face” of his compositional style was the most imperative feature of his work. It retained a distinctive and essential identity all the time. Primitivism is known in art as the style of works of self-trained artists who build up their talents in an imaginary manner, as in the paintings of Henri Rousseau and Grandma Moses. The phrase primitive has also been used to portray the style of time before American naive painters as Edward Hicks and has been practical to the art of the mixture of Italian and Netherland schools, which were formed before late 15th century. Recently, the term has incorporated the contemporary artists who research the earlier periods and the cultures far-off to their own like Robert Smithson and Joseph Beuys (Bell 25). Primitivism is a western art movement that has copied different visual forms from the non-western or the prehistoric peoples (Bell 25). The act of borrowing from primitive art has been very vital to the improvement of the modern art. For a long time, the debate to get back to the basics and try to simplify things has been on. This looks at the advantages and disadvantages of simple verses a complicated life (Bell 25). The key elements of the overall primitivism as a basic function of art and development in and around the turn of the century will be articulated so as to be understood. Different art forms using principles of new developments and technologies In the modern society, with the new innovations, improved tools like computers have been incorporated in the basic art. Work of contemporary artists’ is evaluated using the computer and digital imagery by using a variety of formats. Many people are viewing these aspects of the modern technology to be complex and prefer to practice the earlier forms of art. The modern European and Euro American representational conventions are mostly inspired non western art and artifacts (Bell 25). This trend toward the greater use of technology as a creative tool will probably continue into the future, but with different forms (Bell 25). The reason behind this is due to the perspective that, individuals have on the technology that is now at hand. Technology has mostly made the work of the artists to be easy and simple, in terms of design and storage. Stravinsky’s use of motivic development, which is a repetition of different guises of musical figures throughout a composition, includes motivic development. This is essentially where notes are added or subtracted to a motif regardless of the consequent changes in metre. The same technique can be seen being used in the 16th century. For example, this is depicted in the music of Orlandus lassus, Carlo Gesualdo and Roe Cipriano (Hiller 56). Stravinsky maybe the only great composer, who managed to come up with a rhythm by himself that, showed the actual dignity of art. However, we get to understand that he was not alone in the foundation of the most important contributor to primitivism. There existed others like Paul Gauguin, who was a great painter. He decided to escape from European civilization and took residence in the French colony, and adopted a very simple way of life, which he considered to be natural than the one he used to live. All of Gauguin’s exploration for the primitive was noticeably longing for more sexual freedom than was on hand at that time of the century Europe, and this is reflected in paintings like The Spirit of the Dead Keeps Watch, which was in 1892, Anna the Javanerin, which was in 1893, Te Tamari No Atua, made in 1896, and Cruel Tales, printed in 1902, among others. During the early 20th century, Pablo Picasso and Henrri Matisse were very much intrigued and inspired by the power and simplicity of the styles of the Native Americans and the African Micronesian. During 1906, Picasso, Matisse and another artist; Andre Derain and others in Paris, had gained interest in primitivism. This was due to Iberian sculpture, African art and the tribal masks and also in part because of the compelling works of Paul Gauguin that had abruptly achieved center point in the avant-garde circles of Paris (Hiller 63). From the period of 1906 to around 1909, Pablo Picasso's paintings explored the impact of Primitivism through Iberian sculpture, the African sculpture, the great African traditional masks, and further the historical works which included the Mannerist paintings of El Greco, which resulted in his masterpiece Les Demoiselles D'Avignon and the innovation of Cubism. Reducing art to its most basic and simple form There was a propensity in late nineteenth century, and early twentieth century art, which was in the direction of the simplification of pictorial means and the making use of essentials from primitive art, that is, from ancient, medieval, folk and children’s art (Hiller 47). The broadening of primitivism as a creative code was accustomed by the elemental, revolutionary hostility of a number of artists to the open bourgeois traditions, which were marked by sensitive contradictions and a dominating strength of mind of positivism. The artists sought after place of safety from reality in a primitive life. Primitivism mostly based on the visual incorporation of imaginative cultures that had beforehand been well thought-out as “low,” “rudimentary,” and “barbaric.” throughout such customs, the artists sought after completeness, expressive clarity, and an “impulsive” technique of staring at the humankind. This was in contrast to logical practicality, naturalism, and impression (Hiller 77). These expedition for simplicity and self-expression were the basis of experimentation by associates of the most important artistic engagements of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The artists frequently deserted all the ethnicity of European inventive culture that had been well-known since the sixteenth century. Functions of primitivism Things do not exist as ‘primitive art’. This is a grouping created for their movement, demonstration and utilization outside their creative habitats. In order To be outlined as ‘primitive art’ it has to be resignified as mutually ‘primitive’ and also as ‘art’. Acts that necessitates substantial communal and cultural work and serious scrutiny of these procedures has essentially transformed the learning of art. The preceding implies that the relationality of the grouping ‘primitive art’ come across its position within the varying connotation and valence of the grouping ‘art’ itself in the Western customs. For the majority of the populace that engage with the arts, ‘art’ remains a reasonable category of just this class; and there is held to be something necessary about these performance in provisions of their worth, their relation to the human awareness or originality or mysticism. This has not, on the other hand, been just a fact of art’s universality, and community historians of art have pursued this peculiarity, the distinctiveness of Western art’s own personality construction, from inside the custom (Hiller 83). Art, like verbal communication, is an arrangement of symbolic exchange that introduces exchange by itself. It is also a very important tool for holding jointly a community based on the first symptoms of not the same life (Rhodhes 14). Tolstoy's proclamation that "art is a means of coming together amongst men, unifying them collectively in the same feeling," elucidates art's involvement to social consistency at the dawn of civilization. Socializing ceremony required art; art works originated in the examination of custom; the custom invention of art and the artistic invention of rites are the similar. Music is what unifies. As the requirement for solidarity pick up the pace, so did the requirement for ceremony; art also participated in a role, in its mnemonic task. Art, with fairy tale closely following, served as the impression of genuine recollection (Rhodhes 14). As In the recesses of the caves, original training proceeded via the paintings and extra signs, projected to engrave rules in depersonalized, collective memory. Nietzsche saw the guidance of memory, in particular the memory of obligations, as the commencement of refined morality. Once the emblematic procedure of art developed it subjugated memory as well as awareness, putting its stamp on all psychological functions. Cultural memory meant that one person's action could be measured up with that of another, together with portrayed ancestors, and upcoming actions anticipated and controlled. Recollections became externalized, akin to belongings but not even the material goods of the subject matter (Rhodhes 23). The principal purpose of art is to objectify sensation, by which one's own inspiration and identity are malformed into signs and metaphor. All art, as symbolization, is ingrained in the creation of replacement, surrogates for something else; by its very nature consequently, it is a fabrication. Life in progressing society is lived almost in every respect in an intermediate of signs. Not merely scientific or technical activity, but artistic forms are norms of symbolization, repeatedly expressed quite, in unspiritual manner (Rhodhes 37). Conclusion Art is being developed, but there are different aspects that keep pulling it to different directions. The new developments in the form of technology have greatly influenced the way artists conduct their work. This is revealed in the forces that seek to reduce art back to its most simple element. Evidently, as ascribed to by Igor Stravinsky, as well as others, primitivism is the main aspect that brings about the different perspective. Even, though Stravinsky is considered as its founder and the most important contributor, it has been noted that there are other great artists that greatly contributed to primitivism. Works cited: Bell, Michael. Primitivism. London, United Kingdom: Methuen publisher. 1972. Print. Hiller, Susan. The Myth of Primitivism: Perspectives on Art. Publisher Routledge. 1991. Print. Rhodhes, Colin. Primitivism and modern art. London, United Kingdom: Thames and Hudson, cop publisher. 1994. Print. Read More