I’ve been wasting a LOT of time working on an art history experiment on one of the art forums I belong to. Yes, the very one I quit a while back.

I don’t know why I went back. I’m an idiot I suppose. I guess it’s because I’m absolutely addicted to talking about art in every way shape, form, blah, blah, blah, and I can’t find that outlet anywhere else. I tried to create a group or two on Google+ and I have tried to make my own forums in the past, but it’s just not the same as talking to a group of strangers from all over the world that don’t necessarily want to show their art. They just want to talk  about art.

And it’s not that I won’t continue my Vision House/Google+  endeavor. I will! This other place just runs itself without me, so it’s easier to do it when I want, or when I don’t want. I guess that’s the difference. It doesn’t rely on me to keep it extremely active.

Anyway, there is this challenging thread happening there right now that takes a lot of work and I decided to make it a post on my blog. I can bore you with it here! Yaye!

It is taking me forever, however, and I’m not even close to being finished. It asks to pick out which artist and/or painting best exemplifies each decade of the the modernist/post-Modernist experiment to date.

So the original poster is asking what general characterization applies to your personal opinion/story, arc for each decade – explaining the steps along the way, from there to here.

I took this to mean to just pick the paintings, without having to explain. For each decade, I’d pick out my favorite pivotal pieces that changed art history towards Modernism – and not necessarily my favorite painting from each artist. Not even paintings by artists I even like!

That’s not easy. I had to look with a different, objective eye. Still, chose my favorite.

I picked paintings that came before other paintings I liked so much more. Many of these guys settled into styles that they later became known for, but when they painted these paintings – it was shocking and NEW. They changed the course of art history forever.

So here is the first installment from 1850 to 1920. I will do another installment of 50 years when I can.

Millet, The Gleaners, 1857

 

Monet, The Walk Woman with a Parasol, 1875

 

Degas, Stage Rehearsal, 1878-79

 

Seurat, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, 1884-1884

 

Toulouse-Lautrec, Abandonment (The pair), 1885

 

Van Gogh, Wheat Field with Cypresses, 1889

 

Munch, The Scream, 1893

 

Gauguin, Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?, 1897-1898

 

Picasso, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, 1907

 

Klimt. Hope II, 1907-1908

 

Matisse, Harmony in Red, 1908

 

Kirchner, Marzella (Franzi), 1909-1910

 

Braque, Violin and Candlestick, 1910

 

Chagall, I and the Village, 1911

 

Kandinsky, Farbstudie — Quadrate mit konzentrischen Ringen (Color study — squares with concentric rings), 1913

 

Modigliani, Jeanne Hébuterne, 1919

 

Klee, Twittering Machine, 1922