Modern Art

Anche in Storia della civiltà europea. Vol. 16 - il Novecento. Arti visive, pp. 104-108.

Dal mondo antico allʼinizio del terzo millennio: migliaia di saggi e oltre 10.000 immagini, un imponente corpus testuale e iconografico organizzato in periodi cronologici e in aree tematiche: storia, filosofia, arti visive, scienza e tecnologia, musica, letteratura e teatro, comunicazione. Unʼopera curata da Umberto Eco, che propone nuove modalità di esplorazione della storia e del sapere e che offre potenti strumenti capaci di intrecciare e collegare, grazie a percorsi dinamici, i personaggi, le idee e gli eventi che hanno formato la nostra cultura. Lʼidea di partenza di Umberto Eco è quella di realizzare unʼopera a carattere enciclopedico che aiuti ad avere il senso delle distanze storiche, a stabilire rapporti di contemporaneità tra eventi di natura diversa e che consenta di ricostruire fenomeni di lunga durata, dinamiche sociali e culturali, comportamenti della vita quotidiana. Il progetto della Storia della Civiltà Europea, nato nel 1993, antesignano di unʼeditoria multimediale di qualità, raggiunge solo il suo compimento editoriale e la sua maturità tecnologica, organizzando i propri contenuti in ogni formato disponibile per ogni tipo di pubblico.

Nel Novecento gli intrecci fra arte, politica, società hanno prodotto ribaltamenti, cancellazioni e rinascite di modelli artistici oscillanti fra la ricerca di un ordine nuovo e la fascinazione per l’irrazionale, fra l’assunzione dell’arte come strumento politico e il rigetto di ogni ideologia, fra la tensione a un’arte individuale e aristocratica o al contrario anonima e collettiva. Nella collisione di fine Ottocento fra tradizione e novità dirompenti cola a picco l’idea di continuità nella storia: il secolo si apre all’insegna della rottura e delle sperimentazioni più ardite in termini di linguaggio e di contenuti. Le avanguardie, tra cui si contano cubismo, espressionismo, futurismo, neoplasticismo e costruttivismo, alleate in un percorso di astrazione, tagliano traguardi che paiono senza ritorno: la cancellazione del soggetto, la forma come forma assoluta, la nuova preminenza del linguaggio, la negazione del racconto, l’esilio dei sentimenti, tutte conquiste che sanciscono il primato culturale dell’Europa. Finché nell’arco di alcuni decenni si verifica un capovolgimento di prospettiva col ritorno al figurativo e con lo spostamento del cuore culturale dall’Europa verso New York e Los Angeles, rimesso più tardi in discussione dall’emergere della nuova polarità dell’Asia. In questo ebook si possono trovare tutte le maggiori espressioni artistiche del Novecento, in cui l’ideale dell’arte subisce un progressivo spostamento verso il futuro, arrivando, nelle sue forme più estreme, a produrre un’arte internazionalista, senza radici e senza memoria, dotata di una lingua aniconica universale, che cancella i confini delle identità nazionali e si proietta nella realtà globalizzata.

Il libro presenta un’indagine sistematica sui tesori appartenenti agli edifici religiosi della città di Randazzo, in provincia di Catania e nasce dall’esigenza di dare un contributo allo studio della sacra suppellettile in materiale prezioso con particolare riguardo alle tre maggiori chiese. Partendo dal profilo storico del centro etneo, protagonista nei secoli XIV e XV delle vicende siciliane grazie al ruolo di sede estiva della corte regia, vengono descritte le tappe salienti che portarono alla realizzazione delle oreficerie. Lo studio individua caratteri internazionali per le suppellettili medievali, svelando provenienze francesi, toscane, veneziane e nord italiane. Nel periodo che va dal XVI al XIX secolo, la concentrazione di materiale che giunge dai due maggiori centri di produzione siciliana quali Messina e Palermo, unitamente alla presenza degli argentieri di Acireale e Catania, permette di acquisire un valido campionario di marchiature. La seconda parte è dedicata all’illustrazione ed alla descrizione dei singoli oggetti, con lo specifico compito di rilevare la particolare cifra stilistica voluta dalla committenza delle diverse “collezioni” che, nel loro insieme, costituisce una delle più cospicue raccolte di oreficeria sacra all’interno del panorama isolano.
Conclude l’indagine un’appendice documentaria in cui sono trascritti i primi risultati della ricerca avviata presso vari fondi archivistici, riservando grande spazio ad inventari ed atti inediti relativi al tesoro di Santa Maria. In questo modo è possibile percepire la ricchezza delle risorse godute in passato da questa chiesa grazie alla donazione De Quatris, la cui Opera commissiona nel 1561 l’interessante custodia eucaristica all’argentiere palermitano Antonio Cochula.

In this essay I seek to explore the icon of the Fighting Cock movement (Khorus Jangi) and of its Manifesto, " The Slaughterer of the Nightingale, " in order to consider its implications and imagistic allusions. In outlining the background of the Khorus Jangi and associated movements, I discuss the imagery of the khorus both in ancient Iran and globally, and in the context of the ideology of the Khorus Jangi. The Manifesto is discussed and analyzed and it is seen that the khorus prefigured the Manifesto, and heralded the appearance of a new movement in painting, as distinct from what had already happened in surrealist and modernist circles in writing. The manifestation of surrealist and modernist ideology in imagery seems to have been a response to this wake-up call of the Khorus Jangi.

Aida Foroutan, “Why the Fighting Cock? The Significance of the Imagery of the Khorus Jangi and its Manifesto ‘The Slaughterer of the Nightingale,’” Iran Namag, Volume 1, Number 1 (Spring 2016), XXVIII-XLIX.

https://www.irannamag.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/1.1-English-Foroutan-Iran-Namag.pdf

Un'analisi generale sul "pittore vineziano" Lorenzo Lotto, attivo tra il Nord e il Centro-Italia; un interprete della pittura e del disegno cinquecenteschi, inquadrato attraverso la lettura e interpretazione critica della cornice a lui dedicata da Giorgio Vasari.

*Winner of the Peter C. Rollins Prize for Best Book of the Year from the Northeast Popular Culture Association*
An investigation of the irrational and the unconventional currents swirling behind the Bauhaus's signature sleek surfaces and austere structures.

The Bauhaus (1919–1933) is one of the twentieth century's most influential art schools, celebrated as the archetypal movement of rational modernism and famous for bringing functional and elegant design to the masses. In Haunted Bauhaus, art historian Elizabeth Otto liberates Bauhaus history, uncovering a movement that is vastly more diverse and paradoxical than previously assumed. Otto traces the surprising trajectories of the school's engagement with occult spirituality, gender fluidity, queer identities, and radical politics. The Bauhaus, she shows us, is haunted by these untold stories.

The Bauhaus is most often associated with a handful of famous artists, architects, and designers―notably Paul Klee, Walter Gropius, László Moholy-Nagy, and Marcel Breuer. Otto enlarges this narrow focus by reclaiming the historically marginalized lives and accomplishments of many of the more than 1,200 Bauhaus teachers and students (the so-called Bauhäusler), arguing that they are central to our understanding of this movement. Otto reveals Bauhaus members' spiritual experimentation, expressed in double-exposed “spirit photographs” and enacted in breathing exercises and nude gymnastics; their explorations of the dark sides of masculinity and emerging female identities in design; the “queer hauntology” of certain Bauhaus works; and the school's communist period (1928–1932), when Bauhäusler put their skills into the service of the revolution―even as Nazism emerged and entered the Bauhaus itself.

With Haunted Bauhaus, Otto not only expands our knowledge of a foundational movement of modern art, architecture, and design, she also provides the first sustained investigation of the irrational and the unconventional currents swirling behind the Bauhaus's signature sleek surfaces and austere structures. This is a fresh, wild ride through the Bauhaus you thought you knew.

Late nineteenth-century Britain experienced an explosion of interest in sculpture. Sculptors of the “New Sculpture” movement sought a new direction and a modern idiom for their art. This book analyzes for the first time the art-theoretical concerns of the late-Victorian sculptors, focusing on their attitudes toward representation of the human body. David J. Getsy uncovers a previously unrecognized sophistication in the New Sculpture through close study of works by key figures in the movement: Frederic Leighton, Alfred Gilbert, Hamo Thornycroft, Edward Onslow Ford, and James Havard Thomas.

These artists sought to activate and animate the conventional format of the ideal statue so that it would convincingly stand in for both a living body and an ideal image. Getsy demonstrates the conceptual complexity of the New Sculptors and places their concerns within the larger framework of modern sculpture.

http://www.amazon.com/Body-Doubles-Sculpture-Britain-1877-1905/dp/0300105126/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1297084836&sr=8-2

This paper will discuss the idea of modernism in territory as complex as India, with a focus on the city of Chandigarh. It will be examined how Chandigarh operates within the notion of national identity in India, and specifically, whether the new capital evokes Indianness or is another example of European hegemony, placed even after the era of colonialism, within postcolonial reality.

Since the 1990s, artists and art writers around the world have increasingly undermined the essentialism associated with notions of "critical practice." We can see this manifesting in the renewed relevance of what were previously considered "outsider" art practices, the emphasis on first-person accounts of identity over critical theory, and the proliferation of exhibitions that refuse to distinguish between art and the productions of culture more generally. How Folklore Shaped Modern Art: A Post-Critical History of Aesthetics underscores how the cultural traditions, belief systems and performed exchanges that were once integral to the folklore discipline are now central to contemporary art’s "post-critical turn." This shift is considered here as less a direct confrontation of critical procedures than a symptom of art’s inclusive ideals, overturning the historical separation of fine art from those "uncritical" forms located in material and commercial culture. In a global context, aesthetics is now just one of numerous traditions informing our encounters with visual culture today, symptomatic of the pull towards an impossibly pluralistic image of art that reflects the irreducible conditions of identity.

This research aims to answer the question of how the artwork of Jeff Koons, specifically in his series, The New, epitomizes the consumeristic culture of today’s society. The paper asserts that by using ordinary objects in provocative ways, Jeff Koons successfully creates suggestive sculptures reminiscent of the consumerism that has been prevalent since early 20th century America. Through the paradoxical scenario of elevating and celebrating ordinary goods to then sell them as “works of art,” a consumeristic microcosm is formed. Further, it provides quotes giving insight from Jeff Koons himself. Using mostly secondary sources, the research presented is a comprehensive look at The New and its theme of consumerism in America. Sources include magazine and newspaper articles, as well as published works, that focus on Jeff Koons as an artist, as well as image archives from various museums and auction houses. Written in subsections, this paper focuses on the background information, controversy, the readymade form of art, exhibited artworks, consumerism, real world parallels, the microcosm created by The New, and conclusive statements associated with The New series. After taking a general look at the artist and his work, a deeper look is taken into the specific series as well as how it fits in to the context of modern consumerism. Comparison to modern day retail stores is given in relation to Bed Bath & Beyond. Using historical fact and critical analysis, Koons’ work is evaluated from a consumeristic point of view.

Que les contours en aient été déterminés par des réformes endogènes, par la colonisation, par les conditions de la Guerre froide et/ou celles de la décolonisation, la création artistique sur le pourtour sud et est méditerranéen, et au-delà dans la Péninsule arabique et en Asie centrale, a été le produit à la fois d’interactions supranationales et d’enracinements locaux variés, qui se sont matérialisés dans toutes sortes d’innovations et d’hybridations, d’échappées particulières et de dyschronies. L’étude et la déconstruction de ce champ artistique se sont pourtant principalement occupées jusqu’à présent des stéréotypes véhiculés par le « centre » sur ses « périphéries ». L’objectif du séminaire est de renverser la focale pour placer le Maghreb et le Moyen-Orient en tant que territoires de création artistique au cœur de l’enquête. Il est aussi de transgresser les approches par médium qui segmentent et obscurcissent les problématiques communes aux arts plastiques, aux arts décoratifs et à l’architecture de cette aire géoculturelle. Dans cette exploration d’une approche plurimédiale, plus interactionniste et multipolaire des œuvres et des mondes de l’art qui y ont vu le jour, quelle importance accorder aux caractéristiques visuelles, esthétiques et techniques des œuvres ? Leur prise en compte ne doit-elle pas accompagner, voire enrichir l’analyse sociopolitique, dans l’optique de contextualiser le regard et ainsi favoriser l’engagement dans les territoires étudiés et vis-à-vis des sociétés qui les composent ? Ouvert aux masterants et doctorants, le séminaire s’adosse aux travaux, outils et ressources numériques développés par le laboratoire InVisu dans le cadre de contrats de recherche français et européens et de partenariats diversifiés.

Séminaire hebdomadaire du laboratoire InVisu organisé par Nadine Atallah (Paris I-InVisu), Juliette Hueber, Claudine Piaton et Mercedes Volait (CNRS-InVisu), du 22 janvier au 16 avril 2019.
Galerie Colbert, Université Paris 1, Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris 2e.

https://invisu.inha.fr/fr/recherche/seminaire/arts-visuels.html

"Salò", or 120 minutes of "a fossil". On transgression and its negation in Pier Paolo Pasolini’s last film

The article is an attempt to analyse the problem of transgression in Pier Paolo Pasolini’s “Salò, or the 120 days of Sodom”. The author argues that although at the visual level the film appears as a perverse work of art, its message remains very conservative. “Salò”, being a loose adaptations of Sade’s “The 120 days of Sodom” is not (unlike the source text) praise of permanent transgression. Pasolini actually thematises the latter, showing (coldly) its abysmal dimension. That anti-transgressive overtone of the film (which was to be, first of all, the polemics with the tendencies observable in contemporary, permissive culture and its fascist, exclusive essence, which bothered the director) results in the absence of any non-normativity positively connoted. Its lack – surprising in the context of the Italian director’s artistic output – makes “Salò” (a supposedly “sick”, “appalling” and “nihilistic” work of art) appear as the most prudish in its message of all Pasolini’s films, which also seems to be a subversive defence of the “civilisation of life” (understood in a conservative way).

Artykuł stanowi próbę przyjrzenia się problemowi transgresji w filmie Piera Paola Pasoliniego „Salò, czyli 120 dni Sodomy”. Autor dowodzi, że chociaż film na płaszczyźnie wizualnej jawi się jako dzieło perwersyjne, to jednocześnie jego wymowa pozostaje bardzo zachowawcza. „Salò” będące luźną adaptacją „120 dni Sodmy” Sade’a, nie jest (w przeciwieństwie do powieściowego pierwowzoru) pochwałą permanentnej transgresji. Pasolini raczej tematyzuje tę ostatnią, pokazuje (na chłodno) jej infernalny wymiar. Ów „antytransgresyjny” wydźwięk filmu (mający być przede wszystkim polemiką z niepokojącymi dla reżysera tendencjami współczesnej, permisywnej kultury i jej „faszystowską”, ekskluzywną esencją) powoduje, że w analizowanym dziele nie znajdziemy żadnej, pozytywnie konotowanej, nienormatywności. Jej – zaskakujący na tle całej twórczości Włocha – brak sprawia, że „Salò” (utwór rzekomo „chory”, „bulwersujący” i „nihilistyczny”) okazuje się nie tylko najbardziej pruderyjnym w wymowie obrazem Pasoliniego, ale wydaje się również przewrotną obroną (konserwatywnie rozumianej) „cywilizacji życia”.

The article addresses the main problems related to the implementation of architectural practice of one of the most active trends in commutative design called parametrism. An analysis of the negative tendencies in the projects of modern architects who are developing this trend is carried out. The article argues for the fruitlessness of the attempts of adjustment of some theoretical positions offered by the parametrism ideologists in real design work. At the same time the doubtless benefits which parametrism offers and possible prospects of its future development are emphasized. The author believes that professional requirements must be changed for specialists who work in this method which features significant complexity of design methods. The article develops the position according to which the parametrism is to consider as a method, rather as the architectural style.                              Keywords: architectural design, parametrism, architectural design, parametrism, parametricist manifesto

Članak govori o Bijelom gradu, četvrti Tel Aviva s brojnim reprezentativnim primjerima građevina podignutih u stilu internacionalne moderne arhitekture u razdoblju između dva svjetska rata, a u povodu izložbe održane u Architekturzentrumu u Beču u prvoj polovini 2008.

PhD dissertation: This dissertation examines how mass magazines framed American abstraction for a broad public during the years following the Second World War.  While art historians have devoted much attention to Abstract Expressionism’s place within the New York art establishment and its international promotion, the presentation of this and other art to the American public has been largely overlooked.  Most Americans who did not frequent museums and galleries or read art journals would have experienced art primarily in mass magazines such as Life, Time, Look, Newsweek, and The Saturday Evening Post.  This dissertation investigates how such magazines defined modern art and its role in postwar American culture for millions of readers.

During the late 1940s mass magazines portrayed modern art as a culturally divisive issue in articles that ridiculed abstraction, describing it as a mediocre European derivation that required no skill and questioning whether it was art at all or actually a highbrow hoax on middle America.  As American abstraction gained support from art institutions and markets in the 1950s, magazines depicted modern art as a commonplace consumer object, a stylistic choice that demonstrated both the consumer’s personality and capitalist freedom.  By the end of the decade, mass magazines characterized Abstract Expressionism as the embodiment of American freedom and individualism, the leading international style, and an asset in the cultural Cold War.  Yet letters to the editors reveal that readers were still not convinced of the value of abstract art.  These mass magazine representations of abstract painting and readers’ responses to it constructed both a vision of postwar American culture and a middle American public for it.

This article unveils imagery that seems intended to be recognized in phases from such sites as Font-de-Gaume (pg. 24), Laugerie-Basse (pg. 35-37), Isturitz (pg. 37-38), Saint-Cirq-du-Bugue (pg. 38-39), and Guy-Martin (pg. 26-35), after describing the first Paleolithic sculpture of an animal reported in the Ile-de-France. These include: 1) The extended panel of Ségognole 3. The grotto is known for a vulva between 2 faint horses, but its largest graphic element is a groove that has been explained away as a “border”. The groove is actually the caudal line of a 1.9 meter-long bas-relief of a bison that has been overlooked because of the failure to apply the same conventions of the vulva – figurative realism, monumentality, and the use of natural forms – to the engraved line, although it is identical in manufacture. The wisent composed by natural relief accentuated by incising, flaking, and polishing confirms that the ensemble is Paleolithic. 2) A survey of Paleolithic parietal images wh...

Il paper è dedicato all'analisi delle vicende del Groupe de Grasse (1940-1942), variamente composto da perseguitati politici e artisti in esilio in attesa di un visto per emigrare negli Stati Uniti, trovatisi a condividere a stretto contatto un periodo stori-co estremamente travagliato e incerto. Dopo una breve introduzione sulla storia e la struttura di vari gruppi artistici creatisi nel Sud della Francia durante la Repubblica di Vichy, si passa ad analizzare il contributo dei singoli artisti e la loro idea di collettività artistica. Si intende pertanto riflettere sui problemi storici posti da una tipologia di opere difficile da inquadrare all'interno del percorso di ogni singolo artista del gruppo. Dal punto vista metodologico si è scelto di operare un taglio eminentemente storico, sulla base di documenti inediti e testi rari provenienti dalla Stiftung Hans Arp di Berlino.

The artistic Anatomy in the School of Fine Arts in Barcelona. The cases of Jeroni Faraudo (1823-1886) and Tiberio Ávila (1843-1932)
This article focuses on the subject of Artistic Anatomy at the Barcelona School of Fine Arts during the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries, discussing its signification. The connecting thread of this article are Jeroni Faraudo i Condeminas (1823-1886) and Tiberio Ávila Rodríguez (1843-1932), its first two teachers, who remain nowadays practically unknown. The knowledge of their ideas completes the history of contemporary Catalan aesthetics and also contributes to the comprehension of the erosion in the primacy of the use of ancient models in the official artistic teaching in Catalonia.
Key words: Jeroni Faraudo i Condeminas, Tiberio Ávila Rodríguez, Barcelona School of Fine Arts, Academy of Fine Arts of Barcelona, artistic anatomy, artistic pedagogy
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Aquest article se centra en la significació i transcendència de l’assignatura d’Anatomia artística a l’Escola de Belles Arts de Barcelona durant la segona meitat del segle XIX i principis de segle XX. S’empren, com a fil conductor, les figures de
Jeroni Faraudo i Condeminas (1823-1886) i de Tiberio Ávila Rodríguez (1843-1932), els dos primers professors que impartiren la matèria i que romanen, en l’actualitat, pràcticament inèdits. El coneixement de l’ideari de Faraudo i d’Ávila
permet completar el panorama de l’evolució de les idees estètiques a la Catalunya del moment i, alhora, contribueix a la comprensió de l’erosió de la primacia de l’antic en l’aprenentatge oficial de les arts a Catalunya.

Pour la philosophie des sciences, un paradigme
est la matrice disciplinaire adoptée
par une communauté scientifique. Il constitue
et délimite le champ, la logique et la pratique
à suivre de l’étude même : il identifie
l’objet d’étude de la recherche scientifique, les
problèmes auxquels on ne peut déroger et la
meilleure technique pour les affronter. Dans
son application, un paradigme est la conjonction
d’expériences, étayées par des maquettes,
qui peuvent être étudiées ou répétées. Le paradigme
prédominant est souvent une façon particulière
de voir la réalité : davantage et autre
chose qu’une méthode scientifique générale.....

Folding screens, known as byôbu in Japanese, are treasures within any museum’s collection and are beloved by the general public. This beautiful publication brings together the very finest screens from the world-renowned collections of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Saint Louis Art Museum. The featured works range from an extraordinary pair of landscapes by Sesson Shukei, a Zen-Buddhist monk-painter of the late 16th century, to daring contemporary works from the late 20th century.

The first half of the Edo period (1615–1868) is especially well represented, with a dozen screens from the 17th century by such masters as Kano Koi and Tosa Mitsuoki. The contemporary scene is also well covered, with ten examples from the 20th century—proving the longevity of this art form and its currency among modern-day artists. Enlightening essays by important scholars in the field cover topics like the emergence of screens as an art form and a novel discussion of the relationship of Japanese screens to those made in other countries.

Stanford University recently unveiled a new statue on its campus titled Hello by Xu Zhen's acclaimed artist. The bronze and stainless steel sculpture is a Greek column with a Corinthian cap, coiled like a snake. "The work fuses the classical Greek column shape and the snake's aggressive biological attitude to stimulate viewers' perception and experience of classic civilization," explains Stanford's official website. "The moment the viewer's eyes come across the Corinthian capital also represents a confrontation with the depth of history and culture. With the increasingly frequent blending and impacts among global civilizations, the work constitutes both a reality and a metaphor for encountering civilizations of different times and space." You can see the video for yourself. The link is https://youtu.be/npyk-G3-RSE

This essay deals with the “Information” exhibition of 1970 at MoMA, one of the more significant exhibitions of Conceptual and related art of the period. The role of the curator as a type of artist is discussed, as is the importance of Marshall McLuhan’s writing to the exhibition.

In his poetry, Jean (Hans) Arp expressed a strong interest in growth, death, and rebirth, and he used this same language of fertility and gestation to describe his artistic practice. Arp was closely associated with the Surrealist group in the first half of the twentieth century, and in this paper I explore how his Classically-influenced marble and bronze torsos were shaped by his interest in life, animation, metamorphosis, and the ideal as well as Surrealist misogyny, the female muse, and the looming Freudian archetype of the horrifying, grotesque female body. I argue that Arp’s attempt to create a natural and pure form that was fluid, fertile, and constantly transforming was bound up in his close and lasting association with the Surrealist group. Clearly drawn to sculpting Classical forms but also influenced by the avant-garde aesthetics and ideas of Surrealism, Arp began his own process of what Georges Bataille called “endless metamorphosis” (Bataille, Erotism, p. 128) — deliberately fragmenting and re-forming female bodies to produce an uncanny and objectified hybrid of the Classical and the avant-garde. 

The art and architecture of the Islamic world had a decisive impact on the development of decorative and fine arts from 1880 to 1945. Many leading artists and architects took inspiration from the rich Islamic language of forms and ornamentation. They were fascinated by the mathematical principles and unusual harmonies of colors in Persian miniatures and rugs, stained glass windows or Iznik tiles, and punched metal works and ceramics from the Near East, North Africa and Moorish Spain. While only some of them actually visited the Islamic world and studied its art and architecture in situ, many discovered it through exhibitions and publications. Following on from Paris (1893/1903), Stockholm (1897) and Algiers (1905), Munich set new standards in 1910 with the exhibition “Meisterwerke muhammedanischer Kunst” (“Masterpieces of Muhammadan Art”). Museums, art dealers and private collectors from a number of countries contributed some 3,600 works, including valuable carpets, ceramics, metalwork pieces and Persian miniatures. The exhibition marked a turning point not only for the academic studies of the time, but also in terms of the reception of Islamic arts. In the Western fine and decorative arts of the 19th century, the “Orient” conjured up motivic imagery heavily influenced by the colonialist perspective, whereas the artists of early Modernism investigated Islam’s stylistic devices in depth, transposing them to their own environment through a process of artistic internalization. In combination with their own traditions and their respective times, it was this very internalisation that instilled motivating creative processes, out of which artists developed countless new forms of expression.

The contributions in this volume approach these questions from different perspectives, considering theoretical and practical applications developed by western artists, architects and decorators and how Islamic art was considered as a model for the renewal of European arts at the turn of the twentieth century.