Art is not just a way to express oneself. Often, art is an expression

of culture, particular to a people or a nation, in a specific moment in time.

What is Cubism?When did the Cubism movement take place?

Who were the major players?* * *

Cubism is regarded by most art historians to be the single most influential art movement of the 20th

century, developed in Paris by Picasso and Braque, beginning in 1907.

PICASSO BRAQUE

What is Cubism?What is Cubism?

• Cubism exploded onto the scene as an art revolution that presented objects from multiple views simultaneously. • This multi-perspective depiction presented form as the mind sees it, as a multi-dimensional existence.

at Horta de Ebro

What is Cubism?What is Cubism?

In their early cubist paintings, Picasso and Braque introduced methods that undermined the illusion of space. Their paintings defied the traditional look of art that had dominated for over three centuries.

They became known for their revolutionary abandonment of conventional perspective and illustrative definition.

At Horta de Ebro

Picasso

casso: Landscape with Bridge 1909

What is Cubism?What is Cubism?

• Picasso and Braque’s paintings fragmented focal points right into their background, eliminating clear boundaries and contours.

• This innovation, allowing air and rock to merge and interpenetrate, became the concept that revolutionized art.

Landscape with Bridge 1909

Picasso

What is Cubism?What is Cubism?

• Depicting such an open passage among objects defied the laws of physical experience and broke ground for art to become a function of internal logic and integrity, no longer bound by the laws of physical experience.

• By treating earth, sky, and objects in the same way, Picasso made the canvas appear more unified, but in the process also introduced ambiguity by no longer differentiating what is solid from what is void.

Houses at La Estaque 1909

Braque

How has Cubism changed the way in which we view the world today?

The creation of Cubism announced to the world that this century would have a very different look and feel- a world of multiple overlapping cultures, polities, and groups, each with its own divergent frame of reference and point of view. No longer

can we view the world from a single perspective. We must look at the world around us from

multiple points of view.

Some argue that Cubism influences many practices of our everyday lives, from the pixel-like world of the Information Age, to the cubicles that

workers accept as their commonplace environment.

Lady with Guitar

No Bull

Mont Sainte-Victoire

Cézanne

Popova: Two Figures

Matisse

Girl Looking In Mirror

Unplugged