Mapping Modernisms
Now that you’ve studied and reflected on Alfred Barr, Ad Reinhardt, and Hank Willis Thomas’s diagrams, it’s time to make your own!
Make a diagram that describes the history that we have covered this semester from the 1860s to the 1960s. You may use any medium you like, digital or analog, two dimensions or three, as long as you can document it visually in jpg files that can be uploaded to Canvas. Your diagram can be abstract or pictorial; it could represent a progression, connections, relationships, and/or commonalities.
Reflect back :
What people or movements do you think are central to driving the European and American art world in this period?
What things set up the cultural world as it exists now?
What artists or movements did we NOT cover that you think are critical to this story?
You can use artists’ names and/or the names of movements, and specific works of art. You can include things that influenced those movements which you think are important. You may even choose to re-center your diagram on someplace besides Europe. You can also choose to include yourself, and think about how these artists influence you. Here’s a list of artists, movements, and ideas we covered this semester. You do NOT have to use them all, this is just to jog your memory.
Once you’ve drawn your map/diagram, post a 500-word response (no more than 600 words) that addresses the following points.
A – Introduction to your map: in 1-2 sentences, introduce your diagram. Describe what period and geography it covers, and its form.
B – Observations & analysis – Analyze the three following elements of your process of mapping:
What artists/movements did you choose to emphasize in your map? Why?
What types of relationships do you want your viewer to understand? Why do you think they are the most important?
Why did you make the formal choices you did in making your map? (color, forms, medium)
C – Save space for a final paragraph! Answer the following question: What argument does your map make about Modernism and how is it similar or different to either Barr, Reinhardt, or Thomas’s arguments?
D – Revise for unity. Go back to your introduction and write 1-2 sentences that specifically address the main goal of this assignment. So, think about the ways in which the history of modern art has been constructed by different people and why they have created these different constructions (what were the stakes). Then revise your whole essay, ensuring that your observations and analysis support the claims you are now making in your introduction (remember this is a process of cutting and rewriting!).
