| Artist: | Henri, Robert |
|
|---|---|---|
| Title of Work: | 57th Street, New York | |
| Date of Work: | 1902 | |
| Nationality: | American | |
| Context: | Pre-WWI | |
| Movement: | Ashcan School/The Eight | |
| Medium: | Oil | |
| Subject: the theme of the city street is back, only this time it is not the place of alienation and psychic disequilibrium that it was for the German Expressionists (see Kirchner), nor is it the place of revolt and dynamism that it was for the Italian Futurists (see Boccioni). Those European avant-garde movements look quite abstract by comparison to this New York city street scene. What the American Ashcan group (also known as The Eight) stress is realism and humanity. There is no idealizing (note the dirty snow); they base their art on life, not on formalism or an art for art's sake. In a way, they pick up where Eakins had left off, stressing an American art that is grounded in realism. Style: most of the artists that Henri gathered together under the neutral heading "The Eight" started out as newspaper journalists. They thus were used to working quickly and focusing in on the telling, annecdotal detail; they worked directly from observation of life and usually convey an affection for their subjects. What they are after is a slice of life. Though Henri himself had not worked as a newspaper illustrator, he was the spokesman for the group, proclaiming an art-for-life aesthetic, rather than an art-for-art's sake. They do not idealize or abstract. In a way they were the urban rappers of their day. Context: America is the New World, and quite different from the Old World with its European avant-garde. The Eight were not so concerned with aesthetic theories or breaking with tradition; America had no real art traditions to break from! They were concerned with the American experience, and their art is based on that and a realism that comes from direct observation of life. The critics who thought their work was not beautiful in the Academic sense, dubbed them the Ashcan School, deriding them for the dirty, unseemly details of urban life that they did not edit out of their art. The critics thought their work belonged in the ashcan, but the public embraced The Eight when they exhibited together in New York in 1908. What held them together as a group was not a group style; Henri believed too much in individualism as an important aspect of the American character. Thus, there is stylistic individuality among The Eight, from Henri's unidealized city streets with their dirty snow to Arthur Davies's fantasy scenes of unicorns and arcadian dreams. The majority of the group, however, worked in a style that can be called humanistic or subjective realism, which emphasized the individual and expressed what Henri called "the spirit of the people." | ||
