Seven movements did most to change Western art in the 20th century: Fauvism, Cubism, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, Conceptual Art and Minimalism. Each broke with the one before it, and several were shown in London early, some of them a short walk from Shoreditch at the Whitechapel Gallery.
Fauvism, from 1905
Fauvism took its name from a review of the 1905 Salon d’Automne in Paris. The critic Louis Vauxcelles saw a conventional sculpture by Albert Marque in a room of paintings by Henri Matisse, André Derain and others, and wrote “Donatello parmi les fauves”, Donatello among the wild beasts. The painters used flat, unmixed colour that did not match what they saw, so a face could be green and a tree red. The group lasted only a few years, but its use of colour fed into most of the movements that followed.
Cubism, about 1907 to 1914
Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque developed Cubism in Paris from about 1907, the year Picasso painted Les Demoiselles d’Avignon. Cubist paintings break an object into planes and show it from several viewpoints at once, in place of the single viewpoint of perspective painting. The early work used muted browns and greys. From about 1912 Picasso and Braque glued paper and other material on to the canvas, the start of collage as a fine art technique.
Surrealism, from 1924
André Breton launched Surrealism with his first manifesto in Paris in 1924, defining it as “psychic automatism in its pure state”. Surrealists used chance, dreams and automatic drawing to get past conscious control. The best known painters include Salvador Dalí, René Magritte, Max Ernst and Joan Miró. London held the International Surrealist Exhibition at the New Burlington Galleries in 1936.
Abstract Expressionism, 1940s and 1950s
Abstract Expressionism grew up in New York during and after the second world war. Jackson Pollock poured and dripped paint on to canvas laid on the floor. Mark Rothko painted large fields of soft-edged colour. Willem de Kooning kept the figure in violent, gestural brushwork. It was the first American movement to lead the international art world.
East London saw it early. The Whitechapel Gallery showed Pollock in November and December 1958 and Rothko from 11 October to 12 November 1961. Rothko’s Seagram murals, which he gave to the Tate, now hang at Tate Modern.
Pop Art, from the mid-1950s
Pop Art started in Britain before it took off in the US. Its best known early work, Richard Hamilton’s collage Just what is it that makes today’s homes so different, so appealing?, was made for This Is Tomorrow, an exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery from 9 August to 9 September 1956. Hamilton’s section was a collaboration with John McHale and John Voelcker.
In the 1960s Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein and Claes Oldenburg turned soup cans, comic strips and household objects into paintings and sculpture. Pop Art used bright colour, hard outlines and the methods of advertising, including screen printing.
Conceptual Art, 1960s and 1970s
Conceptual artists argued that the idea behind a work mattered more than the object. Joseph Kosuth and Sol LeWitt used text, instructions, photographs and documents, and some works existed only as a set of written directions for someone else to carry out.
Minimalism, 1960s
Minimalist sculptors such as Donald Judd, Carl Andre, Dan Flavin and Robert Morris used industrial materials and simple repeated forms, with no sign of the artist’s hand. Andre’s Equivalent VIII, a low rectangle of 120 firebricks, became one of the best known works in Britain when newspapers attacked the Tate for buying it.
Where to see 20th century art in London
- Tate Modern, Bankside, SE1. Free collection displays cover most of the movements above.
- Whitechapel Gallery, 77-82 Whitechapel High Street, E1. Open Tuesday to Sunday from 11am to 6pm, and to 9pm on Thursdays.
- For contemporary work, see the best art galleries in Shoreditch and the Shoreditch street art walk.