Talking Art

Note: This is the meeting postponed from October, due to the weather.

The artists who came to be known as Fauvists (“Wild Beasts”) emphasised colour as a structural and expressive methods into art in the early twentieth century. Their impact was such that the world of art shifted on its axis: all subsequent movements were influenced, and the “look” of the man made environment changed irrevocably. From architecture to fashion, from graphic design to table mats, in addition to the art appearing on the walls of galleries, museums and private homes, colour became king and the drab world of the past confined to the dustbin. The sixties, with its explosions of colour and emancipation, began in 1905 in a small fishing village in the south of France, when Henri Matisse and Andre Derain threw caution and muddy greys to the wind and drew fire and freedom from their canvasses.

“Colour was not given to us in order that we should imitate Nature. It was given to us so that we can express our emotions.” – Henri Matisse

“I don’t paint women, I paint pictures. . . What I am after above all is expression. If in a portrait I put eyes, a nose, a mouth, there isn’t much use; on the contrary it paralyses the imagination of the spectator, and obliges us to see the person in a certain way.” – Henri Matisse

“What I could have done in real life only by throwing a bomb which would have led to the scaffold I tried to achieve in painting by using colour of maximum purity. In this way I satisfied my urge to destroy old conventions, to disobey in order to re-create a tangible, living and liberated world. – Maurice Vlaminck

”Art has the power to help economies thrive, to educate and enrich societies, and to create greater
cultural understanding. We are reminded now more than ever of the power of the arts….We believe in the
restorative power of the arts….” advertisement by the Bank of America.

The meeting takes the form of an illustrated talk of about fifty minutes or so with time afterwards for
questions or discussion. We are concentrating on the Modern period, from the end of the nineteenth
century; but any period, movement or particular artist may be focused on, pondered and discussed if a
member requests.

In a recent Norwegian scientific paper, looking at of two groups of pensioners, it was discovered that
those who looked regularly at artworks, and in particular modern ones with brighter colours, found a
marked improvement in their health and general sense of well being. So there it is: ART IS GOOD FOR
YOU.

Whether you are an experienced gallery goer or sporadic sightseer and would like to know a little more
about art, about why a painting or sculpture is considered an important cultural icon, or wish to expand
your present knowledge and look a little deeper into the background, the techniques and the lives of the
artists, Talking Art is the space for the adventure. Come and join in the conversation or just listen and
enjoy.

If you find Nigel Spivey’s subtitle – how humans made art and art made us human – to his Television
Series (2005) How Art Made the World puzzling, and a challenge to your ideas, then the monthly
meetings are for you.

Past Meetings:

Three Expressionists: Edvard Munch, James Ensor and Käthe Kollwitz

Egon Schiele

Gustave Klimt

Klimt