To help me revise I am going to write a series of shorts about a certain topic, basically so that I can get to grasps with the basics of each subject, the critics/artists/artworks/context. By posting it on here it is encouraging me to actually do it instead of say I'm going to do it and then not...
So topic one is on cubist collage. By using the texts of Clement Greenberg and Louis Aragon, I am going to attempt to outline the defining features of collage and how this has affected modern art up until our current point. If we take the musings of Greenberg, who posits that modernism manifests itself in art that creates a relationship with the actual artwork itself rather than what is being depicted, then we can begin to pick apart the work of Picasso and Braque. These two artists had a fascination with the surface of the work, particularly in creating a definition between the surface of the canvas and the subject on top. To do so, the collage technique was developed by pasting found objects such as fabrics, newspapers, ropes or even paints mixed with sand onto the canvas, which could create shadowing or a disjunctive way of viewing the image. Using the word 'image' may be problematic here, as collage seemed less involved with the image and more involved with the process and visibility of different planes. Greenberg believes that art can be just about itself, and this is something that is exemplified through the process orientated works of both Picasso and Braque.
Louis Aragon characterises cubist collage as falling into two categories: that which focuses on the 'formal', for example that has been created around the positioning of one certain object/material, and that which focuses on the materiality, for example a textural material or something that creates a defined colour palette. These two types of collage are interchangeable in the practises of both Picasso and Braque, with Picasso taking the latter a step further when he begins constructing his cubist sculptures. These are heavily orientated around the usually found materials that they are constructed out of, and they take the separation of the surface/subject planes to a step further. These objects are now three-dimensional and sit above the surface, casting shadows in much the same way as Braque's primary work, where a nail casts a shadow across the flat plane of a canvas. This could be seen as a full circle in the development of collage, however collage has had a far further reach than just cubism, which is seen almost critically be Aragon who states that 'art has ceased to be original' as the endless borrowing of ideas continues.
Many a movement is born out of collage; dada photomontage is one of the most explicit examples, where collage takes on a political and propagandist motive and transgresses into the anti-aesthetic medium of montage. Formally it is the most reminiscent, yet other movements share attributes less obvious. Abstraction can be seen as following in the footsteps of art that is detached from social engagement, a purely aesthetic experience that sees the collapse of representation. If we take Mondrian, we see an over-emphasis of the flatness of the plane, where the surface and the subject are inextricably close yet transcending one another. It is even possible to take the notions of deskilling and the removal of the artists hand to say that the idea of the readymade grew out of cubist collage. As Max Ernst poignantly states. 'it is not the glue that makes the collage'.
Images to use:
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