Existing comment:
American Art -- Modern Era:
At the turn of the 20th century, American artists and designers sought new ways to capture the changing world around them. As immigration swelled, some tenaciously emphasized an Anglo-American identify to urge social and moral refinement; others celebrated the nation as a land of diverse cultural contrasts, rooted in cities as well as in the romanticized West. All -- modernists and antimodernists alike -- were shaped by the country's increasingly urban and industrial character. Through impressionist, realist, and more avant-garde approaches -- examples of which are on view in this gallery -- artists explored what it meant to be "modern" in a new century. An innovative vocabulary that emphasized form, color, and geometric composition, influenced by European styles, captivated many. The dynamism of urban culture as well as the quieter symbolism of nature and handicraft also informed different modes of production and decoration. In its broadest terms, modernism -- more a cultural attitude than a coherent movement -- defined an impulse to reconcile the present and remake the future for positive, even utopian, ends. |