The Relationship between Greenberg’s Art Theory

 

 

The Final Exit to reach for the Art

 

2. The Relationship between Greenberg’s Art Theory and the
artists in his realm - Application of his theory of art to art in
practice

As mentioned above, I have described the main concept of
Greenberg’s avant-garde art and its brief history based on several
of his writings. I will now examine how Greenberg applied his theory
of art to practical art works.

Greenberg pointed out that the first revolution in the history
of Western art is Renaissance art in terms of the ｅxpression of
three-dimensionality. During the Renaissance period artists such as
Giotto, Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, and others successfully
replaced traditional two-dimensional ｅxpression (flatness) by threedimensional
way.17) But, according to Greenberg, in the process of
thess artists lost the original character of the medium by focusing
only on creating three-dimensional illusions. He felt this was very
problematic and a new artistic movement to solve this problem
started in the nineteenth century.18)

As I describe above, Greenberg regarded Courbet
as the first avant - garde artist in terms of a new way of
ｅxpression - ‘flatness.’This movement influenced to
impressionism. Impressionist artists such as Manet,
Monet, and Cezanne consider that the color is the original
character in painting They did not glaze to create
any illusion and tried to expose the color itself on the
canvas. The painting style was developed by the post -
impressionist artists in terms of flatness and their use
of pure colors on the picture plane. Fauvist artist
Matisse used simple and bright colors such as red, yellow,
green, and others to achieve flatness. Finally the
cubist artist through out Cezanne succeeds in the
ｅxpression of two -dimensionality - the originality of
painting - on the flat picture plane by using a collage
technique. The flatness reached a peak during the
Cubist art period but avant-garde art did not stagnate.
One of the main characteristics of avant-garde art is to
develop gradually and ceaselessly. Greenberg considered
an abstract ｅxpressionist art as a developed art
form in terms of its painterly style. It seems to me
Greenberg was influenced by the theory of Heinrich

 

Wolfflin. Wolfflin in his book, “Principles of Art History,”argues
that linear style such as the style in Renaissance moved to a
painterly style in Baroque. Finally, abstract ｅxpressionist art
became a predominant avant-garde art form in the middle of the
twentieth century.

ⓒ 모암문고 www.moamcollection.org