What is expressionism....
From the songs and poems we saw today, expressionism seems to come out of the feelings and passion of sad times such as wars, or rejected love (if you're talking about rejected love, then most pop songs out there are expressionistic, haha). Most forms of it seem to be very slow and have a tortured feeling to them. Sometimes it almost seems meditative (the people preforming buto looked like they were meditating at times).
-Sarah R. put it in good words "more about the feeling of the piece, than how it actually works".
-Sarah F. pointed out that expressionism also seems to be focused on the feelings behind the movements. I thought that viewpoint was interesting, since it would make sense why many of the clips we saw today were slow (and why the poems we were given seem like they should be read slowly, although they could be said fast, which would remind me of this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiEtsVPpjyM&feature=related)
The DADA dance group reminded me of expressionism, a little, in that it was very passionate and....dark.
I wonder if there are any optimistic expressionist works? Or if that wouldn't be expressionist...but if its about conveying feelings, then happiness is a feeling....
Oh My! You found BECKETT all on your own! Awesome! Beckett... not strictly expressionist; Beckett is the leading absurdist playwright, but one can easily connect a direct line from the Dada/Expressionist movement to the absurdists. Why don't you look up Absurdism and Samuel Beckett and see what you find.
ReplyDeleteExpressionism - it's name says it all - it is about the feeling of things rather than the plot of things. Now, it does tend to have a heavy duty depressing quality to it, but that is more the way it is remembered, and how it evolved. Some of it is wonderfully airy.... Have a look.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_CijcaA9yq58/TLskjRgtz1I/AAAAAAAAHok/F0q_Me_vwsc/s1600/Marc%3B+Large+Blue+Horses,+1911.jpg
There is a lot of overlap between Dada and Expressionism. In fact, artists of the time tended to work in both genres commonly. Dada is the connecting string between Expressionism and Surrealism.
Excellent post.
L