Rene Magritte is born November 21, 1898. He was a Belgian surrealist and became well known for a number of witty and thought-provoking images. He painted his first solo exhibition, in 1927, The Menaced Assassin is one of his largest and most theatrical composition.

In the artwork of The Menaced Assassin, there is a naked body of a women lies on a couch, and blood trickling from her mouth. A well-dressed man who is wearing suit, standing in front of a table. His coat and hat on a chair and his bag adjoining. It seems like he is ready to leave, but he is delay by the sound of music. He stands in front of the table and listens to a gramophone. In the meanwhile, there are two men who just look like twins standing behind two sides of foyer. The one stands on left is holding a club, the one stands on right is holding a net. It seems like they are planning to ambush him. Then behind him, there are three heads of men and they look like triplets. They watch from over the balcony and witness what’s happening inside the room.

As I assume, the dead woman may be the lover or wife of the well- dressed man and he properly is the one who kills the women and after the killing he decides to leave. The two men who just look like the twins properly are the agents of the law, they try to arrest him. The triplet will be the witnesses of the all frame. There is a weird thing that triplet and the twins are just look alike.

The artwork of The Menaced Assassin will be considered as surrealism which is a part of Modernism. It is the recreation of an imaginary crime scene, which is a perfect combination of cruelty and pleasure, love and death. It is a way the artist visually narrates a love- tragedy.

I chose this artwork because it caught me right on the eyes. It is so different than the other artworks I have seen. It is bloody and mysterious. The naked corpse of the young women, a well-dressed man listening to a gramophone next to the corpse. Two homicide detective hiding in wait and three curious heads at an opened window. It is just like a scene of mysterious crime that waiting to be solved.

I am very interesting at this artwork, but the looks of the figures are weird. The men on the frame are just look alike. Does the artist done it on a purpose?

Work Cited

“Matteson Art.” Rene Magritte Biography -. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 May 2016.

“Museum of Modern Art | MoMA.” The Museum of Modern Art. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 May 2016.

Pablo Picasso was born in Málaga, Spain in 1881 and died on April 8, 1973, in Mougins, France. Throughout his life Picasso created wondrous works that were recognized all over the world. Previous to his enormous success Picasso was an ordinary child like most. His father being a painter and art teacher provided him with the stepping stones toward his love for art. Overall Picasso was a poor student, but he had undeniable desire to draw, and as time went on, an undeniable talent. His father began to teach him how to draw/paint when he was 13 years old and soon surpassed the talents of his own father. As a result of his undeniable talents his lack of interest in academics increased. Later on his family moved to Spain where Picasso enrolled in a prestigious fine arts school, and his admission was certain. This was quite an accomplishment considering he was not of age to be accepted. Nonetheless he was, but his interest in the school also diminished because of the many rules that came along with attending. He was not a fan of following the crowd, so he decided to break free of the traditional institution, and hit the streets of Barcelona. This deviation from the classics continued as he attended and abandoned the Royal Academy of San Fernando. It was obvious that he could not submit to the ideas and teachings of these institutions. This realization led to his journey of experimentation and innovation of art.

The above painting is titled Girl before a mirror, created by Picasso in 1932. Girl Before a Mirror was painted during Picasso’s cubism period. Picasso was a co-creator of cubism, and it was given it’s name due to the obvious geometric shapes used to form the work. As a creation of the painter himself it is obvious that the form of painting was new, different, and experimental (words that very easily describe modernism). The painting depicts a woman known Picasso’s mistress, Marie Therese Walter. The woman is looking into a mirror at a distorted version of herself. The image of her outside of the mirror is more symmetrical than the one in the mirror. The mirror portion of the painting uses darker colors and shifts the shapes used in her other image.

Picasso was very much part of the modernist movement; which is an easy conclusion to come to considering his failure at traditional education. Cubism was his own creation and in no doubt new and experimental in his day and age. Traditional art was known to reflect things as they were. If someone were to paint a tree then the tree would have to be painted exactly how it looked in nature. The modernist movement changed that ideal. The purpose was to create a different image of the world; which is definitely seen in Girl before a mirror.

I encountered this work while at the Museum of Modern Art and what truly drew me to it was the style of painting. The use of the shapes and the eccentric colors made it stand out from many other works on display. You could make out the image even though it was not painted exactly how it would have looked in real life. If there were any questions I had about this work it would have been “what does it mean?”. But while doing my research I encountered many different interpretations. One of them being that the woman was terribly insecure and as she looked into the mirror she saw all her flaws. In relation to this I read up that Marie Therese Walter killed herself shortly after Picasso’s death. It is possible that this was due to a broken heart, but I choose to believe it was because she no longer had anyone to find beauty in her flaws.

Giorgio de Chirico was born in 1888 in Greece. He drew this painting in 1914. The painting was named “The Song of Love”.  In the first sight, we can see the Greek statue in white, the  red glove and a green ball. When I look closely, I can find the city far away from the wall in the darkness. The dark blue sky makes me feel anxiety .Through the description of this painting, there is a train shrouded near the red glove. The unrelated objects and the difference of the color makes the painting be deeply impressed for me and let me have a lots of questions.

This  painting is expressionism.  Expressionist works by the artist focuses on the performance of inner feelings , but neglected to describe the object in the form of facsimile , so often manifested as distortions of reality and abstraction of this approach in particular to express feelings of fear. In this painting, the unrelated objects makes the whole painting look wired. The blue sky and the dark train shrouded shows the atmosphere of anxiety. I feel like the artist is fear about something. And in the Greece, the statue is stand for the freedom and democracy. But the green ball and red glove makes us think whats the relation between them. I can easily remember the painting and feel the complicated mood of the artist, the fear and pursuit for freedom.

After the searching, the artist finished the painting in world war I. In that period, people were scared about the ward and the death. The artist wants to use the unrelated objects to show the messed up society or the panic of the world. The artist hates the war.

Actually the Greek statue catches my sight. The unbalance of the painting gives me the good impression.

For this painting, I wonder that does artist question the democracy of the whole world?

Marcel Duchamp was born in 1887 in the French region of Normandy. Duchamp was born into a family of artists. Of his six surviving siblings, four became established artists. Duchamp was given classical training in the arts as a child, but rejected traditional eighteenth century art in favor of modernist strains. Influenced by his older brother, Jacque Villon, Duchamp began his career in cubist painting, however he became increasing avant garde throughout his career.

In 1915, Duchamp coined the term “readymade.” Through it Duchamp asserted the artist not only as the creator of art, but the declarer of art. Dictionnaire abrégé du Surréalisme or the Abridged Dictionary of Surrealism, written by leading surrealist artists Andre Breton and Paul Eluard, defined readymades as “an ordinary object elevated to the dignity of a work of art by the mere choice of an artist.” Duchamp saw readymades as the antithesis to what he called “retinal art” or visually appealing art that lacked any underlying thoughts or complexity.

Bicycle Wheel was Duchamp’s first readymade, although the artist did apply that designation retroactively (It is actually an “assisted readymade” since the found objects had been altered by Duchamp.) Sitting on a white platform within The Museum of Modern Art’s Drawing and Painting II gallery, Bicycle Wheel is a wooden stool painted white has a bicycle fork mounted on its seat. The wheel attached spins freely when pushed. Duchamp actually encouraged onlookers to spin the wheel, but unfortunately this is not permitted in this museum.

The wheel is considered to be a piece of Dada art. Dada grew out of pre-World War I avant garde movements like cubism. However, Dada was a distinct product of disgust and horror towards the Great War. Dadaists felt that the war was manufactured in the same way mass-produced products were. They felt that cold and emotionless logic and rationality lead to the brutal destruction of the war. Dadaist reacted to this by eschewing logic as a whole and instead embraced chaos and irrationality. In fact “Dada” itself is a nonsense word.

Bicycle Wheel is intensely irrational. By placing the two pieces together, the functionality of either piece is cancelled, rendering both unusable. Duchamp rejected the industrialized fashion in which the wheel and stool were created. By making the rational functionality of the objects irrational and useless, Duchamp is mocking the entire system from which they were born.

The feeling of humor and mockery was compelling, as well as the elegant simplicity of the piece. As a precursor to true conceptualism, it conveys its message of irrationality and rejection of modern industrialization effortlessly. It is not too heavy handed in its condemnation, nor too forgiving. The ability to interact with the piece as well as the captivating kineticism of the piece is also equally fascinating (Bicycle Wheel is actually considered to be the first kinetic sculpture ever made.) These are the elements that draw me to Duchamp’s Bicycle Wheel.

If I were to ask questions I would ask what happened to the original creation of the Wheel? It has been noted to be lost. I also wonder why Duchamp chose to keep it from a gallery for so long. It was first created in 1913, but was only first formally shown in a gallery in 1951. 

This painting is known as the “Reading at a Table” and was done by Pablo Picasso in 1934. Pablo Picasso was a Spanish painter who is best known for his usage of cubism and his wide range of different artistic styles.  The painting depicts a young woman sitting at a table reading by a lamp with a whole variety of colors and crude lines. After some research, I found out that woman is actually French and her name is Marie-Therese Walter. Marie-Therese Walter first met Pablo Picasso when she was seventeen and he was forty five. The two eventually had a relationship that people say it was his happiest yet least public. I believe this painting fits with the era of modernism for many reasons. For one, the “Reading at a Table” is an impressionist painting. Impressionism is when artists capture images without much detail but with bold colors. This is seen with the lamp which is just a yellow section of the painting without too much attention however it is clear by the bright color that this is a light source for the girl reading. Another way to classify this painting is saying this is an art piece of expressionism. Expressionism is an artistic style of distorting the subject for emotional effect to evoke moods or ideas. This type of modernist style is associated with Pablo Picasso often. In the “Reading at a Table,” nearly every item in the painting is distorted in some way or another. The female’s head is shaped unconventionally which is a common theme for Pablo Picasso when he painted humans. The chair and other items are also not drawn with straight lines that makes them look as they have been warped. The reason for this can be because this was the modernist style Pablo Picasso has been known for. My personal opinion regarding the distortion is that is has been done to create an environment of comfort because the lines are not perfect and that makes me feel as there is an energy of relaxation as the female reads her book. I saw this painting at The Metropolitan Museum of Art after walking into the modernism wing on the first floor and I noticed a tour group surrounding this painting. I was intrigued and saw that is was one of Pablo Picasso’s work and I am a huge fan of his so I was motivated to analyze it some more. There were other Pablo Picasso’s in this wing but the colors of “Reading at a Table” and the easiness I feel from observing it was the reason I was drawn to this piece. The only question I would have about this painting is what exactly is the female reading? She has her hand by her head which can either be a sign of relaxation or being tired so I am curious on what evoked that choice of hers.

–Do you think that Gregor is more powerful BEFORE or AFTER his metamorphosis?  Explain your response.

–How is Gregor’s family transformed in the wake of his metamorphosis?

–At the end of the second section of the story, Gregor’s father pelts him with apples.  What do you think this episode is about?

–Gregor emerges from his room one last time when he hears his sister playing her violin for the lodgers.  What is the significance of this? What meaning does music hold for Gregor here?

–Ultimately, what do you think Gregor’s metamorphosis means?  What does it mean to be transformed into a giant bug?

–Explain your understanding of Gregor’s death.  How/why does he ultimately die?

–The story’s narrator is revisiting a place he once lived.  Explain the significance that this “revisiting” has in relation to the themes of the story.

–What is the connection between our narrator and Weifu?  Why do you think so much of the story is spent on Weifu’s life, while the narrator shares very little about his own life experiences?

–Explain the significance of the story about reburying Weifu’s little brother?

–Weifu recalls when he and the narrator used to pull the beards off religious statues in the Temple when they were younger.  What is the significance of this memory?

–Describe an instance of filial piety in the story.  What is its significance?

–What aspects of this short story seem to you to be particularly modernist?

–The poem opens, “Let us go then, you and I….” Whom do you think the speaker is addressing here?
–What is Prufrock’s relationship to time?
–Look at the description of the yellow smoke in the second and third stanzas of the poem. What do you make of this description?
–“I have measured out my life with coffee spoons,” laments Prufrock. What do you think this line means?
–Describe the overall mood of the poem. What feelings does it leave you with?
–In the final lines of the poem, the speaker shifts from “I” to “We.” How do we explain this shift?

–How does justice work in the world of “Punishment”?  What happens when one tells the truth? What happens when one lies?

–What do we make of Chandara’s choice to take responsibility for the death of her sister-in-law? Do you see her as a hero or as a victim?

–Explain the significance of the details Tagore offers about the marriage between Chandara and Chidam.  How do they help us understand the events of the story?

–How do you understand the title of the story?

–As she approaches death, Chandara both says, “to hell with him,” and maintains that she loves her husband.  How do you reconcile these two apparently contradictory statements?