Artists dissatisfied with the injustices around them often express their desire for change by representing their ideals through the worlds they create. Consider two (2) of the following works in light of the cultural milieu in which they were created. Ground your response with details about the individual artists that you have learned from class, the reading and/or other research, and be specific in your description of the works’ shared formal qualities (what it looks like) and/or construction (how it was made) by using some of the following terms/ideas in your post: cubist, pointillist, primitive, contour, planar, surface, and cropping. The works are: a detail of a still from Fritz Lang’s 1927 film Metropolis; For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, 2007 (hear the artist speak about the work here); Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash, by the Italian futurist Giacomo Balla, 1912; a still of Pablo Picasso drawing from the film Visit to Picasso, 1949; Dress by the Russian futurist Natalia Goncharova, 1924; Blue Nude, a papercut work by Henri Matisse (and a documentary photo of the artist at work in this media), 1952 (watch this trailer to the very interesting documentary A Model for Matisse, and the whole thing on Netflix if you have time), Land of Cockaigne, 1567 by Pieter Bruegel, Käthe Kollwitz’s Death of a Child, 1925, and Ai Weiwei’s Forever Bicycles, 2003. To watch Weiwei’s dance moves to Gangnam Style, click here. And as usual, click on the links for a lively jaunt, and on the images to see them larger. 
Art Survey at Wheaton, Fall 2014 
Still photograph of Pablo Picasso as he was drawing in the film Visit to Picasso in 1949
The film, Visit to Picasso, created in 1949 was directed by Paul Haesaerts in attempt to capture Picasso’s creativity in action. The woman, painted in this particular still photo, seems to be some sort of mythological character or possibly a divine being portrayed through contour drawing. This is one of many pieces that were included in the film and as Picasso once said, “It isn’t up to the painter to define the symbols. Otherwise it would be better if he wrote them out in so many words! The public who look at the picture must interpret the symbols as they understand them.” One very important aspect of this art is the literal drawing, but a greater aspect is the fact that Picasso is examining his work and peering through, seemingly staring at the audience. The intensity of photograph, gathered with the knowledge that at this time, Picasso was already an established artist, makes the photo that much more meaning
For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, 2007
The fantastic piece titled For the Love of God by Damien Hirst was created in 2007 and was cast in platinum, based off of a human skull and teeth, and topped with 8,601 flawless diamonds. Damien Hirst claims that the title originates from what his mom would always say to him, “For the love of God, what are you going to do next!” This piece sophisticatedly portrays the ephemeral nature of life and, as explained by Hirst himself, “You don’t like it [death], so you disguise it or you decorate it to make it look like something bearable – to such an extent that it becomes something else.” A piece like such acts to remind everyone of the ugly truth, the unavoidable truth: we are all going to die.
Both works of art are very different in style, structure, and form. The surfaces are distinctly different, Hirst’s being rough and topping a rounded plane and Picasso’s being on a completely flat surface. Both represent life along with strange descriptive qualities.
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For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, 2007
The piece is a great work of art that was made with many diamonds on a 18th century human skull. The teeth are original and purchased; the piece is great and shows that the artist put a lot of work into the art work. The name of the piece is inspired by his mother asking “For the love of God, what are you going to do next?” Hirst represents great detail in this sculpture, and it the material used was platinum cast on the skull. This makes the piece last and gives it great value. He displays this love of decoration with death and relates this to a heritage. This displays the meaning of death to the artist and makes people think of death in a shiny, new way.
Blue Nude, a papercut work by Henri Matisse
This piece is a wonderful piece made by Matisse who thought blue signified distance to Matisse. The surface is smooth and blocks out parts of the body to signify the shape, curves, and angles. The painting shows the opposite of pointillism; it uses a lot of smooth lines instead of small dots that point out every detail. Also, it may have not have taken so long since the method pointillism wasn’t used. The contour is presented well, and you can see the outline of the woman’s body in the picture.
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“Visit to Picasso” and “Dynamism of a dog on a leash” are the two works I will focus on. Both of these works take a different view of the world through their art. In “Visit to Picasso” the artist paints on glass to give the illusion of painting on air. Picasso was a leading artist from abstract art, so his illusion of painting on air fits very well into his genre. In “Dynamism of a dog on a leash” the artist gives the illusion of fast movement by repeatedly drawing the dogs legs in different moments of motion. The artist, Giacomo Balla, was known for creating works that gave reference to light, movements, and speed. His portrayal of a dog on a leash was very fitting into his genre as well. Both works focus on something simplistic, and don’t get caught up in too many details. Picasso’s work is very primitive in this fact, and the surface is probably the most complex part of the work. For Giacomo’s work, the surface the dog is walking on is more planar. Giacomo also uses cropping of the dog’s owner to keep the focus on the dog’s movements as he walks on a leash.
-Jessica Abbey
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The still from Metropolis has great contour lines and creates a planar view as the light circles around the robot. This film was created after the director, Fritz Lang, viewed the skyscrapers and conceived of the future Metropolis. Lang also used many biblical references in his film, comparing a center building to the Tower of Babel. This particular image fits into the dystopian theme, as the robot sits unnaturally erect with creepy, glowing eyes. The uses of human-like robots contributes to Lang’s dystopian view of the increasing amount of complex architecture and technology. On the other hand, Dress, by Natalia Goncharova was made around the same time with very opposite views. Goncharova was excited by the potential of the new scientific advances and was an avid futurist. Her dress shows this positivity, with its cubist pattern and bright colors, the dress flows and portrays the hope of the future. She specifically portrays her utopian view of the future of Russia with her influence of Russian folk art and her use of flowers. She seems to be portraying with the bright flowers that the hope of rebirth for Russia, associated with spring, is coming.
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The film, the Metropolis, was written three years after the end of the first World War by Fritz Lang, a German film director. The film presents a dystopian world where the lower class is severely exploited by the upper class. Metropolis reflects the feelings of despair and disillusionment the German people felt after they were reduced to complete poverty after the war. There was no hope in Germany, and many Germans may have been afraid that they would become like the people in this film: poor and mistreated. The robot in the still above has a primitive, god-like quality. It resembles the clycadic figures popular in ancient times and hints at a fear of becoming, like those long-ago religions, obsolete in the world. However, the Germans were not going to passively accept that fate, so a young man named Hitler came into the political scene to “turn Germany around.” Lang’s film clearly displays these feelings of malcontent and extreme fear of humanity, and it stands opposite to the For the Love of God piece by Damien Hurst. This skull, Hurt claims, represents everything that is good and perfect in humanity. The skull is not a dark piece but a piece filled with light and hope that humanity may some day become as beautiful as a skull made entirely out of diamonds. The skull has a pointillist quality to it, as the underlying bones are covered by individual diamonds, giving it the appearance similar to pointillist paintings.
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For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, is a diamond encrusted skull which cost, in the words of the artist, 14 millions pounds to make. It sold for 50 million pounds. The surface of the skull is literally covered in diamonds; rows and rows; giving it a dotted, even quality, almost like what is sometimes seen in pointillism. This piece of art is interesting because it is both dark and light: the skull represents death, but the diamonds give a beautiful, brilliant quality. It brings to mind qualities of the vanitas paintings: death and objects of material wealth put together into a chilling still life.
Blue Nude by Henri Matisse is a work made from blue and white paper. The monotone composition of the figure lends to an interesting planar effect: all parts of the body are the same color, and yet by the twisted form one can see how they are set in different depths of field. This abstract, impressionistic work makes sense in light of the fact that Matisse lived in one of the first generations with a camera, and so his work was no longer required to represent material reality. Instead, he could use his own imaginations and make something non-realistic, such as a figure cut entirely from blue paper.
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The first piece that caught my eye was “For the Love of God” by Damien Hirst. His artistic website that the only part of the artwork that would be found on an authentic skull is the teeth, that were native to the original skull that Hirst used for inspiration. The foundation of the skull is 32 platinum plates encrusted with tiny flawless diamonds. The inspiration of the title of the piece came from a common expression his mother would cry when he told her about his newest artwork. “For the love of God” is also a work commenting on dealth and how a natural human response to it is to try and beautify it, perhaps to hide the loss we feel entirely. I happen to be in anatomny class, which is why I wanted to anaylize this work, and the skulls function and structure is familiar to me. Yet, when it is turned into a piece of artwork, although the contour of the lines, and curvature of the distinct bones remain identical to an organic skull, this skull seems much different. The surface is uniform in color and texture unlike that of a normal skull. The diamonds unify it in such a way that the sutures between indiviudal bones is no longer visible. The surface of this skull almost reminds me of a disco ball! The artist was going for a more flasky appearence to make a final statement about how humans have dealt with dealth throughout history.
The second work of art that I was drawn to was Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash, by the Italian futurist Giacomo Balla, 1912. According to http://bittleston.com/artists/giacomo_balla/, Balla was one of the firsts artists in the futuristic wave of style. He was primarily concerned with light and movement during this time period, which is evident in this work. This painting shows the movement of the dog and walker through the repeated sequences of the legs moving to a slightly superior or inferior position. The idea of motion is also made by blurring the space where the legs are, which adds a almost speed like quality to the movement. The painting is very two-toned with the figures in black and the background in cream, this sharp contrast makes the figures stand out even more and their movement more noticeable. The surface of the walking plane of the figures in the painting also makes the viewer believe that the dog and walker are moving fast because the plane that they are walking on is propelling them forward with parallel lines painted on the surface. It is interesting to me that the dog and walker seem to be practically running but to nowhere in a space of nothing. They are constantly being propelled forward into space for no reason, this could be a comment on the human journey of life from the authors point of view.
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For the Love of God by Damien Hirst is an interesting and striking piece. Created from the cast of a human skull and diamonds, Hirst spent nearly fourteen million pounds to create while it sold at about fifty million. The piece also has much significance besides it physical appearance and the makeup of the work. The name “For the Love of God” was given to the piece as his mother used to say to him “For the Love of God, what are you going to make next?”. Aside from his personal attachment to the piece it is also a work that all humans can connect to. The image of the skull explicitly represents death, an inevitable event that will occur in all of our lives. We all may have a different emotional response when approached with the subject of death but it is still a universal theme of life that all people must learn to live with; which is interesting as to why the skull is covered in diamonds almost as if to give the impression of the possibility to influence the portrayal of death by making it appear different than it is. From the artistic point of view, the piece can also resemble work from the pointillist perspective as each diamond represents a dot that when all combined creates one unified piece. Similarly, the still from Fritz Lang’s movie Metropolis gives off the same feel as the skull does. The plot of the movie in general is of a dystopian society filled with much crisis and injustice. This robot figure contrasts that idea greatly, much like the skull plays off the negative image of death in our culture, as its god-like appearance overpowers the dystopian society. Both pieces also seem to be hiding something or changing the perception of a common theme. As already mentioned the bright diamonds in the skull help change the ideas of death while the image of the robot showered in lights on his throne seems to transcend the difficulty of the life the rest of humanity had in the struggling society.
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Blue Nude, a paper cut work by Henri Matisse
This beautiful work of art was constructed with white and blue paper. Matisse makes all the body parts blue, perhaps to signify that the body is one unit. But he also puts the body parts in a different order, which could resemble that each body part has their own job. This painting is the opposite of pointillism, the surface is smooth. It is an abstract painting but you can still see that the painting is a body.
The next painting that caught my eye was “For the love of God” by Damien Hirst. It is a very unique work of art. He used a real human scull that was covered in diamonds. It eventually sold for 50 million pounds. The piece of art also had a personal meaning to Hirst. The name was given to the piece because his mother used to say “For the love of God what are you going to make next”. It is also interesting how the skull represents death but also represents life, hence the diamonds. If I had to put a style to the artwork I would say it is pointillism because of all the diamonds. The diamonds also make the skull God-like or magical in a way
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Damian Hirst’s For the Love of God is an odd piece indeed. Seemingly borne out of an Indiana Jones film, it’s hard to fathom what exactly inspired Hirst to create this object. It is interesting to hear that the skull is an actual skull of some unknown 18th century man, the bone striped away and replaced with platinum, the surface studded with diamonds, only the teeth from the man remaining. It reminds me a bit of the colorfully painted skulls in the Mexican Dia de los Muertos celebration. What would be a grim reminder of our inevitable decay has been reworked into something beautiful. as Hirst puts it “triumph over death.”
I like Natalia Goncharova’s Dress quite a bit. Frankly, there isn’t a lot of fancy work going on here. Simple form, simple contours, simple geometry and color compose the dress. It hangs gently and the material looks comfortable. The pattern on the dress reminds me of fall leaves blowing in the wind. It is simple, elegant, and pleasing to look at.
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I will be looking at Blue Nude by Matisse and Death of a Child by Kathe Kollwitz. Blue Nude is an impressionist piece, the forms of the figure are not defined to perfection, but it retains its ability to convey the human body. The contour of the figure is occasionally a jagged one, while its interior continues this feeling with sudden shifts in the shade of blue. This is a quality that is shared by Death of a Child, being composed of harsh carvings in an angular manner. This along with omission of the torso leaving simply darkness, conveys the tragedy of losing a child. Sadness and loss is a common theme throughout Kollowitz’s works, she considered it her task to make known the sufferings of people. Although Blue Nude possess these similar compositional qualities, I do not see it conveying sadness, but possessing the feeling of serenity.
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Damien Hirst’s skull For the love of God is a very interesting piece. It seems to be as in the video a piece that Jack Sparrow would travel across oceans to obtain. It is a very interesting piece. As in the video Hirst said that even he was surprised by how uplifting it turned out to be. At first it does look dark but after seeing it in the video with all the diamonds and the real teeth it is a symbol of conquering death in a way. I really liked this work mostly because I think the human skeleton is amazing. The still from Fritz Lang’s 1927 film Metropolis is a utopian piece of work. Here it is about constructing the perfect woman and/or humans. But it is also a bit disturbing to think about because it is very unnatural for humans to be “perfect.” Sin is in our nature and if that is taken about it almost dehumanizes. Even though this piece is for a utopian society it is a bit on the darker side of creating the unachievable.
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For the Love of God is a beautiful piece by Damien Hirst. The skull is made of pure diamonds that eventually sold for 50 million pounds. The title was inspired by his mother saying “For the love of God, what are you going to do next?” This sculpture mimics pointillism because there are no smooth lines and each diamond is placed specifically to create the smooth shape of the skull. The irony is that skulls represent death, but diamonds represent eternal beauty.
Blue Nude, a papercut work by Henri Matisse is very different from For the Love of God. This piece uses blue and white paper. The body of the woman is segmented and less exact with the placement of the paper than the diamonds were in the other piece. Not all of the body parts are in proportion. This is an impressionist piece. Even though the piece is flat, there is depth with how Matisse layers the woman’s limbs .
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Fritz Lang’s Metropolis and Damien Hirst’s For the Love of God drew my attention in the deep contrast that their artwork holds. The still from Lang’s Metropolis shows a robot, the replica of Maria created to cause havoc, being transformed in some manner (presumably to look like Maria). The robot’s form clearly has planar elements, with sharp lines and segmented parts. His film, released in 1927, comes about a time period in which a Marxist conception of society was incredibly influential and that is prevalent in the film.
Hirst’s Love of God clearly has pointillist roots but it’s not exactly pointillistic. The form is already predetermined so the dots don’t actually give shape to the art but rather accentuates it.
Metropolis comments on the innerworkings of society and the power struggles at play. He takes what he sees in our current day society and extrapolates it into a future dystopia in order to comment on what he sees in his society.
Hirst’s art, known to be very controversial and shocking, is perhaps revealing of his attitude towards God and the church today. The jewels surrounding the skull (which seems representative of the decay/death of religion) seem to suggest an inappropriate exoneration of the “sacred”. His comment on current state of things also seems to represent a dystopian view of society.
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Blue Nude by Matisse is an image of the nude form that is crafted using blue paper that has been cut and arranged. The image relies primarily portrays the nude using a minimalist theme. This is because there is absolutely no detail, and no way of knowing the image represents a nude asides from the name of the painting. It is interesting to note that this paper cutout is actually the second in a series of two pieces. The first piece contains much more detail and is extremely provocative. In the second piece, Matisse is able to channel the same emotions, but in a much more subtle way.
When Weiwei created the piece Forever Bicycles, he wanted to create a piece that focused on a common item that could be found in any house in the region of China which he was from. He chose the bicycle, because not only is it a common item, but is also a means of existence. The fact that the bicycles are arranged in a circular shape alludes to the idea that the bicycle is a timeless means of transportation.
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A detail of a still from Fritz Lang’s 1927 film Metropolis and Land of Cockaigne, 1567 by Pieter Bruegel both stress the inherit fear in the thought of a utopia/ dystopia. Fritz Lang’s still shot gives us the picture of a futuristic utopia, but is in some ways also a dystopia because it looks as if robots are given a life more important than humans. This shows that at the heart of humans is not the need for a perfect world, but rather the fear of a terrible world. In the Land of Cockaigne piece it looks as if a plague has wrecked the area, and this also appeals to our inner fears and worries. both are very primitive pieces, emphasizing the simplicity of the fears in our heart.
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For The Love of God by Damien Hirst (2007) is composed of platinum, diamonds, and human teeth. Being recognized as one of Damien’s most recognized works. For The Love of God received its title by what his mother said when he told her of his new idea for an artwork. “For the love of God, what are you going to do next!” was her saying. He uses this art as a reminder that life is short, and he also combined the different cultures such as the Aztecs and the Mexicans. Hirst also explains that the diamonds symbolize “the best and the worst in people…people kill for diamonds, they kill each other.”
Käthe Kollwitz’s Death of a Child (1925) and some of her other works went against the trends among the other artists during the 1920s, and that was “paint the light.” Kollwitz created pictures with a dark theme to show the struggling times in people’s lives. In Death of a Child, she conveys a tough time in her life with losing her son. The black background with the white sets the mood of sorrowful times, and the expression in the face and the coffin creates a dark event in the picture.
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The photograph of Pablo Picasso as he was drawing, taken from the film Visit to Picasso, attempted to capture Picasso’s creativity in action. The woman Picasso paints is portrayed through contour drawing. The work is not a literal drawing, as the woman looks more like a mythical creature rather than a human woman. The photograph includes the artist himself, which is interesting because Picasso is painting on clear glass, giving the impression that he is drawing on air, but also allows us to see the artist interacting and creating his own works. Picasso is famous for his painting of abstract art, so this illusion fits well with what we know about him.
The still from Metropolis creates a planar view with the light around the robot and has great contour lines. We know the film was created after the director spent time looking at skyscrapers and other large buildings, which lead him to conceive the idea of Metropolis in the future. This particular image fits into the dystopian theme well, as the robots are representative of the human race and the increase in complex technology and architecture within that technology.
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The two pieces I looked at were the For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst and Pieter Bruegel’s Land of Cockaigne. I believe these caught my attention because I thought of what they represented. Damien Hirst’s diamond skull contains 8,601 little diamonds on the outside, and holds actual teeth inside the mouth. Hirst, who is the United Kingdom’s richest artist, spent 14 million pounds creating this, later asking for 50 million for this piece of art. A skull usually represents death, but the diamonds give it a “twist” and therefore, make us feel like death is uplifting and that it should be celebrated. With death being our destiny, I think Hirst’s skull says we should glorify it, rather than fear it. The second piece of art I observed was Land of Cockaigne, which was painted in 1567 by Bruegel. His oil painting depicts a mythical land called Cockaigne, which isn’t at all very pleasant. He uses primitive and simple lines to create his people and animals in a cartoonish fashion. Many believe that Buegel’s work represents two of the seven deadly sins: gluttony and sloth. This can be seen as he creates a picture of misery and death with dark, dull colors, which seem to show a life without purpose
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Still photograph of Pablo Picasso as he was drawing in the film Visit to Picasso in 1949
This film was released in 1949 and was created by director by Paul Haesaerts so that he could capture Picasso’s creativity on film. The woman in this photo appears to be a divine being or creature of mythology. This is one of many pieces that were included in the film. Picasso believed that it is up to the public to decide for themselves what they think that the symbols in art are about. An important part of this piece is the drawing itself, but more important is the thought that Picasso put into his work to make it mean something to the public. This photo has much meaning because of its historical significance and ambiguity.
For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, 2007
Damien Hirst created this piece, modeling after a human skull and teeth, in 2007, using platinum. The piece is covered with 8601 diamonds. The inspiration for the title of the piece came from Hirst’s mother, who always said “For the love of God, what are you going to do next?” Through this piece, Hirst was trying to show how people try to disguise or decorate death because they don’t like it, and that they try to make it into something that it is not. This piece is meant to remind the audience that everyone will die eventually, and that it is unavoidable.
The surfaces of these two works are very different. For the Love of God is very rough and has many different textured items on it, while the picture is just a flat two dimensional piece of paper.
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Fritz Lang’s Metropolis was one of the works that stood out to me. While the film was produced in 1927, it featured futuristic elements like robots and large cities. The picture of the robot in the film represents the rise of machines and the fall of man, meaning that the director thought that eventually machine would become superior to man. This pessimistic point of view is backed up by the time period of the film. Metropolis was produced in 1927, which was during the modern era, a time of pessimism, leading into the great depression.
The Land of Cockaigne describes the gluttony and sloth evidenced by the artist. The type of painting is clearly from the medieval times, not quite primitive art, but more primitive compared to the forms of art created today. The painting was drawn during the time when overseas trading was starting to boom, so nations became much, much wealthier by trading goods. I think that the artist evidenced this greed and wealth and wanted his painting to make a statement about the sloth and gluttony it caused.
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For me, “For the Love of God” by Damien Hirst projects an strange idea of utopia at first glance. Although the work itself is a human skull, something more likely to be associated with death and dystopia, it is covered in diamonds and looks like it has been immortalized. According to http://www.damienhirst.com/for-the-love-of-god, however, this unusual skull “is a reminder that our existence on earth is transient.” Furthermore, the same source quotes Hirst as saying of death: “You don’t like it, so you disguise it or you decorate it to look like something bearable–to such an extent that it becomes something else.” Far from being planar, the three dimensional “For the Love of God,” definitely gets that point across. Few people could fail to identify with such a difficult topic that is so close to home for us all.
“Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash” was painted by Giacomo Balla, an artist influenced, according to http://bittleston.com/artists/giacomo_balla/, by Pointillism, as well as by Futurists, who liked to portray motion in their works. The painting is rather unsettling; when one looks closely, the dog, the human, and the ground seem to be moving at an alarming speed. It is almost dizzying. Perhaps Balla is dreaming of a world where people move faster and therefore make even more progress toward the great possibilities of the future.
The cropping of the action in Balla’s planar work leaves us wondering what has been left out of the picture, while Hirst’s skull sits fully exposed, staring back at the viewer; the diamonds are gaudy and demand attention. “Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash” asks the observer to press on into the future and its unknown possibilities. “For the Love of God” stops the observer in his/her tracks and confronts the false impression one might have conveniently created in his/her mind while racing toward the future.
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“Visit to Picasso” 1949 really displayed Picasso’s creativity to me. Picasso in this film is really sticking to what he knows best, which is abstract art. During this time period women were really using their bodies to portray strong images and we see more women stepping out of the traditional woman character, in the 50’s there was a lot of change so maybe he portrayed these women like the women of that day, one in the nude looking very comfortable and the other with large hair and very confident looking. I really enjoyed the surface that Picasso worked on, the glass. It made it look like he was drawing on air and was very creative, his faces he makes during the art is very funny and adds to his character on the pieces he is creating, spontaneous and alive.
Käthe Kollwitz’s Death of a Child, 1925 is very dark and is not out of place when it come to her work. She says that ” is my duty to voice the sufferings of human kind, the never-ending sufferings heaped mountain high. This is my task, but it is not an easy one to fulfill.” her dark very linear countour adds to this effect. During the 1920s or the “roaring 20’s” times were happy and joyful but you don’t see that here, you see her mourning the loss of her son. A majority of artists do not create such honest pieces but Kollwitz really captures what the hearts of people are feeling, pain and loss.
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I looked at Pieter Bruegel’s Land of Cockaigne. This painting by the Bruegal highlights the greed and lavishness we often display in the midst of our plenty. The Belgian created his painting with the idea of a dystopia arising what could have a chance for a utopia. Cockaigne is supposed to be a mystical land of plenty, but in his painting Bruegal shows it instead as a land shattered by gluttony and laziness. Bruegal shows a primitive landscape overcome with ruin.
I also looked at Ai Weiwei’s Forever Bicycles. Ai Weiwei is a Chinese activist who has come into conflict several times because of the governments deny of certain human rights. This colors many of his works and definitely influenced Forever Bicycles. Ai Weiwei’s piece is commenting on the mass transportation and sameness that characterizes China’s workforce. Everyone rides to work on identical bicycles, creating the illusion of a utopia in a dystopia. The bicycle is also common, an everyday object, but Ai Weiwei shows that even common things banded together in unity can be powerful.
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The film Metropolis and the painting Land of Cockaigne both portrait places that are thought to be perfect but are not all that they seem. The film Metropolis, directed by Fritz Lang, tells the story of a futuristic city where the rich live in absolute splendor and luxury. However, far below this gleaming and seemingly perfect city live its poor residents. They work tirelessly in awful conditions to run the machines that power Metropolis. The still from the movie is of a robot who eventually replicates into a female character in the movie. The robot attempts to destroy the underground of the city and cause chaos, but she is stopped by a young man who goes on to unite the two classes of people living in Metropolis.
The painting Land of Cockaigne by Pieter Bruegel the Elder depicts the mythical land of Cockaigne in a less than flattering way. The land of Cockaigne was mythical medieval land of plenty where one could escape the harshness of life and live a life of ease and indulgence. Pieter Bruegel instead of depicting this utopia shows instead people people napping after having gorged themselves. He depicts the land of Cockaigne as a land of gluttony and laziness that corrupts a person.
Both works show places that from the outside look ideal and perfect but are actually corrupt on the inside. The city of Metropolis is a bright and shining example of the progress of mankind yet hidden away from view it is powered by the poor who are basically slaves. The land of Cockaigne is a land of pleasure and indulgence where one can escape the evils of life, but in reality if corrupts those who go there and makes them lazy. The stark contrasts between the two parts of Metropolis is very evident in the film making. One shiny and bright the other dark, dirty and grim. At the time of its production it was considered a groundbreaking film in the area of science fiction. The Land of Cockaigne looks almost 3d. Pieter Bruegel does a good job of creating depth in the painting and allowing the viewer to almost step inside Cockaigne and see for themselves its true emptiness. This is also depicted in the paintings bleak color. Despite the different mediums both works still do a good job in showing that despite all of our attempts to cover up brokenness and showcase man’s achievement we are still flawed humans living in an unjust world.
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Hirst’s For The Love Of God is interesting in that at first glance it seems to be a classic Memento Mori (a reminder of our own mortality) and shows us an interesting inversion of values. It shows us the result of a life lived in the pursuit of riches. It shows us that even as millionaires, the best we can hope for is to be buried in elegance, which, let’s be honest, isn’t very satisfying. Hirst though, in an interview says that he sees the piece as rather bright. He says he’d intended it to be a bit darker and possibly dystopian but the end result ended up being brighter and happier than expected. On the other hand, the still from Lang’s Metropolis is clearly dystopian. In a formal sense, both the pieces share metals as their basis of construction and explore contours as their primary formal quality. Lang’s piece was intended as a warning for what the future might hold if Germany was to continue pursuing such rapid technological advances. In hindsight now, we might say he was wrong as Germany is now the closest thing to a technological utopia (aside from Switzerland maybe).
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The still of Picasso drawing, from the film Visit to Picasso, is a contour drawing of a woman done on the surface of a mirror. The artist, Picasso, was a cubist who experimented with the art of portraying artwork in a way that would cause his viewers to view it, not from one perspective, but from many perspectives. The art would have a sense of three-dimensionalism about it, making it even more complex. For this particular artwork, Picasso strayed from his normal form of art to draw a two-dimensional woman. Compared to his other works, this one was a lot less complex and was done by what looks like a number of randomly drawn lines.
Damien Hirst often uses skeletons in his artwork. For the Love of God, a skull made entirely of diamonds and human teeth, is no exception to this. This artwork is a very expensive piece, putting even that more pressure on HIrst to make it just right. He informs us that he imagined it as being darker than the the end product was, as the final piece was considerably bright. However, he is very pleased with how it turned out.
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The still from fritz langs 1927 film Metropolis represents a distopian universe populate by machinery and robots and is actually a fairly frightening image when the film is viewed. it was constructed using film as a base, and by painting over it. The image relies heavily on cropping, seeing as how it is film and framing is very important. It takes on a very futuristic image, rather than a primiative one. By contrast, damien hirsts piece is a very primative piece and focuses on giving an ironic ornate quality to the most basic part of our humanity, our bones. It is a very primative idea and relies heavlily on cropping to create the weight of the image, forcing your focal point on the skull.
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Both Damien Hirst’s For the Love of God and Ai Weiwei’s Forever Bicycles represent a dystopian universe, but in slightly different ways. For the Love of God takes something very recognizable and very clearly associated with death, a human skull, and covered in something very beautiful that we associate with happiness, diamonds. The contours of the skull are very clear, very crisp, and the work itself is somewhat pleasing to the eye, but there is an odd contrast as the skull clashes with the diamonds. Ai Weiwei’s Forever Bicycles however, again uses something very familiar to us, a bicycle, except that in this case the object really does not have a negative connotation. Weiwei joined many, many bicycles together forming a large circle many bicycles high in a primitive shape. This circle of bicycles is dystopian because of how the form of the bicycle has been altered from its original shape and purpose. No longer could any of those bicycles be used for what they were meant to be, but now they have become a part of something more, something bigger than all of them.
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For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, is a platinum cast of a human skull encrusted with 8,601 diamonds. This piece is a memento mori, a reminder that our time on earth is transient. The thought of death is uncomfortable, so we disguise it and decorate it until it becomes something else entirely, something more bearable. Though Hirst transformed a human skull, a very real reference to our own mortality, into something ethereally beautiful, it is still a clear statement that though we can try to make the idea of death more palatable, death will consume us in the end.
Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash, by Giacomo Balla, is a striking painting that contains elements of futurism. The painting effectively conveys a sense of movement with stark black forms and what appear to be lace veils. The many limbs of the dog and its walker also provide a sense of movement within the painting. One interesting artistic choice in this work is the way the painting is cropped and focused. The human is mostly cropped out of the work, with only her feet showing. Instead, the painting gives us perspective from the view of the dog, at ground level, effectively reducing the human world to knee-level.
Both of these artists utilize the surfaces of their works to achieve different effects. Hirst’s piece is three-dimensional and he covers the surface with something unexpected (diamonds) to catch the eye of the viewer and show the dissonance between how we like to think about death and how death truly is. Balla’s surface is two-dimensional, but he is able to manipulate it to give it a sense of movement.
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For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, and Blue Nude, a papercut work by Henri Matisse are the pieces I will focus on. The skull, engraved with diamonds, is a marvelous work. I like how the teeth are still intact. Others may have their opinion, but when I first see it I think of the verse from 1 Corinthians. “Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God. You are not your own.” To me it shows this because God (perfection), made us in his image. There is nothing more perfect in geology than a diamond so I think a diamond cover skull shows this verse perfectly. The Blue Nude is a minimalist work by placing cut out arranged blue paper. This piece was inspired by an African sculpture that Matisse once saw. You can see mostly the simplicity of the art piece, but there is also some sophistication along with the piece.
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The two pieces I will be focusing on are a detail of a still from Fritz Lang’s 1927 film Metropolis and For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, 2007. Both seem to convey similar meanings — some sort of a warning almost. The film reflects a dystopian world filled with injustice towards the poor. The lower class is being exploited by the upper class and the figure in the chair holds a very straight face, giving off an almost eerie aura. It seems to me that the unchanging face represents how we have grown indifferent to many of our emotions, as we try so hard to cover the ugly sides of us. We are all starting to conform to these social constructions, and what difference is there to humans and robots if we don’t feel the emotions anymore? In terms of art, the piece has a very planar view and has a primitive quality. There is great contour lines around the robot. For the Love of God seems to convey rather a similar message. The diamonds, which are considered one of the most beautiful things you can buy with money in this world, come together to create a skull, which symbolizes death. The title originates from what Hirst’s mother used to say to him, “For the love of God, what are you going to do next!” This symbolizes us covering up death and focusing on external beauty, when in fact, death is death. Hirst’s Love of God holds a pointillistic form to some degree, and it’s not planar but is one a rounded plane. You can see the contour of the skull around it.
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In Death of a Child and Forever Bicycles, both pieces demonstrate a sense of dystopia. Throughout her printmaking career, Kathe Kollwitz observes the darkness in life and portrays it in transparent and vulnerable snapshots of reality. Death of a Child is a piece that has been printed, with the person’s features etched away. It is a simplistic black and white image, made up of simple contours that constitute the face, figure and casket for the deceased. In a way, it is primitive, showing a smooth surface interrupted by crude lines. It’s simplicity highlights even more fervently the poignancy of death within this scene. Kollwitz shows the inevitability of dying, even for a youth. Throughout his work, Ai Weiwei has been known for being a political activist. His sculptural installations have gained attention in being sometimes shocking and unexpected. In Forever Bicycles, Ai Weiwei employs ordinary objects in a very unordinary way. While the audience can recognize the bicycles, they are shaped in a very interesting and obtrusive way. In doing so, Ai Weiwei shows the way in which the nature of the earth and human life is eternally cyclical, without an end in sight. In a similar way, Kollwitz portrays the inevitable cyclic nature of life, including death.
-Caroline Caicano
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“For the Love of God” by Damien Hirst really caught my eye. The work is made of platinum, diamonds, and real human teeth. The title comes from Hirst’s mother, she used to say, “For the Love of God what are you going to do next?” The surface of the skull is covered in diamonds making the viewer think of life and riches, but then you remember that this was constructed from an actual human skull which gives a sense of darkness to the work.
Visit to Picasso was the other work that caught my eye. It is from a 1949 documentary by Paul Haesaerts. Haesaerts wanted to capture the creative process of the great Picasso. The picture itself shows Picasso’s work, which is a contour drawing.
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I chose Blue Nude and a still from visit to Picasso to evaluate. I enjoy both of the pieces because of their cubist traits. I think cubism allows the viewers to see how our brain recognizes things. It helps us understand how we make meaning to things and how that affects us. They were both close friends and Matisse was intrigued on the shocking effect of cubism. Picasso created cubism through influence of shocking art. They both used it to express their thoughts on war as well. I think they use their art to create and evaluate the culture we are placed in a shocking yet simple way.
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For the Love of God and the Death of a Child comment on the desire for change. Although Hirst, the artist of For the Love of God, said that the piece is almost happy but the way I see it is that the love of wealth, which is represented by the diamonds, leads to certain death. The cast of the skull represents death. In our time especially, having wealth is our culture’s definition of success. Hirst wanted us as observers to see death in a new light. He took something that is beautiful and juxtaposed it with something most people fear. The expression of the man in Death of a Child portrays the need for change. The sadness and hopeless look behind the dark eyes seem to plead for change. Social issues and her desire to make a difference in the time around WWII inspired Kollwitz. The small casket is the focal point of the piece. It has the greatest contrast and in placed in the foreground. The viewers’ eye is immediately drawn there. I was drawn to these pieces because I saw the many similarities between them. They both dealt with death but each put them in very different lights. For the Love of God but death but death in a positive light while Death of a Child displays the horror and sadness that death can bring.
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The two artworks that I would like to compare and contrast are the film metropolis and the skull for the love of God.
The film Metropolis was first inspired after the filmmakers first visit to New York. The plot of metropolis is as follows. In a city in the future, the inhabitants have been divided by class. The rich are given complete luxury and live in a mechanical paradise resembling Eden. While, the poor are workers who slave everyday to maintain the city. One day, a enchantress, created by a madman, enters the city. Upon her arrival, chaos ensues. Enticed by her, the inhabitants of the city destroy their own city.
This film was one of the first dystopian flims created and was filmed in black and white. One thing I noted that was particularly interesting about this film is the amazing amount of makeup the cast wore. Unable to fully capture the actors faces, the makeup artists of that time, made sure to dramatically contour the actors faces. Also, as the video cameras, of that time, were unable to capture the color of the setting, the filmmaker used the contrast of shadow and light to bring out the grandeur of the city. Another factor that makes this video so fascinating is the rhythm apparent in the actors movements that makeups up for the actors lack of conversation. One last thing that’s quite important about this film is that it makes viewers reevaluate the society they live in.
For the love of God, like metropolis cost a fortune. However, like metropolis it leaves a big impression. For, one the artwork was not shaped into shape of a skull but instead used a skull as a base. This is somewhat difficult to accept. This definitely made me reevaluate the amount of respect society has for things of the past. The fact that a person can buy a human skull means alot. Besides that, the use of diamonds to overlay this piece makes it so unique. Diamonds are used to symbolize wealth and beauty yet they cover a skull; which symbolizes death. In doing this, the artist has diminished the ominousness of death and instead made it something beautiful to behold.
While, these two artworks are of completely different mediums and have different themes. They both make the viewers reevaluate certain concepts about life.
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The pierce of art with all the bikes stands out to me the most! It kinda shows a view of our world that we are always going some where and have an agenda! Out culture is very multi-task driven so we are always go around doing multiple things at once and we always have to be somewhere or meet someone or do something! So I think the bikes give a great representation on the constant moving of our culture today! The skull also jumps out to me! It’s covered it diamonds and I think it represents outlr culture striving and working till we die for thinks like money and jewelry and that’s what our whole love is driven by! And I think this piece shows that when you die you have to leave that behind! The skull is decorate with what our culture values most and works their whole lives for.
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^^^ comment above = Keith Johnson
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For the Love of God by Damien Hirst really stood out to me. Damien Hirst covers an entire skull in diamonds and in doing so brings beauty and life out of something that typically represents death. In his video interview, he describes it as almost uplifting which does seem to be the case. At the same time, I feel as though he shows that the pursuit of wealth is pointless as we all die in the end and leave all the wealth that we amassed behind. Hirst sort of uses a form of pointillism with the diamonds on the skull. Visit to Picasso is another piece that really stood out to me. Watching Picasso paint this piece really gives you a greater appreciation for the piece as you watch the process from start to finish. Picasso uses contour art to form a picture of a woman that you are unaware what it is until it is complete. Both pieces are great works of art.
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Metropolis is a science fiction film made by Fritz Lang, a german artist, in 1920s shortly after the first world war. The silent film is set in a futuristic urban dystopia. It shows the harsh life that the people in the bottom of the society have to endure. The robot in the picture is one of the main characters in the movie, Maria. According to the lines and contour showing in the picture, Fritz Lang might have been a cubist.
I find For the Love of God by Damien Hirst intriguing. This 18th-century human skull is decorated with 8,601 diamonds. Hirst even found the original teeth to pair with the skull. He tried his best to make the work looks perfect. While the cost of making this piece is very high, £14 million, it was sold at a sky-high price, £50 million; the highest price paid for a single artwork by a living artist. Hirst is very rich, probably the richest living artist in United Kingdom, however, with all the money, he is still going to die someday. We are all dying. But we could turn it into something beautiful. We do not have to fear death.
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Blue Nude, a papercut work by Henri Matisse
For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst, 2007
For the Love of God, by Damien Hirst is really intriguing. It is gorgeous when you first look at it because of all the light being reflected by the diamonds, but then upon further inspection you begin to notice things such as the morbid aspect to the piece or the fact that Hirst used real teeth. To me using the contour of a skull could represent two things: death or wisdom. Hirst uses diamonds which commonly represent wealth. In my opinion he is using this piece to illustrate that wealth can ruin both wisdom and life. Blue Nude, a papercut work by Henri Matisse is a very different piece of art than For the Love of God. First, it was incredibly less expensive to make, its only made out of paper. Matisse gives a more abstract, but still intelligible form to a human. Blue Nude is a planar piece that has the perception of more than one plane. The way Matisse stopped the line of a leg that was tucked behind the other creates the idea of more planes, but there is still only one plane.
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I found Henri Matisse creation of A Papercut Work very interesting since he created it in a wheelchair due to his cancer. He called his new art of cut outs, “painting with scissors.” His art piece is the opposite of pointillism because instead of making shapes out of dots the figure is revealed through the strokes and angels of the smooth lines. However, you can see how he contours each body part to represent a bigger more full picture.
For the Love of God by Hirst is a very eye-catching art piece due to the fact that it’s made of diamonds and yet in shape of a skull. The title is after his mom who would always exclaim, “For the love of God, what are you going to do next!” His view of death shown in this art piece is, “You don’t like it, so you disguise it or you decorate it to make it look like something bearable – to such an extent that it becomes something else.” This work could be categorized as pointillism due to the diamonds that were added to enhance the shape of the skull. The surface of it is smooth and yet rough in other places like with the addition of teeth and the forehead piece.
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The works that I think particularly show break through in cultural context are Visit to Picasso by Picasso and Blue Nude by Matisse. These are personally two of my favorite artists of all time. Both these works share a basic principle of impressionism and flatter the simple shape and curve of line, which was such a new, and raw idea in their time. Both these artist show discontent with culture and a desire to change the perspectives of art, because in the time period they were made, the works were not considered particularly beautiful or unique due to their abstract, impressionistic and often cubist form. These ideas and perspectives were new to the world and rejected at first although now they are held in high esteem.
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Damien Hirst’s “For the Love of God” very uniquely demonstrates the artist’s disillusionment with with life and culture. In his work, there is a dark, slowly decaying skull that speaks to the deathly atrophy of life and society. Yet it is gilded with jewels and shimmering with a veil of false abundance. By leaving the human skull, and choosing only to cover it superficially with diamonds, Hirst shows that the pitfalls of a broken society are too deeply ingrained to fully eradicate, and can only be “painted over” or obscured with the false security of fickle wealth. In contrast, Henri Matisse illustrates the degradation of society in his “Blue Nude” by displaying the primitive aspects of life and culture as the most distinguishing feature of the work.
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Blue Nude, a paper cut work by Henri Matisse
This magnificent work of art was constructed with white and blue paper. Matisse makes all the body parts blue, perhaps to signify that the body is one unit. However he also puts the body parts in a varying order, resembling that each body part carries a different function from the rest. This painting is the opposite of pointillism, the surface is smooth. It is an abstract painting but you can still see that the painting is of a body.
The next painting that intrigued me was “For the love of God” by Damien Hirst. This is a unique work of art. He used a real human skull that was covered in diamonds. It eventually sold for 50 million pounds. The piece of art also had a personal meaning to Hirst. The name was given to the artwork because his mother used to say “For the love of God what are you going to make next”. It intrigues me how the skull represents death, but contrastly represents life with respect to the diamonds. If I had to put a style to the artwork I would say it is pointillism, because of the diamonds. The diamonds also make the skull God-like or magical in a way that stands out to the audience.
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