20th-century French art
The first half of the 20th century in France saw the even more revolutionary experiments of Cubism, Dada and Surrealism, artistic movements that would have a major impact on western, and eventually world, art.
After World War II, while French artists explored such tendencies as Tachism, Fluxus and New realism, France's preeminence in the visual arts progressively became eclipsed by developments elsewhere (the United States in particular).
Picasso and Georges Braque (working independently) returned to and refined Cézanne's way of rationally understanding objects in a flat medium; but their experiments in cubism would also lead them to integrate all aspects of day-to-day life: newspapers, musical instruments, cigarettes, wine.
Picasso and Braque exhibited their analytical Cubism under an exclusivity contract at the gallery of Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, located on a quiet street behind La Madeleine in the 8th arrondissement of Paris.
These artists had no intention of analyzing and describing mundane objects from daily life—a bowl of fruit, a pipe, violin or guitar—but chose subjects of vast proportion, of provocative social and cultural significance, expressing the dynamic qualities of modern urban life.
When Dada reached Paris, it was avidly embraced by a group of young artists and writers who were fascinated with the writings of Sigmund Freud, and particularly by the notion of the unconscious mind.
Coined by André Warnod, the School of Paris describes a loosely connected community, particularly non-French artists, congregating in the cafes, salons, shared workspaces, and galleries, especially of Montparnasse.
[6] Montparnasse became a hub for many of these artists, including notable painters like Marc Chagall, Jules Pascin, Chaïm Soutine, Isaac Frenkel Frenel, Amedeo Modigliani, and Abraham Mintchine.
[10] Coined in 1925 by André Warnod, the term "l’École de Paris" aimed to counter xenophobia towards foreign artists, many of whom were Jewish Eastern Europeans.
In 1960, Pierre Restany and Yves Klein founded the New Realism movement (in French: Nouveau Réalisme), and a joint declaration was signed on October 27, 1960, by nine people: Yves Klein, Arman, Francois Dufrêne, Raymond Hains, Martial Raysse, Pierre Restany, Daniel Spoerri, Jean Tinguely and Jacques de la Villeglé; in 1961 these were joined by César, Mimmo Rotella, then Niki de Saint Phalle and Gérard Deschamps.
Yves Klein had nude women roll around in blue paint and throw themselves at canvases; Niki de Saint-Phalle created bloated and vibrant plastic figures; Arman gathered together found objects in boxed or resin-coated assemblages; César Baldaccini produced a series of large compressed object-sculptures (similar to Chamberlain's crushed automobiles); Daniel Spoerri used meals and food as artistic material.
Like Dada before it, Fluxus included a strong current of anti-commercialism and an anti-art sensibility, disparaging the conventional market-driven art world in favor of an artist-centered creative practice.
In May 1968, the radical youth movement, through their atelier populaire, produced a great deal of poster-art protesting the moribund policies of president Charles de Gaulle.
Other important contemporary French artists include Jean-Pierre Raynaud, Orlan, Ernest Pignon-Ernest, Daniel Buren, Jean-Marc Bustamante, Pierre Huyghe, Valérie Mréjen.
