Modern Art and the Object
by Ellen H. Johnson
Modern art radicalized the way we see and create art. That is a truism by now. By extension, it also radicalized the way we interact with the objective world, or at least it did for people who pay attention to art. Ellen H. Johnson’s Modern Art and the Object is a survey and overview of the way in which modern artists treated objects in their works and as their works, sometimes even making themselves the works of art as well. While Johnson’s writing is descriptive and analytical, it doesn’t break any new ground in terms of art criticism or theory.
Her opening chapter is probably the most useful one in the whole book. As a survey, it traces the development in how objects are related to in art starting with Cezanne and his influence on Impressionism and Cubism which also opened up the doors to Dada and Surrealism. Cubists started the trend of incorporating found objects in their paintings while the latter two, Dada and Surrealism, brought the objects out of the canvases and made them into art objects standing alone as themselves. She then moves on to unexpected territories, examining the use of human actors as objects in performance art and even making the actual artist into a work of art in the case of Andy Warhol. Some of these themes get taken up in later essays while others, particularly the objectification of humans in performance art, never get any further mention. This first chapter at initially seems to be a great introduction to the subject, but unfortunately, it turns out to be the most provocative one in the whole book.
Johnson goes on to examine Cezanne and Picasso. Most specifically, she looks at the way in which both artists related to nature, the ultimate source of objective reality. She sees both artists as using similar techniques to release and draw out the inner essence of the material world. In the case of Cezanne, he shifted his perspective, moving his viewpoint several times while working on one canvas in an attempt to fully paint three-dimensional objects in a two-dimensional surface. Picasso, in his Analytc Cubist phase, operated by fracturing the surfaces of the objects he portrayed, making them incomplete and overlapping to further the sense of open space and depth in his paintings. Both techniques resulted in a visual outpouring of essences that had previously been trapped inside the surfaces of the objects. That is a great observation. The only problem is that if you have studied either artist or their theoretical writings then this nothing new. By the time Ellen Johnson wrote this book in the 1970s, this was common knowledge for anyone who had kept up with modern art. She merely states the obvious.
Those chapters on Cezanne and Picasso may not be original, but they are nicely written. Another nicely written chapter is the one on Jackson Pollock. Johnson explains how his works in Abstract Expressionism are deeply rooted in his relation to the natural world. Where Pollock differs from the two aforementioned artists is that his depiction of the “energies” of nature are shown without the objective surfaces that make them recognizable in everyday life. Cezanne and Picasso released these natural forces by fracturing surface appearances and drawing those energies out while Pollock entirely abandoned the surface appearances and painted the way in which he perceived those pure energies. . This is interesting, but again it is old information.
Another one of the better chapters is on Claes Oldenburg. In his attempt to re-integrate art into the praxis of everyday life, he created art objects representing everyday household items like typewriters, kitchen utensils, and cigarette butts. Only Oldenburg differs from those others because he neither destroys the outer surfaces of them nor does he abandon them in the Jackson Pollock way. What he does is soften those outward surfaces, making those ordinary things look cushy and pillow-like, as if the outward flow of their energy is neutralizing their outward forms, making them less rigid and more approachable. Yet again, this is not a unique observation.
The rest of the chapters are more or less just descriptive. There isn’t much explanation other than what the art objects, or the art depicting object, look like. Johnson continues on with the theme of how the artists related to nature and objectivity, but doesn’t come up with anything insightful or groundbreaking in any way that will enhance your understanding of modern art. Her writing can be awfully dull too and lacking in direction. The author spent her life as a prominent curator and gallery manager and that must have been her true calling in life because her work as an art critic doesn’t really go anywhere.
Modern Art and the Object is not essential reading. It appears to be Ellen Johnson’s attempt at leaving her mark on the world rather than offering some useful theories for the interpretation and understanding of modern art. The critic and Artforum editor Rosalind Krauss did a much better job of this in contrast. Johnson is preoccupied with the inner nature of objects, whereas Krauss wrote extensively about the surfaces of objects in modern art. Modernism was always about style more than substance and postmodern artists mostly sought to do away with substance entirely, making art about surface and nothing else. Rosalind Krauss demonstrates this successfully in her criticism. Ellen Johnson, on the other hand, leaves the reader feeling like she doesn’t have much to say. Perhaps that is because she is looking in the wrong places when she interprets modern art.
Her opening chapter is probably the most useful one in the whole book. As a survey, it traces the development in how objects are related to in art starting with Cezanne and his influence on Impressionism and Cubism which also opened up the doors to Dada and Surrealism. Cubists started the trend of incorporating found objects in their paintings while the latter two, Dada and Surrealism, brought the objects out of the canvases and made them into art objects standing alone as themselves. She then moves on to unexpected territories, examining the use of human actors as objects in performance art and even making the actual artist into a work of art in the case of Andy Warhol. Some of these themes get taken up in later essays while others, particularly the objectification of humans in performance art, never get any further mention. This first chapter at initially seems to be a great introduction to the subject, but unfortunately, it turns out to be the most provocative one in the whole book.
Johnson goes on to examine Cezanne and Picasso. Most specifically, she looks at the way in which both artists related to nature, the ultimate source of objective reality. She sees both artists as using similar techniques to release and draw out the inner essence of the material world. In the case of Cezanne, he shifted his perspective, moving his viewpoint several times while working on one canvas in an attempt to fully paint three-dimensional objects in a two-dimensional surface. Picasso, in his Analytc Cubist phase, operated by fracturing the surfaces of the objects he portrayed, making them incomplete and overlapping to further the sense of open space and depth in his paintings. Both techniques resulted in a visual outpouring of essences that had previously been trapped inside the surfaces of the objects. That is a great observation. The only problem is that if you have studied either artist or their theoretical writings then this nothing new. By the time Ellen Johnson wrote this book in the 1970s, this was common knowledge for anyone who had kept up with modern art. She merely states the obvious.
Those chapters on Cezanne and Picasso may not be original, but they are nicely written. Another nicely written chapter is the one on Jackson Pollock. Johnson explains how his works in Abstract Expressionism are deeply rooted in his relation to the natural world. Where Pollock differs from the two aforementioned artists is that his depiction of the “energies” of nature are shown without the objective surfaces that make them recognizable in everyday life. Cezanne and Picasso released these natural forces by fracturing surface appearances and drawing those energies out while Pollock entirely abandoned the surface appearances and painted the way in which he perceived those pure energies. . This is interesting, but again it is old information.
Another one of the better chapters is on Claes Oldenburg. In his attempt to re-integrate art into the praxis of everyday life, he created art objects representing everyday household items like typewriters, kitchen utensils, and cigarette butts. Only Oldenburg differs from those others because he neither destroys the outer surfaces of them nor does he abandon them in the Jackson Pollock way. What he does is soften those outward surfaces, making those ordinary things look cushy and pillow-like, as if the outward flow of their energy is neutralizing their outward forms, making them less rigid and more approachable. Yet again, this is not a unique observation.
The rest of the chapters are more or less just descriptive. There isn’t much explanation other than what the art objects, or the art depicting object, look like. Johnson continues on with the theme of how the artists related to nature and objectivity, but doesn’t come up with anything insightful or groundbreaking in any way that will enhance your understanding of modern art. Her writing can be awfully dull too and lacking in direction. The author spent her life as a prominent curator and gallery manager and that must have been her true calling in life because her work as an art critic doesn’t really go anywhere.
Modern Art and the Object is not essential reading. It appears to be Ellen Johnson’s attempt at leaving her mark on the world rather than offering some useful theories for the interpretation and understanding of modern art. The critic and Artforum editor Rosalind Krauss did a much better job of this in contrast. Johnson is preoccupied with the inner nature of objects, whereas Krauss wrote extensively about the surfaces of objects in modern art. Modernism was always about style more than substance and postmodern artists mostly sought to do away with substance entirely, making art about surface and nothing else. Rosalind Krauss demonstrates this successfully in her criticism. Ellen Johnson, on the other hand, leaves the reader feeling like she doesn’t have much to say. Perhaps that is because she is looking in the wrong places when she interprets modern art.
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