Scandinavian Architecture and Design

Scandinavian architecture and designs don't follow a really uniform style: different works of the same artist and, thus works of different artists are highly different from one another. In general, I found Scandinavian architecture quite boring, but there are some designs that I found really interesting and remarkable.

Alvar Aalto's designs seem to me plain and boring. I think I could walk by his buildings and never notice them. However, Eero Saarinen's architecture is much more eclectic and interesting; his design of the Dulles International Airport is just marvellous and really modern (if someone told me that was built last year, I would believe it!). Saarinen's TWA terminal is great too and it sort of reminds me of Sidney's opera.

Dulles International Airport

TWA terminal

Sydney Opera

Scandinavian design itself is really interesting, but I didn't find it quite as innovative as the designs of the Arts and Craft movement and Art Nouveau. But, in any case, the Scandinavian furniture seem like a bunch of pieces that can be found in any home middle class home here in Mexico!

Die Neue Sachlichkeit Painting

If Die Neue Sachlichkeit's painters wanted to be recognizably different from the Expressionists artist, they did't make a good job on that. However, they really did a good job on making interesting and really beautiful paintings.

George Grosz's paintings, for example, not only share the same weird style of many Expressionists painters, but also the same kind of subject-matters. The characters portrayed in Grosz's works are really expressive themselves, but as a whole, his paintings can also be mistaken with a Futurist's and even a semi-Cubist's creation.

In Grosz's 'Eclipse of the Sun', we can recognize some expressive characters and the presence of a skull in the lower right corner (usually portrayed in Expressionism), but some  other shapes can remind us of Cubism, and the subject-matter itself seems kind of Futurist.

Otto Dix's paintings also seemed really Expressionist, as they portrayed the feelings of the world because of the war. 

Dix's 'War Wounded', for example, portrays a man whose face has been deformed  in the war. We just have to take a look at his remaining eye to discover what he is feeling.

Mack Beckmann made portrays of himself. There's nothing left to say, that is highly Expressionist! 

Max Beckmann's 'Self-Protrait with Tuxedo'

Objective Photography

I really didn't find the 'objective' or 'straight' part on objective photography. Even though, it is true that they didn't use visual effects or make painting-like compositions, I think that Alert Renger-Patzsch's and August Sander's photographs are highly artistic and complex!

Patzsch's 'Glassware', for example, doesn't feature any sign of visual effects or editions, but it is recognizable artistic and realy appeaing!

Again, there's no visual effects on Patzsch's  'Tools', but just the arrangement of the objects is really artistic!

There's nothing special in Sander's 'Children' if we're taking about effects, but this photograph is really artistic and higly represents Sander's personal style

Objectivity - Music and Dance

Objective music can be defined into a single word: Neoclassicism. However, the greatest exponents of this period do not sound really alike: Igor Stravinsky's Neoclassicism sounds much more classical and harmonious than Paul Hindemith's and Carl Orff's pseudo pedagogic melodies. I really liked the work of these three composers, but I find Stravinsky more sublime, delicate, and appealing to my ear. Plus, I think that Hindemith's and Orff's extensive use of xylophones, marimbas and other exotic percussions gets somehow annoying after 5 minutes.

In general, I don't really like ballet itself (even though I've been a dancer myself). Nevertheless, I think Georges Balanchine's choreographies are extremely graceful and attractive. I really really like that Balanchine, like Picasso, composed in a lot of different styles, techniques, and even art movements because I think that a real artist doesn't stick to only one way of doing art! I think an artist should always be eclectic!

Nonsense poetry

Lewis Carroll's 'Alice in Wonderland' and 'Alice Trough the Looking-Glass' have been one of my favourite books since I was just a kid. Even though they're sometimes too disturbing and alarming, I just think they are some of the best tales in the world (doubtfully for kids, though). One could think that Carroll just got really high and started writing... I don't think he actually did, but in any way, Alice's adventures are just perfect, and Alice herself is, in my opinion, one of the most memorable characters (along with the Cheshire cat).

Erik Satie

I fell in love with Erik Satie's 'Gymnopedie No. 1' and now I can't stop listening to it... it's really relaxing. Somehow, I found this melody really familiar, although I acknowledge I didn't know anything about Satie before.

Surrealist Film

Surrealism in cinema is certainly a unique experience!  I particularly liked 'Un chien andalou' by Luis Buñuel (such an honour that he had chosen Mexico for making a lot of his films). At first, I must admitted I was feeling a little unsatisfied because I thought I didn't understand it. However, I realized that it is Surrealism what I was seeing, and I remembered there's no point in looking for a meaning for it, it's just art! I think it is amazing how Buñuel and Dalí wrote this short film in such an automatic and imaginative way. How they could even come out with those ideas?! I think 'Un chien andalou' is a sublime masterpiece that I hope never gets forgotten with the years.

Viking Eggeling's 'Symphonie Diagonale' is also really interesting, and quite innovative by that time. Now, that movie could be perfect for those Windows sound media reproducers that just show patterns of shapes and colour when you're playing a song... who would think that that was art too?

"You're Surrealists, but I'm a normal guy..."