AP European History College Board

19th Century Culture and Arts

19th Century Culture and Arts

Romanticism

• Emerged as a reaction against Enlightenment rationalism, emphasizing emotions, intuition, and individual creativity.
• Major figures included J. M. W. Turner and Caspar Friedrich in visual art, Lord Byron and Edgar Allan Poe in literature, and Ludwig von Beethoven and Hector Berlioz in music.
• Focused on themes of the sublime in nature, the hero's journey, and the inner emotional world.

Realism

• Art and literature movement that sought to depict life as it really was, rather than idealizing it.
• Literary realists like Gustave Flaubert and Charles Dickens examined society's problems and offered incisive social criticism.
• Artists like Gustave Courbet focused on everyday subjects, representing them with stark honesty and attention to detail.
• Emerged in part as a response to rapid urbanisation and industrialisation during this period.

Impressionism

• Artistic movement that sought to capture fleeting sensory impressions, particularly the shifting effects of light, rather than create detailed, realistic depictions.
• Key figures included Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Camille Pissarro.
• The movement faced initial criticism and struggled to gain acceptance, but profoundly influenced later developments in painting.

Symbolism

• Symbolists rejected Realist and Naturalist depictions of the external world, focusing instead on the internal, emotional world.
• Key figures in literature included Charles Baudelaire and Paul Verlaine.
• The movement had significant influences on both visual arts and music.

Classical Revival

• Reflected a renewed interest in the art and architecture of ancient Greece and Rome, serving as a reaction against the perceived excesses of Romanticism and the Industrial Revolution.
• Found expression in neoclassical architecture and sculpture, with Antonio Canova as a notable figure.
• Later in the century, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in Britain sought a return to the detailed and vibrant art of the Early Renaissance.

Later Developments

• Late 19th and early 20th century saw the emergence of new artistic movements such as Cubism, led by artists like Pablo Picasso and George Braque.
• Art Nouveau, a decorative art movement, emerged near the turn of the century, focusing on organic forms and intricate detail.
• In literature, Modernist authors like James Joyce and Virginia Woolf began to explore innovative forms of narrative and disillusionment with traditional societal norms.