The Young Artists and Scientists' Club (1947-1949). Discussions and Polemics Concerning a New Model of Modern Art

• Authors: Kurzac Małgorzata

Title variants

PL

Klub Młodych Artystów i Naukowców (1947-1949): Dyskusje i polemiki na temat nowego modelu sztuki nowoczesnej

• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

EN

The aim of the present paper is a survey of the problems concerning Polish art over a few postwar years, as reflected in the activity of the Young Artists and Scientists' Club, which existed in Warsaw from 1947 to 1949. The most salient feature of the artistic life of that time was its breakup into numerous currents. The artists decimated and the creative milieus disrupted during the war were in a natural way replaced by the young generation who contributed their own proposals concerning art. Thus three tendencies coexisted in the Polish art of that period. There was a predominance of colouristic painting, which referred to the prewar experience. Much less vigorous were the groups representing avant-garde tendencies (so-called 'Nowoczesni') and the traditionalists who referred to nineteenth-century realism. In view of various options, the controversies over a new model of creative work acquired exceptional importance in the country's intellectual life. Two proposals were advanced that amounted either to educating the public, that is, bringing the masses up to the standard of modern art, or to educating an artist, which would mean his stooping to the most primitive tastes of a mass viewer.The Young Artists and Scientists' Club (KMAiN), too, joined the discussion. Declaring for the so-called modern art both in the artistic sense and in that of popularizing new creative ideas. However, sharp differences of opinion were revealed between the Club's artists and literary men, concerning,among other things, subject matter, freedom of formal expression, and the choice and topicality of the models drawn from cultural tradition. While the artists, rejecting an illusion of representation, stood for entirely new forms of art, the writers proposed a realistic and expressive model of art. A particular opportunity for a broad exchange of opinions was offered by discussions that accompanied the opening of each exhibition of the Club. They attracted members of all sections, the invited guests, and the general public. The Club discussions on painting attest above all to a deep commitment of this circle to the matters connected with the situation of the modern current in Polish art. They reveal the then felt common need for providing an optimum formula that would be sufficiently flexible to reconcile a wide range of issues to be considered, such as modern form, realism, presence of subject matter, reference to reality, utility of art and its independence, dialectical development of art, and the category of a mass viewer.

Keywords

EN

YOUNG ARTISTS AND SCIENTIST'S CLUB (WARSAW 1947-1949)

Discipline

• ARTS_&_ARCHITECTURE: ARTS & ARCHITECTURE

• Publisher: Jagiellonian University in Cracow, Institute of History of Art
• Journal: Modus. Prace z historii sztuki
• Year: 2002
• Volume: 3
• Pages: 51-86
• Document type: ARTICLE

Dates

published

2002

Contributors

author

Kurzac Małgorzata

• Instytut Historii Sztuki UJ

• M. Kurzac, Uniwersytet Jagiellonski, Instytut Historii Sztuki, ul. Grodzka 53, 31-003 Kraków, Poland

Identifiers

CEJSH db identifier

06PLAAAA01553412