Expressionism
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In its most general sense, Expressionism is a term that has been applied by art historians to tendencies recurring in the arts since antiquity. The aim of all art is, of course, to communicate, to express ideas or sentiments that evoke responses in the viewer. But in the early years of the 20th century, the term originated as a means of describing art that conveyed, through a wide range of styles and subject matter (or in the case of abstract art, no subject at all), the subjective emotions, the innermost feelings of the artist what Vasily Kandinsky called "inner necessity". Herwarth Walden, critic, poet, musician and the founder in 1910 of the German avant-garde periodical Der Sturm (the storm), drew the distinction between new, revolutionary tendencies after the turn of the century and Impressionism. Expressionist artists built on the discoveries of the Post-Impressionism, who rejected Impressionist devotion to optical veracity and turned inward to the world of the spirit. They employed many languages to give visible form to their feelings, but generally they relied on simple, powerful forms that were realized in a manner of direct, sometimes crude expression, designed to heighten the emotional response of the viewer. The essence of their art was the expression of inner meaning through outer form.
Expressionism is a movement in European (predominantly German) painting that puts emphasize on subjective feelings and emotions. It developed during the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a reaction against academic standards that had prevailed in Europe since the Renaissance (14th century to 17th century). It gained significance between years 1905 and 1918 during a politically and culturally turbulent era of revelation of the profoundly problematic conditions of the turn-of-the-century Europe...