A Favorite Painting, 38

Robert Delaunay, Champ de Mars: The Red Tower, 1911/23

I've been thinking a bit lately about the meaning of "modernism," not just in relation to art but as a historical phenomenon associated closely with the twentieth century. It's a term that permeates much of what was and is written about the period marked by rapid technological advances and concurrent developments in political, social and aesthetic thought and practice. At its core, modernism suggests that what is new is better, or at least more important or significant, than the traditional practices that dominated the Western world (at least) for the previous several hundred years (classicism). Where art and painting is concerned, this is manifested in an image like Delaunay's, the style of which is representational, but fragmented and analytical as opposed to merely illustrative. In viewing more traditional works, a viewer might break it down into component parts for study, but here, Delaunay has already done that for us. There's a comparison to made between this and Peter Breugel's Renaissance depiction of the Tower of Babel, but Delaunay's image portrays the inherent instability of his structure without needing to invoke any outside point of reference as Breugel's work does. What's really interesting is that that instability is built into the modern sensibility-- something cannot be new forever, and will inevitably give way to something else. The question remains as to whether there is an infinite pool of innovation to draw upon, or if it is inevitable that we rediscover and integrate the classic ideas over and over in order to continue fostering what we consider to be change.