YASUO KUNIYOSHI

Born in a Year of the Cow, according the the Japanese calendar, it seemed obvious to Kuniyoshi that he would feel a kinship to these creatures. Invited to an art colony in Maine for the summer of 1920, surrounded by agricultural land and pastoral fields of grazing bovine, his paintings ‘usually began with cows’. Yet despite the ample opportunity, Kuniyoshi worked in the Japanese tradition of painting from memory, not from life. His subjects were a combination of visual recollection and idealistic imagination, resulting in subjects that were the ideals of their being, the platonic perfection of cows. This was combined with an influence of Cubism from the West that resulted in angular, geometric lines and reductions, producing images that bridged a cultural gap. Over the 1920s, he painted more than 60 works with cows as the central subjects. There is something in these works that speaks to the uniquely universal experience of agricultural, while still feeling reminiscent of deeply American way of life. 

MAX PECHSTEIN

The ‘Die Brücke’ artists prided themselves on their crudeness. Like their French counterparts the Fauves, they rejected both total abstraction and realist depiction, disliking Impressionism’s focus on aesthetic beauty and the neutered, domestic subjects of Pointillism. They were the proton-expressionists, informed by primitive art and the raw expression of emotion, in subject matter explicit and erotic charged. Their very name ‘Die Brücke’, translates to ‘The Bridge’, an acknowledgement the group made that they were to be a bridge to the art of the future, a self fulfilling prophecy that ensured both their importance and their brief life. It was in the early days of this creatively enthused rebellion that a young Max Pechstein joined the group, and became the only artist with formal training to do so. This led, unsurprisingly, to a fractious relationship and resentment between the members, especially as Pechstein gained more commercial success than the others. He was expelled in 1912, and became a darling of the art world until he was vilified as a degenerate by the Nazi’s and his art removed from all institutions. His career revived after the war and Pechstein continued to paint and create to acclaim and through it all, his style always spoke to the Die Brückes. A member for only 6 years in a more than 50 year career but there was not a brushstroke painted that wasn’t informed by the wild philosophies of his youthful rebellion.

JEAN BÉRAUD

Béraud became so immersed in the city of Paris that he came to represent the very pinnacle of metropolitan life. Charming, eloquent and exquisitely dressed, after moving to the city from his native Russia and abandoning his law degree, the doors of the capital opened for him. He found himself at the centre of the glittering social scene and was calculated in rising through the ranks to become the most talked about figure in contemporary art. His paintings were the height of modernity in both style and subject, depicting everyday urban life on the streets, the seedy underbelly of the city, and the private rooms of high society, not accessible to most Parisians. This confluence of high and low society was testament to how deeply Béraud understood Paris in all of its variation, and the neutral precision of his depictions did not pass judgement against any facet of life. Béraud’s reputation has waned since his death, but the work of the man considered the most modern of artists still retains an urgency when viewed today, more than a century after its conception.