Exhibitions of Modern European Painting 1905-1915

Within just a few years, before World War I, the appearance, and indeed the very notion of (western) painting changed radically. The history of early 20th century modern European art has often been written as the development of new forms and isms. Conversely, little systematic research has been done about how those forms and isms were presented to and received by the public, and whether and how artists used specific strategies to gain an audience. In the 19th century exhibitions had become the primary place to originate discussions about advances in painting and this seems also to be the case after 1900. The project aims to study the history of a crucial moment of modern European painting from the perspective of exhibitions. In order to manage an exhaustive research we concentrate on the period from 1905 to 1915. This time frame covers a particular density of avant-garde movements such as Fauvism (the term originates 1905 at the Salon dAutomne in Paris), Expressionism, Cubism, Futurism, Rayonism, Orphism, Suprematism (springing up in the December 1915 exhibition 0,10 in St. Petersburg, already in the middle of a World War). The first step of the project is the creation of a database of exhibitions taking place in this period, where modern European artists participated. We assume to include ca. 600 exhibitions with roughly 180.000 paintings and two to three thousand artists. The database will be as exhaustive as possible and open to research for anybody on the internet. Within the time frame the quantitative and qualitative analysis of the collected data will serve to outline: 1. The geography and networks of modern painting: Where (in which cities, in which institutions), when, and with whom did artists exhibit? 2. The chronology and geography of exhibiting new forms and propagating isms: Which kinds of paintings were exhibited when and where? 3. The exhibiting strategies of modern painters: How did artists choose the works to present in which exhibitions? Did they pursue specific policies to make themselves publicly known? The project will deliver a new and much broader ground for our knowledge and understanding of the history of European painting in the early 20th century. We venture to assert that it will change our understanding of Abstract Art and to some extent of the general phenomenon of Avant-gardes at the beginning of the 20th century. Beyond our direct scope of research, the database will be a research tool for multifold purposes, such as research on lesser-known artists, on specific art works and their provenance, on the role of specific institutions and/or cities for modern art. In this respect, the outreach of the project transcends the scholarly field and is also of interest for the art market and for regional histories.

Within just a few years, before World War I, the appearance, and indeed the very notion of (western) painting changed radically. The history of early 20th century modern European art has often been written as the development of new forms and isms. Conversely, little systematic research has been done about how those forms and isms were presented to and received by the public, and whether and how artists used specific strategies to gain an audience. In the 19th century exhibitions had become the primary place to originate discussions about advances in painting and this seems also to be the case after 1900. The research project Exhibitions of Modern European Painting 1905-1915 aimed to study the history of a crucial moment of modern European painting from the perspective of exhibitions or, more precisely, through the analysis of the corresponding exhibition catalogues. In order to manage an exhaustive research, we made a survey of exhibition catalogues published from 1905 to 1915. A time frame covering a particular density of avant-garde movements such as Fauvism (the term originates 1905 at the Salon dAutomne in Paris), Expressionism, Cubism, Futurism, Rayonism, Orphism, Suprematism (springing up in the December 1915 exhibition 0,10 in St. Petersburg). The centre of the project is the database DoME, containing information of circa 1300 exhibitions with over 200.000 paintings and more than 13.000 artists. The database is as exhaustive as possible and accessible on the internet (open access: https://exhibitions.univie.ac.at/). Quantitative and qualitative analysis of the data were used in the project and can further be used to outline: 1. The geography and networks of modern painting: Where (in which cities, in which institutions), when, and with whom did artists exhibit? 2. The chronology and geography of exhibiting new forms and propagating isms: Which kinds of paintings were exhibited when and where? Within the project we especially analysed the beginning of propagating abstract art. 3. The exhibiting strategies of modern painters: How did artists choose the works to present in which exhibitions? Did they pursue specific policies to make themselves publicly known? 4. The discourses around modern art exhibitions: How did exhibitions (and their catalogues) interact with art literature and art criticism? The project delivers a new and broader ground for knowledge and understanding of the history of European painting in the early 20th century. Beyond our direct scopes of research, DoME is a research tool that can be used for diverse purposes research on lesser-known artists, on specific artworks and their provenance, on the history and role of specific institutions and/or cities for modern art.