Editing Modernism (section)

=== The early 19th century ===
{{See also|Impressionism}}
[[File:Crystal_Palace_General_view_from_Water_Temple.jpg|thumb|[[The Crystal Palace]] at Sydenham (1854). At the time it was built, the Crystal Palace boasted the greatest area of glass ever seen in a building.]]
In the context of the Industrial Revolution (~1760–1840), influential innovations included [[Steam engine|steam-powered industrialization]], especially the development of railways starting in Britain in the 1830s,<ref>{{cite book |first=Stuart |last=Hylton |year=2007 |title=The Grand Experiment: The birth of the Railway Age, 1820–1845 |publisher=Ian Allan Publishing}}</ref> and the subsequent advancements in physics, engineering, and architecture they led to. A major 19th-century engineering achievement was the [[The Crystal Palace|Crystal Palace]], the huge cast-iron and plate-glass exhibition hall built for the [[Great Exhibition|Great Exhibition of 1851]] in London.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2024-12-05 |title=Crystal Palace {{!}} Description, History, & Facts |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Crystal-Palace-building-London |access-date=2025-01-06 |website=www.britannica.com |language=en}}</ref> Glass and iron were used in a similar monumental style in the construction of major railway terminals throughout the city, including  [[London King's Cross railway station|King's Cross station]] (1852)<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.lner.info/co/GNR/kingscross.shtml |series=LNER Encyclopedia |title=The Great Northern Railway: Kings Cross Station |access-date=19 November 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150429044237/http://www.lner.info/co/GNR/kingscross.shtml |archive-date=29 April 2015}}</ref> and [[Paddington Station]] (1854).<ref>{{cite book |first=R.V.J. |last=Butt |date=1995 |title=The Directory of Railway Stations |location=Yeovil |publisher=Patrick Stephens |page=180}}</ref> These technological advances spread abroad, leading to later structures such as the [[Brooklyn Bridge]] (1883)<ref>{{Cite web |title=NYC's Bucket List Walk |url=https://www.nyctourism.com/articles/guide-to-the-brooklyn-bridge/ |access-date=2025-01-06 |website=New York City Tourism + Conventions |language=en-US}}</ref> and the [[Eiffel Tower]] (1889), the latter of which broke all previous limitations on how tall man-made objects could be.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2017-10-30 |title=Eiffel Tower history, architecture, design & construction |url=https://www.toureiffel.paris/en/the-monument/history |access-date=2025-01-06 |website=www.toureiffel.paris |language=en}}</ref> While such engineering feats radically altered the 19th-century urban environment and the daily lives of people, the human experience of time itself was altered with the development of the [[electric telegraph]] in 1837,<ref>{{cite book |first=Geoffrey |last=Hubbard |year=1965 |title=Cooke, and Wheatstone, and the Invention of the Electric Telegraph |publisher=[[Routledge]] & Kegan Paul |place=London, UK |page=78}}</ref> as well as the adoption of "[[standard time]]" by British railway companies from 1845, a concept which would be adopted throughout the rest of the world over the next fifty years.<ref>{{cite journal |first=Ian R. |last=Bartky |date=January 1989 |title=The adoption of standard time |journal=[[Technology and Culture]] |volume=30 |issue=1 |pages=25–56 |doi=10.2307/3105430 |jstor=3105430 |s2cid=111724161 |url=https://zenodo.org/record/1235143 |access-date=3 October 2020 |archive-date=26 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201126015659/https://zenodo.org/record/1235143 |url-status=live }}</ref>

Despite continuing technological advances, the ideas that history and civilization were inherently progressive and that such advances were always good came under increasing attack in the 19th century. Arguments arose that the values of the artist and those of society were not merely different, but in fact oftentimes opposed, and that society's current values were antithetical to further progress; therefore, civilization could not move forward in its present form. Early in the century, the philosopher [[Schopenhauer]] (1788–1860) (''[[The World as Will and Representation]]'', 1819/20) called into question previous optimism.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Kay |first=Nichee |date=2019-07-15 |title=The Optimism in Arthur Schopenhauer's Pessimistic Philosophy |url=https://nchky.medium.com/the-optimism-in-arthur-schopenhauers-pessimistic-philosophy-f7e8b2d20a03 |access-date=2025-01-06 |website=Medium |language=en}}</ref> His ideas had an important influence on later thinkers, including [[Friedrich Nietzsche]] (1844–1900).<ref name="Stanford">{{cite encyclopedia |year=2017 |title=Søren Kierkegaard |encyclopedia=Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |publisher=Stanford University |url=http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kierkegaard/ |department=Metaphysics Research Lab |access-date=30 November 2014 |archive-date=25 February 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170225014254/https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kierkegaard/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Similarly, [[Søren Kierkegaard]] (1813–1855)<ref name="Stanford" /> and Nietzsche<ref name="Collinson">{{cite book |last=Collinson |first=Diané |title=Fifty Major Philosophers: A reference guide |publisher=Routledge |year=1987 |place=London, UK}}</ref>{{rp|page=120}} both later rejected the idea that reality could be understood through a purely objective lens, a rejection that had a significant influence on the development of [[existentialism]] and [[nihilism]].

[[File:Edouard Manet - Olympia - Google Art Project 3.jpg|thumb|left|[[Édouard Manet]], ''[[Olympia (Manet)|Olympia]]'', 1863–65, [[Oil on canvas]], [[Musée d'Orsay]]. Olympia's confrontational gaze caused great controversy when the painting was first exhibited at the 1865 [[Salon (Paris)|Paris Salon]], especially as a number of details identified her as a ''[[Demimonde|demi-mondaine]],'' or [[courtesan]]. These include the fact that the name "Olympia" was associated with prostitutes in 1860s Paris. Conservatives condemned the work as "immoral" and "vulgar".]]
Around 1850, the [[Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood]] (a group of English poets, painters, and art critics) began to challenge the dominant trends of industrial [[Victorian England]] in "opposition to technical skill without inspiration."<ref name="Bloomsbury">{{cite book |title=The Bloomsbury Guide to English Literature |publisher=Prentice Hall |year=1990 |editor-last=Wynne-Davies |editor-first=Marion |place=New York, NY}}</ref>{{rp|page=815}} They were influenced by the writings of the art critic [[John Ruskin]] (1819–1900), who had strong feelings about the role of art in helping to improve the lives of the urban working classes in the rapidly expanding industrial cities of Britain.<ref name="Bloomsbury" />{{rp|page=816}} Art critic [[Clement Greenberg]] described the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood as proto-modernists: "There the proto-modernists were, of all people, the Pre-Raphaelites (and even before them, as proto-proto-modernists, the German [[Nazarene movement|Nazarenes]]). The Pre-Raphaelites foreshadowed [[Édouard Manet|Manet]] (1832–1883), with whom modernist painting most definitely begins. They acted on a dissatisfaction with painting as practiced in their time, holding that its realism wasn't truthful enough."<ref name="Greenberg">{{cite periodical |last=Greenberg |first=Clement |date=February 1980 |title=Modern and Postmodern |url=http://www.sharecom.ca/greenberg/postmodernism.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190901163630/http://www.sharecom.ca/greenberg/postmodernism.html |archive-date=1 September 2019 |access-date=15 June 2006 |volume=54 |issue=6 |series=William Dobell Memorial Lecture, Sydney, Australia, 31&nbsp;October 1979 |periodical=Arts}}</ref>

Two of the most significant thinkers of the mid-19th century were biologist [[Charles Darwin]] (1809–1882), author of ''[[On the Origin of Species|On the Origin of Species through Natural Selection]]'' (1859), and political scientist [[Karl Marx]] (1818–1883), author of ''[[Das Kapital]]'' (1867). Despite coming from different fields, both of their theories threatened the established order. Darwin's [[theory of evolution]] by [[natural selection]] undermined [[Religious views on truth|religious certainty]] and the idea of [[Anthropocentrism|human uniqueness]]; in particular, the notion that human beings are driven by the [[Instinct|same impulses]] as "lower animals" proved to be difficult to reconcile with the idea of an ennobling [[spirituality]].<ref>{{cite book |title=The Norton Anthology of English Literature |volume=2 |edition=7th |place=New York, NY |publisher=[[W. W. Norton & Company]] |year=2000 |pages=1051–1052}}</ref> Meanwhile, Marx's arguments that there are fundamental contradictions within the [[capitalist system]] and that workers are [[Labor rights|anything but free]] led to the formulation of [[Marxist theory]].<ref>{{cite book |first=Craig J. |last=Calhoun |year=2002 |title=Classical Sociological Theory |place=Oxford, UK |publisher=[[Wiley-Blackwell]] |pages=20–23}}</ref>

[[African art]] had an important influence on modernist art, which was inspired by their interest in abstract depiction.<ref name="African Influences in Modern Art">Murrell, Denise. [http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/aima/hd_aima.htm "African Influences in Modern Art"], ''[[The Metropolitan Museum of Art]]'', April 2008. Retrieved on 31 January 2013.</ref><ref name=":8">{{cite encyclopedia |title=Art and architecture, History of African |encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of African History |publisher=[[Fitzroy Dearborn]] |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=umyHqvAErOAC&pg=PA636 |last=Lawal |first=Babatunde |date=2005 |editor-last1=Shillington |editor-first1=Kevin |pages= |isbn=1-57958-245-1}}</ref>

[[File:Redon spirit-waters.jpg|thumb|[[Odilon Redon]], ''Guardian Spirit of the Waters'', 1878, charcoal on paper, [[Art Institute of Chicago]]. Describing his work, Redon explained, "My drawings ''inspire'', and are not to be defined. They place us, as does music, in the ambiguous realm of the undetermined."<ref name="Goldwater">{{cite book | title = Artists on Art | first1 = Robert | last1 = Goldwater | first2 = Marco |last2 = Treves | publisher = Pantheon | year = 1945 | isbn = 0-394-70900-4}}</ref>]]