New figuration refers to artistic tendencies in post-war art that rejected the aesthetics of impersonal

abstract art Abstract art uses visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a Composition (visual arts), composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world. ''Abstract art'', ''non-figurative art'', ''non- ...

and updated various forms of return to the figure. While they assumed a human phenomenon, the human did not have to be physically present - a trace or sign was sufficient. The new figuration was not introduced by any manifesto and did not give rise to any homogeneous group. In relation to the previous periods, it is essentially the counterpart of sentimental-aesthetic tendencies and represents an internally urgent expression of moods and existential feelings, which can sometimes appear even as a cult of "ugliness".

History

Earlier classical forms of representation drew on antiquity or the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

, with the assumption that the aim of art was to reproduce the outward appearance of reality.

Cubism Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement which began in Paris. It revolutionized painting and the visual arts, and sparked artistic innovations in music, ballet, literature, and architecture. Cubist subjects are analyzed, broke ...

, too, however revolutionary in its analysis and decomposition of reality, remained the "classicism of the modern age" in this respect.Luděk Novák, Nová figurace / New figuration, Obelisk, Prague 1970, p. 6 The post-war crisis of anthropocentrism and the related departure from traditional conceptions of figuration led temporarily to an emphasis on radical movements of non-figurative art such as neoconstructivism and

geometric abstraction Geometric abstraction is a form of abstract art based on the use of geometric forms sometimes, though not always, placed in non-illusionistic space and combined into non-objective (non-representational) compositions. Although the genre was popu ...

, which had no connection with the world of real phenomena and were assigned a purely artistic role. Adherents of a strictly geometric form founded the Salon "Réalités Nouvelles" in 1947. The wave of abstraction culminated in 1960 at the

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale ( ; ) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy. There are two main components of the festival, known as the Art Biennale () and the Venice Biennale of Architecture, Architecture Biennale (), ...

, where abstract art won all four major prizes. The starting point for the new figuration were movements focused on the subjective perception of reality, such as

expressionism Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...

, which was the first to radically break away from realistic representation and interpret individual feelings independently of reality,

surrealism Surrealism is an art movement, art and cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists aimed to allow the unconscious mind to express itself, often resulting in the depiction of illogical or dreamlike s ...

with its concept of the inner model, and especially

informel Informalism or Art Informel () is a Painting, pictorial movement from the 1943–1950s, that includes all the Abstract painting, abstract and Action painting, gestural tendencies that developed in France and the rest of Europe during the World W ...

as an extreme expression of existential skepticism, which completely rejected both object representation and traditional aesthetic norms. The new figuration, which is a reaction to the crisis of human values and reflects a sense of alienation, is more radical in its outcome and includes revolt, offensive gag, grotesque and blasphemy. It does not renounce the most vulgar naturalism and photography, but also draws on

Dubuffet Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet (; 31 July 1901 – 12 May 1985) was a French painter and sculptor of the École de Paris (School of Paris). His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so-called "low art" and eschewed traditional standards of b ...

Art brut Art Brut is an English indie rock band. Their debut album, '' Bang Bang Rock & Roll'', was released on 30 May 2005, with its follow up, ''It's a Bit Complicated'', released on 25 June 2007. Named after French painter Jean Dubuffet's definition ...

and the aesthetics of the object. It does not seek to re-codify values as a philosophical or aesthetic system. In spite of its intense criticism and open skepticism, to which nothing is sacred, it signifies a new inclination towards the human predicament, and its background is the will to overcome the enormous existential and social dilemma of modern times.

Solitaires and predecessors

In addition to broader tendencies such as Neo-Dadaism, Pop Art,

Nouveau Réalisme A ''nouveau'' ( ), or ''vin (de) primeur'', is a wine which may be sold in the same year in which it was harvested. The most widely exported ''nouveau'' wine is French wine Beaujolais ''nouveau'' which is released on the third Thursday of ...

and

(

Jean Dubuffet Jean Philippe Arthur Dubuffet (; 31 July 1901 – 12 May 1985) was a French Painting, painter and sculpture, sculptor of the School of Paris, École de Paris (School of Paris). His idealistic approach to aesthetics embraced so-called "low art" a ...

), several solitaires from the early 1950s stand out in the emergence of new figuration. French sculptors

Ossip Zadkine Ossip Alexeevich Zadkine (; 28 January 1888 – 25 November 1967) was a Russian and French artist of the School of Paris. He is best known as a sculptor, but also produced paintings and lithographs. Early years and education Zadkine was born o ...

and

Germaine Richier Germaine Richier (16 September 1902 – 21 July 1959) was a French sculptor. Born in Grans, Richier began her studies at the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Montpellier, in the atelier of Louis-Jacques Guigues; in 1926 she went to work with Antoine B ...

, in England

Henry Moore Henry Spencer Moore (30 July 1898 – 31 August 1986) was an English artist. He is best known for his semi-abstract art, abstract monumental Bronze sculpture, bronze sculptures which are located around the world as public works of art. Moore ...

Kenneth Armitage William Kenneth Armitage (18 July 1916 – 22 January 2002) was a British sculptor known for his semi-abstract bronzes. Life Armitage was born in Leeds on July 18, 1916, the youngest of three children studied at the Leeds College of Art and t ...

Lynn Chadwick Lynn Russell Chadwick, (24 November 1914 – 25 April 2003) was an English sculptor and artist. Much of his work is semi-abstract sculpture in bronze or steel. His work is in the collections of MoMA in New York, the Tate in London and th ...

, painters

Diego Rivera Diego Rivera (; December 8, 1886 – November 24, 1957) was a Mexican painter. His large frescoes helped establish the Mexican muralism, mural movement in Mexican art, Mexican and international art. Between 1922 and 1953, Rivera painted mural ...

Fernand Léger Joseph Fernand Henri Léger (; February 4, 1881 – August 17, 1955) was a French painting, painter, sculpture, sculptor, and film director, filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of cubism (known as "tubism") which he gradually ...

Hans Erni Hans Erni (February 21, 1909 – March 21, 2015) was a Swiss graphic designer, painter, illustrator, engraver and sculptor. Born in Lucerne, the third of eight siblings, to a cabin cruiser engineer, he studied art at the Académie Julian in Par ...

and especially

Francis Bacon Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban (; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626) was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England under King James I. Bacon argued for the importance of nat ...

, considered the "father" of neo-expressionism. The founding fathers also include

Pablo Picasso Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, Ceramic art, ceramicist, and Scenic ...

with his late works. The sculptures of

Alberto Giacometti Alberto Giacometti (, , ; 10 October 1901 – 11 January 1966) was a Swiss sculptor, painter, Drafter, draftsman and Printmaking, printmaker, who was one of the most important sculptors of the 20th century. His work was particularly influenced ...

, who was inspired by Etruscan art and emerged from Surrealism, reflect in his prime the existential crisis associated with the search for a new meaning of the figure. American Abstract Expressionism was influenced by

Willem de Kooning Willem de Kooning ( , ; April 24, 1904 – March 19, 1997) was a Dutch-American abstract expressionist artist. Born in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, he moved to the United States in 1926, becoming a US citizen in 1962. In 1943, he married pa ...

, whose ''Women series'' of the late 1940s oscillates between abstraction and figuration. File:Koning en Koningin door Henry Moore.jpg,

, ''King and Queen'' (1952-1953) File:Marl Armitage 01.JPG,

, ''Sitting people'' (1953-1954) File:Eau Richier Tate Modern T00075.jpg,

, ''L'Eau'', Tate Modern (1953-1954) File:Ossip Zadkine-Grosser Orpheus.jpg,

, ''Grosser Orpheus'' (1956) File:'Roaring Lion', bronze sculpture by Lynn Chadwick (British), 1960, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel.JPG,

, ''Roaring Lion'' (1960)

New sources of inspiration

New Figuration sculpture turns in part to ancient forms such as Neolithic idols and Cycladic art. The mythologization of man in sculpture and painting, in addition to archaizing tendencies ( Jean Ipoustéguy,

Olbram Zoubek Olbram Zoubek (21 April 1926 – 15 June 2017) was a contemporary Czech sculptor and designer. His work was inspired by Swiss-Italian sculptor Alberto Giacometti. There is an extensive permanent exhibition of his sculptures and art in Litomyšl ...

Peter Oriešek Peter Oriešek (28 August 1941 – 18 October 2015) was a Czech sculptor, medallist, painter and teacher at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague. Life Peter Oriešek was born on 28 August 1941 in Dolná Súča, Slovak Republic. He studied at th ...

), also has a very contemporary expression in the myth of man in the 20th century. It can be found in paintings and reliefs by Pierre Bettencourt, paintings by Antonio Recalcati, Jacques Monory or a member of the

Nouveau réalisme A ''nouveau'' ( ), or ''vin (de) primeur'', is a wine which may be sold in the same year in which it was harvested. The most widely exported ''nouveau'' wine is French wine Beaujolais ''nouveau'' which is released on the third Thursday of ...

group

Martial Raysse Martial Raysse (born 12 February 1936) is a French artist and actor. He lives in Issigeac, France. He holds the record for the most expensive work sold by a living French artist. Biography Raysse was born in a ceramicist family in Vallauris and ...

. The radical destruction and deformation of the human figure is related to late Surrealism ( Paul Wunderlich, Miodrag Djuric) and to Nordic Expressionism and the

CoBrA COBRA or Cobra, often stylized as CoBrA, was a European avant-garde art group active from 1948 to 1951. The name was coined in 1948 by Christian Dotremont from the initials of the members' home countries' capital cities: Copenhagen (Co), Brussels ...

group (

Karel Appel Christiaan Karel Appel (; 25 April 1921 – 3 May 2006) was a Dutch painter, sculptor, and poet. He started painting at the age of fourteen and studied at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam in the 1940s. He was one of the founders of the avant-gard ...

Asger Jorn Asger Oluf Jorn (3 March 1914 – 1 May 1973) was a Danish painter, sculptor, ceramic artist, and author. He was a founding member of the avant-garde movement COBRA and the Situationist International. The largest collection of Jorn's works� ...

Pierre Alechinsky Pierre Alechinsky (; born 19 October 1927) is a Belgian artist. He has lived and worked in France since 1951. His work is related to tachisme, abstract expressionism, and lyrical abstraction. Life Alechinsky was born in Schaerbeek, Belgium, to ...

Lucebert Lubertus Jacobus Swaanswijk (15 September 1924 – 10 May 1994), known professionally as Lucebert (), was a Dutch artist who first became known as the poet of the COBRA movement. He was born in Amsterdam in 1924. He entered the Institute f ...

) and to post-Cubist formalism ( Pinchas Burstein, alias Maryan S. Maryan). The destruction of the figure in the late César sculptures consists in the deliberate decomposition of a surface welded from steel plates, while the figure by

Karel Nepraš Karel Nepraš (2 April 1932 – 5 April 2002) was a Czech sculptor, draughtsman, graphic artist and professor at Prague Academy. Already in the 1960s, Nepraš became one of the most prominent Czech artists thanks to his ability to master new mate ...

is created as an assemblage of various metal elements joined by textiles. Of the Czech painters,

Jiří Načeradský Jiří Načeradský (9 September 1939 – 16 April 2014) was a Czech painter, graphic artist and educator. He was best known for his human figures, sometimes with erotic and sexual subtext and context. He was born in Sedlec-Prčice, Příbram ...

and Michael Rittstein belong to this current, and of the foreign painters, the Argentine Rómulo Macció or the Spaniard

Antonio Saura Antonio Saura Atarés (September 22, 1930 – July 22, 1998) was a Spanish artist and writer, one of the major post-war painters to emerge in Spain in the fifties whose work has marked several generations of artists and whose critical voice is ...

. In sculpture, the radical deformation of the figure can be flat, as in relief sculptures by Vladimír Janoušek, or the German sculptor

Horst Antes Horst Antes (born 28 October 1936 Heppenheim, Germany) is a German artist and sculptor. Early life and education After his Abitur, he studied from 1957 to 1959 under the important woodcutter HAP Grieshaber at the Akademie der Bildenden Kün ...

Bertha-von-Suttner-Platz mit Blick auf den HBF Eingang

The grotesque monstrosity and wild colouring of

Niki de Saint-Phalle Niki de Saint Phalle (; born Catherine Marie-Agnès Fal de Saint Phalle; 29 October 193021 May 2002) was a French sculptor, painter, filmmaker, and author of colorful hand-illustrated books. Widely noted as one of the few female monumental scul ...

's figures and the late sculptural work of

is based on Pop art. The sense of human alienation can take the form of signs in artworks that reflect the modern world as a set of its proxies, and is already related to conceptual art (

Robert Rauschenberg Milton Ernest "Robert" or "Bob" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combine painting, Combines (1954� ...

), environmental art (

Paul Thek Paul Thek (November 2, 1933 – August 10, 1988) was an American painter, sculptor and installation artist. Thek was active in both the United States and Europe, exhibiting several installations and sculptural works over the course of his life. Po ...

) or

performance art Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a pu ...

(

Bruce Lacey Bruce Lacey (31 March 1927 – 18 February 2016) was a British artist, performer and eccentric. After completing his national service in the Navy he became established on the avant garde scene with his performance art and mechanical constructs. H ...

). Alienation can also take the form of radical leftist anti-bourgeois and anti-militarist engaged art ( Jacques Grinberg, Giovanni Giannini). The majority of the Czech artists of New Figuration went through the

Informel Informalism or Art Informel () is a Painting, pictorial movement from the 1943–1950s, that includes all the Abstract painting, abstract and Action painting, gestural tendencies that developed in France and the rest of Europe during the World W ...

period and their work retains a strong existential subtext despite its external grotesqueness (

Zbyšek Sion Zbyšek Sion (born 12 April 1938, Polička) is a Czech painter and printmaker, a co-founder of Czech structural abstraction art. His later works were mostly imaginative and illusionistic paintings, often on general warning theme or bearing a st ...

Zdeněk Beran Zdeněk Beran' (7 March 1937 – 7 November 2014) was a Czech painter, author of objects and installations, professor and vice-rector of Academy of Fine Arts, Prague. Life Zdeněk Beran attended the Václav Hollar Art School in Prague Vinohra ...

Jan Hendrych Jan Hendrych (born 28 November 1936) is a Czech sculptor, painter, restorer, curator and professor emeritus at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague. Life Jan Hendrych was born in Prague-Střešovice in the family of the lawyer Jaroslav Hendrych ...

, Aleš Veselý). While Western artists such as Canadian

Edmund Alleyn Edmund Alleyn (June09, 1931 December24, 2004) had an art career that underwent many stylistic changes. He explored various styles of painting including abstraction, narrative figuration, technology and pop art, as well as different media.Josée D ...

more strongly perceive the alienation of technical civilization, art classified in the 1970s and 1980s as "Czech grotesque" is considered an ironic representation of stereotypes of human behaviour (

Karel Pauzer Karel Pauzer (born 4 December 1936) is a Czech sculptor, ceramist, painter, printmaker and restorer. Life Pauzer was born in Prague in 1936. From his early youth he was interested in nature, and during holidays in the countryside he drew and mo ...

Hana Purkrábková Hana Purkrábková (19 August 1936, Tábor - 14 January 2019, Prague) was a Czech ceramist and sculptor. Biography After finishing primary school in Tábor, she studied at the Secondary Industrial Ceramic School in Bechyně from 1951 to 1955. T ...

) or bourgeoisie and political establishment (

Bohumil Zemánek Bohumil Zemanek (10 October 1942 in Brno – 12 August 1996 in Prague) was a Czech sculptor and restorer. Biography He was born in Brno as the second son of three children of Bohumír Zemánek, a professional soldier, and his wife Anna Zemánko ...

, Michael Rittstein). The paintings of prominent colourists, such as

Otakar Slavík Otakar Slavík (18 December 1931 – 3 November 2010) was a painter, draughtsman and printmaker, signatory of Charter 77. He is considered one of the most important colourists in Czech art.Karel Miler, Images of Miraculous Color, in: Otakar Slavík ...

Jiří Sopko Jiří (; ''YI-RZHEE'') is a Czech masculine given name, equivalent to English George. Notable people with the name include: B *Georg Benda (Jiří Antonín Benda), Czech composer, violinist and Kapellmeister *Jiří Baborovský, Czech physica ...

, and painters who follow socially critical premises (

Jitka Válová Jitka is a Czech female given name. It is a nickname of the Hebrew name Judith, meaning ''He will be praised'' or ''woman of Judea''. The old Czech form is Jutka, derived from the German name Jutta. The name day is celebrated on 5 December. Pronounc ...

, Květa Válová) also thematise the extremes of human existence. The new figuration also includes the reinterpretation of established pictorial signs - e.g. advertising banners (

Roy Lichtenstein Roy Fox Lichtenstein ( ; October27, 1923September29, 1997) was an American pop artist. He rose to prominence in the 1960s through pieces which were inspired by popular advertising and the comic book style. Much of his work explores the relations ...

James Rosenquist James Albert Rosenquist (November 29, 1933 – March 31, 2017) was an American artist and one of the proponents of the pop art movement. Drawing from his background working in sign painting, Rosenquist's pieces often explored the role of advert ...

) or appropriation of well-known works. After

Bacon Bacon is a type of Curing (food preservation), salt-cured pork made from various cuts of meat, cuts, typically the pork belly, belly or less fatty parts of the back. It is eaten as a side dish (particularly in breakfasts), used as a central in ...

and his 1948 Portrait of Pope Innocent X,

Eduardo Arroyo Eduardo Arroyo Rodríguez (26 February 1937 – 14 October 2018) was a Spanish painting, painter and graphic arts, graphic artist. He was also active as an author and scenic design, set designer. Arroyo is regarded as one of the most important ...

and

Alberto Gironella Alberto Gironella (26 September 1929 – 2 August 1999) was a self-taught Mexican painter born in Mexico City. Heavily influenced by the politics and artist in Mexico, he showcased his works in Brazil, United States, Spain, France, Japan, Sweden ...

also created reminiscences of Vélasquez. In the work of these artists, it is not an inspiration by the art of another epoch but "images of images" as a kind of superphenomenon (

Larry Rivers Larry Rivers (born Yitzroch Loiza Grossberg; August 17, 1923 – August 14, 2002) was an American painter, musician, filmmaker, and occasional actor. Considered by many scholars to be the "Godfather" and "Grandfather" of Pop art, he was on ...

Anthropometry became one of the new ways of depicting the human figure - casting a part (César, Eva Kmentova,

Alina Szapocznikow Alina Szapocznikow (; May 16, 1926 – March 2, 1973) was a Polish artist and Holocaust survivor. Recognized as one of the most important Polish sculptors of the post-war era, Szapocznikow utilized diverse and experimental mediums to investigate an ...

) or the whole figure (

George Segal George Segal Jr. (February 13, 1934 – March 23, 2021) was an American actor. He became popular in the 1960s and 1970s for playing both dramatic and comedic roles. After first rising to prominence with roles in acclaimed films such as '' Ship o ...

) or imprinting the body on canvas (

Yves Klein Yves Klein (; 28 April 1928 – 6 June 1962) was a French artist and an important figure in post-war European art. He was a leading member of the French artistic movement of Nouveau réalisme founded in 1960 by art critic Pierre Restany. Klein wa ...

Rudolf Němec Rudolf Němec (19 May 1936 Prague - 12 March 2015 Prague) was a Czech painter, printmaker, poet and sculptor. He was one of the leading representatives of the New Figuration in Czechoslovakia. Life Rudolf Němec spent his youth and the World ...

). According to Chalupecký, it is an extreme means of making a person present in a work of art. The outlines of figures and various templates were created using a spray gun by

François Arnal François Arnal (2 October 1924 – 28 October 2012) was a French painter and sculptor. Born and raised in a rural area of France, he was educated in Toulon high school and studied law at the University of Aix-en-Provence. Towards the end of t ...

. The blending of photorealistic painting transferred onto a polished steel plate and the mirror reflection of the viewer was used in works by

Michelangelo Pistoletto Michelangelo Pistoletto (born 23 June 1933) is an Italian painter, action and object artist, and art theorist. Pistoletto is acknowledged as one of the main representatives of the Italian Arte Povera. His work mainly deals with the subject mat ...

, a member of

Arte Povera Arte Povera (; literally "poor art") was an art movement that took place between the end of the 1960s and the beginning of the 1970s in major cities throughout Italy and above all in Turin. Other cities where the movement was also important are ...

. The new figuration also returns to the narrative principle in the works of some artists. The influential art critic and co-founder of the art magazine Opus International

Gérald Gassiot-Talabot Gérald is a French male given name, a variant of the old Géraud and more common Gérard, both equivalent to Gerald in English. People with the name include: * Gérald Mossé, French jockey * Gérald de Palmas, French recording artist and singer * ...

had the idea of bringing together, under the umbrella term "narrative figuration", the work of young artists working between 1960 and 1980 ( Gilles Aillaud,

, Jacques Monory, Bernard Rancillac). Narrative figuration works with cycles of images or the delineation of plots in discrete fields (

Cloisonné Cloisonné () is an ancient technology, ancient technique for decorating metalwork objects with colored material held in place or separated by metal strips or wire, normally of gold. In recent centuries, vitreous enamel has been used, but inla ...

), multiplication and variant representations of a single motif, or transfigurations (

). Narrative collages inspired by photographs from newspapers, magazines and film posters are created by Peter Klasen. The alienation of modern consumer society, with its mass production of goods, was the inspiration for

Warhol Andy Warhol (;''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''"Warhol" born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director and producer. A leading figure in the pop art movement, Warhol ...

's famous series of silkscreens of the

Mona Lisa The ''Mona Lisa'' is a half-length portrait painting by the Italian artist Leonardo da Vinci. Considered an archetypal masterpiece of the Italian Renaissance, it has been described as "the best known, the most visited, the most written about, ...

("thirty is better than one"). The figurative work of pop-art artists ( Richard Hamilton, Ronald Kitaj, Allen Jones,

Enrico Baj Enrico Baj (31 October 1924 – 16 June 2003) was an Italian artist and writer on art. Many of his works show an obsession with nuclear war. He created prints, and sculptures but especially collage. He was close to the surrealist and dada mo ...

, etc.) represents a distinctive contribution to the new figuration, even though it originally arose from specific neo-Dadaist motives. A similar principle of repeating the anonymous faces of people from newspaper photographs was used by Argentine

Rubens Gerchman Rubens Gerchman (January 10, 1942 in Rio de Janeiro – January 29, 2008) was a Brazilian painter and sculptor. He was heavily influenced by concrete and neoconcrete art. Many of Gerchman's works are paintings based on populist themes and his ...

. The visual effect of multiplying a single motif is also the subject of Japanese sculptor

Tomio Miki Tomio is a masculine Japanese given name. Written forms Tomio can be written using different combinations of Kanji characters. Some examples: *富雄, "enrich, masculine" *富男, "enrich, man" *富夫, "enrich, husband" *冨雄, "enrich, mas ...

. The relationship between the individual and the crowd, seen from a bird's eye view, is explored by

Juan Genovés Juan Genovés Candel (31 May 1930 – 15 May 2020) was a Spanish painter whose work is considered to symbolise the defence of democracy during the Spanish transition. His work has been recognised domestically and internationally, forming part of ...

in his sculptures and installations, and by Czech painter Jan Měřička. One of the features of the new figuration, but one that has a wider reach and concerns the whole spectrum of modern art, is the abandonment of classical forms of depiction. The distinction between sculpture and installation is blurred, the two-dimensional image enters a three-dimensional space (

Marisol Escobar Marisol Escobar (May 22, 1930 – April 30, 2016), otherwise known simply as Marisol, was a Venezuelan-American sculptor born in Paris, who lived and worked in New York City. She became world-famous in the mid-1960s, but lapsed into relative ob ...

) or loses its precise boundaries ( Jan Kotík).

Antonio Berni Delesio Antonio Berni (14 May 1905 – 13 October 1981) was an Argentine figurative artist. He is associated with the movement known as ''Nuevo Realismo'' ("New Realism"), an Argentine extension of social realism. His work, including a series o ...

, who is one of the representatives of the South American social critical painting '' Nuevo Realismo'', used reliefs from the civilization garbage in his series ''Juanito Laguna''. In his work, the new figuration is linked to the "New Objecthood". In the work of

Bedřich Dlouhý Bedřich Dlouhý (2 August 1932 – 30 May 2025) was Czech painter and a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts in Prague. Life Bedřich Dlouhý's family moved from Plzeň to Most, and after the annexation of Sudetenland in 1938, settled in P ...

, the two components of the work eventually become independent as the object and its pictorial background. Unconventional techniques of depicting the figure using perforation were used by

Adriena Šimotová Adriena Šimotová (1926–2014) was a prominent Czech artist. Known for her work with paper and fabric, she held numerous exhibitions in the Czech Republic and abroad during her lifetime including a retrospective organized by the National Gallery ...

on large-scale objects made of layered paper and by

Alena Kučerová Alena Kučerová (born 1935) is a Czech printmaker. Life A native of Prague, Kučerová studied at that city's Advanced School of Graphic Art, Prague, Advanced School of Graphic Art from 1950 until 1954. From 1955 until 1959 she attended the P ...

in her prints from perforated metal matrices.Luděk Novák, Nová figurace / New Figuration, Obelisk, Praha 1970, p. 17 File:01. Bohumil Zemánek, Kočárek (1964).jpg,

, ''Pram'' (1964) File:Karel Pauzer, Rodinka, 1968.jpg,

, ''Family'' (1968) File:Velký dialog (1966), laminát, drát, textil, lak, 145x190x83 cm.jpg,

, ''Big dialogue'' (1966) File:06. Jan Hendrych, Sedící s myšlenkami (1969).jpg,

, ''Sitting with Thoughts'' (1969) File:23. Zdeněk Beran, Objekt IV (1969).jpg,

, ''Object IV'' (1969) File:18. Vladimír Janoušek, Till Eulenspiegel (1978).jpg, Vladimír Janoušek, ''Till Eulenspiegel'' (1978) File:Zbyšek Sion, Apokalyptická kobylka I, olej, email, plátno, 1963.jpg,

, ''Apokalyptic Grasshopper I'' (1963) File:Rudolf Němec, Sedící, 1967, Národní galerie v Praze.jpg,

, ''Sitting'' (1967), National gallery in Prague File:26. Mikuláš Medek, Zobrazení pohledu na muže v napětí (1967), VČG Pardubice.jpg,

Mikuláš Medek .Mikuláš Medek (3 November 1926 – 23 August 1974) was a Czecoslovak painter. He united the artistic tradition of over three generations and thanks to the originality of his expression, depth and spirituality of his extraordinary work, he occu ...

, ''Depiction of View of a Man in Tension'' (1967) File:49. Zdeněk Beran, Sudie k objektu Rehabilitační oddělení - pánský věšák (1970).jpg,

, ''Study for the object Men's Rack, Rehabilitation Department of Dr.Dr.'' (1970)

Exhibitions (selection)

* 1960 Salon des réalités nouvelles, Paris * 1964 Everyday Mythologies, Musée d'art moderne de la Ville de Paris, Salon de mai * 1969/1970 Nová figurace / New Figuration, Mánes, Prague, Dům umění, Brno * 1977 Mythologies quotidiennes II, Musée d'art moderne de la ville de Paris * 1990 Nouvelle Figuration, Schwarz Gallery, Los Angeles * 1993-1994 Nová figurace / New Figuration, Litoměřice, Pardubice, Brno, Opava, Jihlava * 2008 Figuration narrative, 1960–1972, Grand Palais, Paříž, galerie Anne-Marie et Roland Pallade, Lyon * 2022 The New Figuration, Friedman Benda, New York

References

Sources

* Petrová Eva, Nová figurace / New figuration, Mánes, Union of Czech Visual Artists, Prague 1969 * Marian Váross, Nová figurácia : Die neue Figuration = La nouvelle figuration = The new figuration, Pallas, Bratislava 1969 * Fernand Hazan (ed.), Nouveau dictionnaire de la sculpture moderne, Paris 1970 * Novák Luděk, Nová figurace / New figuration, Obelisk, Prague 1970 * Petrová Eva, Nová figurace / Nouvelle figuration, Dům umění města Brna 1970 * Donald B Kuspit, New figuration, contemporary art from Germany, Frederick S. Wight Art Gallery, Los Angeles, 1983 * The New figuration: Six French artists together again (Erró, Klassen, Monory, Rancillac, Stämpfli, Telemaque), 1960-1990 Mayer-Schwarz Gallery, Beverly Hills, CA, 1990 * Petrová Eva, Nová figurace / New figuration (painting, graphics and sculpture of the 60s and early 70s), North Bohemian Gallery of Fine Arts, Litoměřice, 1993 * Patrick Frank, Painting in a State of Exception: New Figuration in Argentina, 1960–1965, University Press of Florida 2017

External links

Michelle Champetier Gallery: New Figuration 1960-1980

New Figuration, Czech Grotesque, Existential Figuration (1960-1980s), Museum of Art Olomouc

Artfacts: Neo-figuration / New figuration

Jan Souček: Nová figurace, 60. a 70. léta (New Figuration, 1960s and 1970s)

Jan Souček: Nová figurace, 80. léta (New Figuration, 1980s)

Příběhy obrazů a soch. 9/13 Nová figurace / Stories of paintings and sculptures. 9/13 New figuration, Czech TV, 2001
Modern art Art movements {{improve categories, date=October 2023