Expressionism and Oceanic Art: A Comparative Analysis

Expressionism and Oceanic Art The presence of art as a cultural trait is common to both popular and folk culture. Expressionism, the idea of using simplified shapes and distortion of physical features, has considerably influenced modern art practices. Oceanic art is a widespread part of traditional South Pacific Islander culture, and also distorts human features. Expressionism and Oceanic art share many aspects of style, but differ greatly in aspects of origin, diffusion, and purpose.

Expressionism

Artists in the early 1900s commonly utilized techniques of distortion and exaggeration, characteristics of expressionism, to establish the element of emotion. According to Wolf (2017), expressionist artists often incorporate “swirling, swaying, and exaggeratedly executed brushstrokes to convey the turgid emotional state of the artist reacting to the anxieties of the modern world” (p. 1). Amplification of the human figure often evokes strong emotions for audiences of many different cultures. Additionally, the style reflects the consequences of urbanization, such as the alienation of individuals in society (Wolf, 2017).

As the Museum of Modern Art mentions, the expressionists visited ethnographic collections of Oceanic art and “borrowed stylistically from what they encountered—including geometric ornamentation, decorative patterning, and flattened planes” (Boyle, p. 1). Likewise, both styles utilize exaggeration and the human body to illustrate hidden meanings that appeal to human understanding. Conversely, while expressionism reflects suffering and anxiety, Oceanic art displays connections to ancestors. Similarly, the expressionists decided to paint using striking colors, as opposed to the neutral tones in Oceanic statues and tapestries. Despite their many shared principles, expressionism and Oceanic art manage to remain