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Early Twentieth Century Art and Physics - Some Parallets
[edit]Or as mathematics, a human invention
That parallels but never touches reality, gives the astronomer
Metaphors through which he may comprehend
That powers and the flow of things: so the human sense
Of beauty is our metaphor of their excellence, their divine
nature:-like dust in a whirlwind, making
The wild wind visible.
Robinson Jeffers
This article aims to elucidate certain similarities between the ideas explored in modern art (post-Romanticism) and the ideas of modern physics (post-Classical). The period corresponds to the fin de siècle period of 19-th century and the beginning of the 20-th century. One must, however, note that whenever art and physics do show a genuine connection, it is almost never more intimate than a sort of cousinship. Still, in the study of culture, as in genealogy, family resemblances plays an important role.
Scientific philosophies, beginning with Auguste Comte (1798-1857), stressed the matter-of-factness of empirical measures. Prominent researchers, too, contended that it was mistaken to try to find pre-established harmonies between the Laws of Thought and the material operations of Nature. Of course, it is true that science does not require such harmony for its work. But it is important to remark that as science grew more empirical and detached itself from metaphysical notions (but by no means completely liberated from them) it also became less and less materialistic while at the same time, became more and more conscious of its hypothetical nature and it s dependence on deductive logic. From Classical Mechanics (of particles and fields) and absolute Euclidean space, physics proceeded to the Theory of Relativity and denial of the existence of an absolute space at all. As scientific ideas were simplified, the operations of physical sciences became more and more arcane.
An analogous situation was obtained within the arts. The rather simple-minded Realism of Gustave Courbet(1819-77) in "Stone Cutters"
gave rise to the search for the exquisite sensation which culminated in the Claude Monet (1840-1926) paintings of water lilies; e.g.
Thus the mask of mere appearances sponsored an interest in the nature of illusion. And it was that interest which led Paul Cezanne (1839 -1906), and then Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) and Georges Braque (1882-1963), into investigations of artistic form that were as esoteric as General Relativity or Quantum Mechanics.
George Braque - Les Barques à Collioure
All of this grew from empiricist attributes that, towards the end of the 19-th century, came into a sort of suzerainty. In contrast to romanticism and classicism of the intermediate past, all the advanced thought of the Second French Empire (1852-1870) was constructive, reflective, and analytical. Everywhere the technical problems were in the fore-front and in every field of endeavor philosophies dedicated to empirical truth vied with the presumptions of tradition. Because of thoroughgoing commitments to the strictly technical side of the art and because their aesthetic reflected a preoccupation with freedom and mobility, Impressionist came ultimately to reign supreme. Similarly, the direction scientific thought set for itself at this time, when it turned away from naïve materialism to analyze phenomena and the Laws of Thought, set the course of serious investigation from that time to the present.
Physics came up with 2 major novelties to be assimilated during the fist decade of the 20-th century. The first may be referred to as the dissolution of matter. Common sense had always thought of matter as something whose essence, the atom, was to be hard, solid, and impenetrable. The newer physics changed all that. Radioactivity, discovered just before the turn of the 20-th century, was evidence that atoms are not perfectly stable but can break down (i.e. divide) spontaneously. Sir Joseph John Thomson’s (1856-1940) discovery of the electron (1897), followed by Ernst Rutherford’s (1871-1937) discovery of the proton (1907), was leading to the view that the atom is anything but solid in any ordinary sense. The most appropriate picture of it at that time was a collection of minute particles of electricity; organized like a solar-system, most of which being mainly empty space. Matter, made of such atoms, no longer had a continuous dense structure but was mainly empty space containing an assemblage of vast numbers of tiny particles, and even they did not seem over solid to a more old-fashioned outlook.
The second major novelty, which was perhaps even more influential on painters, was the breakdown of the classical ideas of space and time. George Francis Fitzgerald (1851-1901) and Hermann Minkowski (1864-1909) had shown that when one material body is moving in relation to a second, its length, as measured from the second body is altered in a way depending on the relative motion of the two bodies. If we have a number of bodies moving in relation to one-another, like the planets or the stars, each one has its own appropriate frame of space, to which its measurements relate. And Albert Einstein (1879–1955), in his Special Theory of Relativity, pointed out that there is no way of determining, indeed no meaning, in asking which of the frames is the “correct” one. Arthur Eddington (1882-1944) put it this way :
“We have been confronted with something not contemplated in Classical Physics – a multiplicity of frames of space, each one as good as any other.”
And soon, of course, it became evident that these frames, not only included space, but also time. These changes in the world picture of physics were largely due to the fact that it is impossible for an observer to determine quite precisely what, in another frame, is simultaneous with his “now”. There is a certain blurring of what had been thought of as the dimensionless instant, or, to put it in another way, space that had been considered timeless is actually inseparable from motion, which involves time. The absolute and inert space and time of Sir Isaac Newton (1642 - 1727) was thus transformed into an amalgamation of space and time. The new view of physical reality was that of an everywhere dense continuum of events in space-time, or, rather, time-space to emphasize the temporal character of this medium.
The main notions which artists seem to have assimilated from the new physics were these: that matter is less solid, more transparent as it were, than it had been thought to be; that motion cannot really be frozen into a timeless instant; that a real body cannot be properly seen from a single perspective point, but that there are many spatial frames which may be applied to it, and that these are of equal validity. It is very unlikely that they formulated these notions in any clear-cut way and we need not make this assumption to carry out our comparison.
One can find parallels between the underlying ideas of the Special Theory of Relativity and the ideas incorporated in certain works of art. We can point out to some parallels between Analytical Cubism and the Special Theory of Relativity. The originators of the Cubist movement, Picasso and Braque, were trying to represent an object in an eternal four-dimensional space-time continuum, in which temporal change and motion were no more and no less dynamic than the three dimensions of space but were treated on an equality with it. One can specifically point to the paintings “Composition au Violin” (1910-1911) and “L’homme a la guitare” (1914) by Braque and “Aficionado” (1912) by Picasso which represented an everywhere dense space-time continuum.
George Braque – Composition au violon
George Braque - L’homme a la guitare
Pablo Picasso – Aficionado
We shall exercise caution in attributing these paintings to the influence of physics on the painter. In case of Braque, at least we can trace back the development of a dense medium. In his painting “Les Barques à Collioure” (1906), a representational Fauve painting, although there is no gross distortion of whatever outlines were accepted for inclusion, in many areas the edges of the natural forms were effectively reduced to insignificance by placing, within regions of officially empty space, brush strokes as definite as those by which solid masses were delineated. Cover the one big boat in the painting and the rest appears almost completely abstract and non-representational, and shares with Monet the characteristics of an all-over, edge-less distribution of interest, and the implication, not of an empty space containing some solid objects, but of a three-dimensional volume with every cubic centimeter occupied with something or other.
This “all-over-ness” and “everywhere-dense continuum of events” remained a major ingredient of modern art. After Analytical Cubism, it tended to be overlaid by other considerations, until it came back strengthened and refreshed in the Abstract Expressionism of the late 1940s- painters such as Philip Guston (1913-1980), Jack Tworkov (1900-1982), and Carl Morris (1911-1993).
The Special Theory of Relativity put great emphasis on time and indicated the temporal character of such solid entities as atoms-in so far as they were considered as a chain of events in space-time continuum. Always in change and flux. The physical universe of Special Relative was one of dynamic change and was in sharp contrast to the static universe of Pierre-Simon Laplace (1749-1827) and Newton. Once can then draw parallels between this particular aspect of the Special Relativity and certain ideas of the Futurist movement, as embodied in such works as those of Umberto Boccioni (1882-1916) such as “The Unique Forms of Continuity in Space” (1913) and Giacomo Balla’s (1871 - 1958) “Little Girl Running on the Balcony” (1912).
Umberto Boccioni - The Unique Forms of Continuity in Space
Giacomo Balla - Little Girl Running on the Balcony
Boccioni was experimenting with three-dimensional Futurism. He wanted to do more than to suggest motion, he wanted to capture it in metal. Energizing his bronze with molten activity, he gave his sculpture a vitality that recalls both natural and mechanistic forces. “Sculpture”, Boccioni once remarked, “should bring to life the object by making visible its prolongation into space.” And so he tried to “fuse in space” his striding figure. It was not merely a speeding figure that Boccioni was after; it was the dynamic relationship of speed to the very form that speed was remaking in space.
The Futurists, Balla and Boccioni included, tried to represent simultaneously the different aspects an object would assume as it changed through time. They insisted that all movement around, as well as space near and far, must be studied as part of what they labeled “Universal Dynamics”. The Futurist’s effort was aimed at capturing dynamism in their paintings, but what they achieved was kinetic, with an emphasis on movement. However, for our purposes, the very idea of painting dynamic pictures shows a certain affinity with physics – relativistic or non-relativistic.
In physics, the term “dynamic” is used across multiple branches and it essentially implies change and movement. This “change” might be of different nature in different circumstances, but there has to be some change in the physical state of the system under investigation to be able to use the term “dynamic” – and its other derivatives. Statistical Mechanics, a branch of physics developed in the 19-th century, set itself the goal of obtaining those general relationships which do not change over long intervals of time. Statistical Mechanics looks for laws governing the dynamic equilibrium of systems consisting of large (Avogadro number, 6.0221367 x 1023 ) of particles. In physics, by dynamic equilibrium is meant the physical state in which the equilibrium is sustained through small fluctuations of the physical state of the system around a mean (average) set of values. It is these fluctuations that constitute the dynamic aspect of the equilibrium and their net result-summed over large intervals of time-tends to cancel one another out so that the equilibrium state is not disturbed. Physics maintains that all equilibrium is dynamic, i.e. there are always minutescule changes present.
In the realm of the arts too these terms-equilibrium, dynamic equilibrium etc.- are used. The Futurists were not the only ones who employed those terms and tried to give a dynamic aspect to their works. Piet Mondrian (1872-1944) in Holland was walking the same path. Quite early in his career he wrote : “In plastic art reality can be expressed only through the equilibrium of dynamic movement of form and colour; and pure means afford the most effective way of attaining this. When dynamic movement is established through contrasts or opposition of the expressive means, relationship becomes the chief pre-occupation of the artist who is seeking to create equilibrium. I found that the right angle is the only constant relationship, and that through the proportions of dimension, its constant expression can be given movement, that is, made living.” This is the idea which underlies, for example, the painting “Composition” (1930).
Piet Mondrian – Composition
Towards the end of his life Mondrian emphasized the point even more strongly :
“It is important to discern two sorts of equilibrium in art (1) Static Balance (2) Dynamic Equilibrium… The great struggle for artist is the annihilation of static equilibrium in their painting through continuous opposition (contrasts) among the means of expression… Many appreciate in my former work just what I did not want express, but which was produced by an incapacity to express what I intended to express- dynamic movement in equilibrium.”
These words of Mondrian are reminiscent of the ideas of Statistical Mechanics-as espoused earlier.
Certain parallels may also be noted between the ideas of General Theory of Relativity and those of modern art. As we saw earlier, The Special Theory of Relativity amalgamated space and time into a unity – space-time. The General Theory of Relativity, on the other hand, endowed this underlying, four-dimensional continuum with structure; i.e. geometry. The General Theory of Relativity stroke the death blow at the concept of an intuitive, passive space. Space-time was endowed with dynamic qualities which made it an active participant in the physical universe. These dynamical properties were linked to the intrinsic structure (geometry) of space-time. This intrinsic structure, this geometry, was determined by the distribution of matter in space-time. John A. Wheeler (1911-) captured these odd notions perfectly:
"Matter tells space how to curve, and curved space tells matter how to move."
Thus, space-time and matter emerged as inseparable and interlinked. Before the advent of the General Theory of Relativity it was thought that space and time will continue to exist where all the matter of the world were to disappear. The General Theory of Relativity established the doctrine that space-time and matter cannot exist apart from each other. The General Theory of Relativity attaches outmost importance to the geometrical properties of space-time, since these properties ultimately determine the character of space and its properties.
Similar ideas seem to underlie the painting Vega (1957) by Victor Vasarely (1908-1997). In this painting movement, depth, height, and forms of material objects are implied by changing geometry of painting surface.
Victor Vasarely – Vega
The sphere, the ripple at the bottom of the canvas, and so on, are all made visible, indeed created, by virtue of the variation of the checkered pattern. Naum Gabo (1890-1977) also seems to have followed the same ideas in the sculpture “Linear Construction in Space No. 1 (Variation)" (1943)
Naum Gabo - Linear Construction in Space No. 1
According to Gabo : “…don’t forget that space was neglected by artists before our time. In their work they only recognized the simple fact that bodies do not exist in space and that space surrounds them, whereas in my sculpture I am trying to show the penetration of space through everything-through every body, so that space becomes a part of the sculpture, a visual element equivalent to the actual material from which the sculpture is made.”
George Seurat’s (1859-1891) painting “The Circus” (1891) also closely follows the same line of thinking. In this painting the material objects and space are so interlinked that one cannot, without destroying the whole sense of space, remove any object from the painting. Space is spanned by these material objects, or, indeed matter. The space of the Circus painting, in this respect, has very close affinities to the space of the General Theory of Relativity.
George Seurat - The Circus
Indeed, Paul Cézanne (1839 - 1906) also, in so far as his dissolution of a priori space is concerned - in such paintings as “Le Mont Sainte-Victoire” (1885-1187) – has as much in common with the relativistic concept of space-time.
Paul Cézanne – Le Mont Sainte-Victoire
Many more such parallels may be found between physical ideas and artistic ideas. We can mention Alexander Calder (1898-1976) and his “mobiles” . He thought of them largely in astronomical terms. He is reported as saying : “… The idea of detached bodies floating in space, of different sizes and densities, perhaps of different colors and temperatures, and surrounded and interrelated with wisps of gaseous condition, and some at rest, while others move in peculiar manners, seems to me the ideal source of form.”
Alexander Calder - Mobile
His mobiles seems to have had an origin much closer to the geometrizing art, to physics, and Calder’s own education as an engineer. (In fact, a visit to Piet Mondrian's studio in 1930 "shocked" him into embracing abstract art.)
The proceeding parallels between physics and the arts are not inclusive. There are, however, deeper parallels between certain schools of art and physics. This affinity may be characterized as an effort towards geometrization. The Theories of Relativity introduced geometry into physics and thus permanently altered the course of development of physics. The aim and hope of physicists, since the advent of the Theories of Relativity, has been to generalize the concepts of these theories to other branches of physics. Relativistic Physics is based upon the introduction of such geometric concepts as curvature and orientation into physics. Since then generations of physicists have tried to geometrize physics and invent all inclusive, unified theories (called Unified Field Theories) of all physical phenomena. The aim has been to abstract out the absolute, i.e. uncontaminated by the personal elements of the observer, properties of the physical universe. In the General Theory of Relativity this was accomplished by the introduction of the absolute quantities of geometric origin – such as the metric and the curvature. This program has not been successfully carried out in the rest of physics, and a complete geometrization of physics is yet to be done.
The same process was going on concurrently in the arts. The Cubists, the Constructivists, the Futurists, and the Bauhaus were all geomtrizers who were trying to abstract out some absolutes by the application of geometry to art. These absolutes and the corresponding geometrization techniques changed from school to school; from the representation of an object in an eternal space-time continuum in Cubism to simultaneous representation of different aspects an object would assume as it changed through time. The aim of using a vocabulary of geometric-scientific forms has been not to express the visual character of a technological civilization, but an attempt to discover a form of painting which seemed congruent with the spirit of a scientific age. As the General Theory of Relativity provided the impetus for all subsequent attempts to geometrize physics, Cubism provided the first impetus for the development in this line in the modern arts.
Lord Kelvin (1824-1907), one of the giants of Classical Mathematical Physics, in two sentences summed up physics as pursuit of facts. He wrote : “If you can measure that of which you speak, and can express it by a number, you know something of your subject; but if you cannot measure it, your knowledge is meager and unsatisfactory."
The invention of Quantum Mechanics in 1920s and 1930s dramatically changed the physical sciences. We have learnt a great deal about the atomic and molecular structure in the 70 years since then. We have come to understand why less tidy materials, such as rubber and wool, stretch and curl. We have learnt that sulfa drugs are effective because the geometrical arrangement of their atoms causes bacteria to take them for body chemical on which they feed. We know why certain materials like diamond and graphite have different properties although they are made up of the same substance-carbon in this case. We have elucidated the underlying mechanisms of chemical interactions. We have begun to decipher the orderly code in which atoms in living molecules arrange themselves to pass on the message of heredity from one generation to the next. In short, we have been able to connect together and explain a whole host of (phenomena) facts by very general theories.
This is the outlook of modern physics: a search, not for numerical measurements, but for topological (geometrical) relations among the various fundamental entities of the physical universe. Artists, it seems, have been trekking along the same path. In much of abstract painting, one can find the artist in search of significant structure which shall be neither mechanical nor biological; or in the geometrical forms to which modern sculpture has changed the traditional nude.
Lastly, consider a single example; the sculptor Henry Moore (1898-1986). The shapes which Henry Moore gave to human form were strong and highly organized, but they were not organized on the frame of the human skeleton. In the three sculpture reproduced here; “Four-Piece Composition: Reclining Figure” (1934), “Reclining Figure” (1939), and “Stringed Figure” (1937), he was saying something else about the body than that it had bones in it.
Henry Moore - Four-Piece Composition: Reclining Figure
Henry Moore - Reclining Figure
Henry Moore – Stringed Figure
Moore was saying that the limbs are connected by a geometry which is characteristically human and (in his nudes of women) feminine. The shapes that he made owe their humanity to their characteristic geometry.
For seventy years we have been living in an intellectual revolution, in which interest has shifted from the surface appearance to the underlying structure, and then from the gross structure to the fine organization of minute parts in which only the total pattern (geometry) expresses the order.
Whether this geometric program in physics will be successful or not and its influence in art are topics for the future. But that art is the chief human method of communicating from past to the present and from the present to future will remain thus.
Bibliography Sir Arthur Eddington, The Nature of Physical World, Macmillan, New York, 1928. Gyorgy Kepes; Structure in Art and Science; George Braziller, New York, 1965. Katherine Kuh, Breakup: The Core of Modern Art, N.Y. Graphics Society, 1966. Piet Mondrian, Plastic Art and Pure Plastic Art, Wittenborn , New York, 1945. The Museum of Modern Art Bulletin, XIII: 4-5, New York, 1946, The Museum of Modern Arts Bulletin, New York, 1951. John A Richardson, Modern Art and Scientific Thought, University of Illinois Press, Urbana, 1971. Kip S. Thorne, Charles W. Misner, John Archibald Wheeler, Gravitation, San Francisco ,W. H. Freeman , 1973. C. H. Waddington, Behind Appearance, MIT Press, Cambridge, 1969