Good morning everyone. Now, you’ve been learning about Marc Chagall’s life and themes in his art. Today we will talk more specifically about Chagall’s independent style and what some critics think of his work.
As you know, many painters of Chagall’s time used abstract styles to show modern life and experiences such as war
and difficult economic times. These artists believed that
the old ways of painting could not show these experiences. Common themes in modernist art were social problems and loss of hope. On the other hand, with themes such as love, simple life, and nature, Chagall’s art is easy to understand and full of hope. According to Jean-Michel Foray of the Chagall Museum, Chagall wanted people to understand what he was saying in his art. But some critics say that Chagall is just too simple and sentimental, a point I will return to later.
OK, so by now you probably realize that Chagall did not use just one technique. He used elements of many different styles in his work. In I and the Village, he used some cubist and modernist techniques: geometric shapes like circles
and squares, bright colors, and showing objects in an unreal way. But at the same time, many of his subjects look real. This all creates a feeling of fantasy, doesn’t it? His paintings are dreamlike. Look at the painting The Birthday. It shows
a man and a woman. We know how much he loved Bella, so the man must be Marc and the woman must be Bella. Only one of the woman’s feet is touching the ground, and both
of Chagall’s feet are off the ground, with his head turned to kiss her. And where are they? We see a bed and a dresser,
so they may be in a bedroom. Maybe it’s a dream? This is something we see so much of in Chagall: bringing together the real and the unreal. This might be what creates that feeling of dreamy joy.
Some art critics, however, criticize Chagall’s work as being too sentimental. Sabina Ott of the San Francisco Art Institute says that Chagall’s colors, for instance, are fantastic, but his simple subjects—flying animals and dreamy lovers—make his art too sentimental. Ott feels it doesn’t make her look for a deeper meaning.