Editing Post-expressionism (section)

==Background==
Leading up to [[World War I]], much of the art world was under the influence of [[Futurism]] and [[Expressionism]]. Both movements abandoned any sense of order or commitment to objectivity or tradition.

The sentiment of Futurists was most vocally expressed by [[Filippo Tommaso Marinetti|Filippo Marinetti]] in the ''[[Futurist Manifesto]]'', where he called for a rejection of the past, a rejection of all imitation &mdash; of other artists or of the outside world &mdash; and praised the virtue of originality and triumph of technology.<ref>Umbro Apollonio (ed.), ''Futurist Manifestos'', MFA Publications, 2001 {{ISBN|978-0-87846-627-6}}</ref> The Futurist poet Vladimir Mayakovsky, along these lines, said “After seeing electricity, I lost interest in nature.”<ref>Greaves, Zaller, and Roberts 1997, p.779</ref> Marinetti and other Futurists glorified war and violence as a way to revolution &ndash; bringing freedom, establishing new ideas, and rallying one to fight for one's own people &ndash; and as war was shaping up in Europe, many saw it and encouraged a way to “purify” the culture and destroy old, obsolete elements of society.

Expressionists, likewise abandoning imitation nature, sought to express emotional experience, but often centered their art around [[angst]] &mdash; inner turmoil; whether in reaction to the modern world, to alienation from society, or in the creation of personal identity. In concert with this evocation of angst, expressionists also echoed some of the same feelings of revolution as did Futurists. This is evidenced by a 1919 anthology of expressionist poetry titled ''[[Menschheitsdämmerung]]'', which translates to “Dawn of Humanity” &mdash; meant to suggest that humanity was in a 'twilight'; that there was an imminent demise of some old way of being and beneath it the urgings of a new dawning.<ref>Midgley 2000, p.15</ref>

Both futurism and expressionism were always met by opposition, but the destruction that occurred in the war had heightened the criticism against them. Following the war, in and throughout different artistic circles there was a call for a [[Return to Order|return to order]] and re-appreciation of tradition and of the natural world. In Italy, this was encouraged by the magazine ''[[Valori Plastici]]'' and came together in the [[Novecento Italiano|Novecento]], a group that exhibited in the Venice Biennale and was joined by many Futurists who had rejected their former work. [[Mario Sironi]], a member of this group, stated that they “would not imitate the world created by God but would be inspired by it.” The “New Objectivity” or ''Neue Sachlichkeit'', as coined by Hartlaub, described the developments in Germany and became the title of an exhibition that he staged in 1925. ''Neue Sachlichkeit'' was influenced not only by the “return to order” but also a call to arms among more left-leaning artists who wanted to use their art in a forward, political manner that expressionism didn't enable them to do. In Belgium, there was another vein in the common trend, which would later be referred to as a “retour à l’humain”.