The Influence On Western Art Development From Roger Fry's Aesthetic Thoughts

Since the end of 19th century, there has a great change in western art.The advent of the post-impressionism activized the strong reaction in that time, the basis of classical art shaked, art form had a important transition. English modern formalistic aesthetics genre was the outcome of that situation.Roger Fry and Clive Bell are the main delegators of this genre.Based on the art experience of post-impressionism,they defended the modernism in art which was rising and provided the academic basis for it.What Roger Fry and Clive Bell had done had a great and profound influence on the development of western art.This paper,first of all, discusses the characters of the western traditional art briefly.From the cave art pursuing the true-life skills to the transform that western traditional art confronted by the latter half of 19th century,the traditional art form couldn't consistent with the society any more.Art need change,that leaded to the overall breakthrough of tranditional art during the beginning of the 20th century. The timely advent of Fry's aesthetic theory brought the great change in art from the content to the form and gave the revolutionary transition to the domain of art.Second,this paper analyzed the Fry's aesthetic theory on four aspects,which are listed as follows, (l)opposing the Imitative Theory and Art Renaissance,giving the viewpoint that the art should be the subjective creations of artists;(2) "significant form",the value and significance of art lies in " forms and the relaitons of forms themselves";(3 )art is a tool that artists express their emotions and transit these emotions to audience;(4) championing the abstract art and defending the modern art.This paper discussed some artists affected by the Roger Fry's aesthetic theory directly,such as Duncan Grant, Henri More, Henry Gaudier Brzeska, Spencer Gore, Vanessa Bell, Wyndham Lewis,etc.By comparing the former and latter painting styles of all the above-mentioned artists,this paper suggests that the Roger Fry's aesthetic theory had a great influence on the art of that time and later.From then on, art emphasized on the expression of artists' subjective emotions and all kinds of try on art form, and tried to break through the limit of western traditional art, even to shake it off completely.