A revelatory, fast-paced account of the most exciting, frenzied,

and revolutionary decade in art history—1905 to the dawn of World War I in 1914—and the avant-garde artists who indelibly changed our visual landscape

Modern begins on a specific day—March 22, 1905—at a specific

place: the Salon des Indépendants in Paris, where works of art we recognize as modern were first exhibited. Drawing on his forty five-year fine art career,

author Philip Hook illuminates how this new art came to be—and how truly shocking it was.

With Hook's expert guidance, we witness movement upon movement that burst forth in dizzying succession: Fauvism, Expressionism, Primitivism, Symbolism, Cubism, Futurism, and Abstract art. As Hook barnstorms across Europe—to London, Germany, Moscow, Scandinavia, and everywhere modern art was being made—his vivid accounts breathe new life into the work and times of Picasso, Matisse, Modigliani, Kandinsky, Malevich, Klimt, Schiele, Munch, and nearly two hundred other artists who painted, sculpted, and exhibited alongside them, and whose collective genius was understood and appreciated by few at the time.

Hook reconsiders the decade from a series of fresh angles: What was the conventional art against which Modernism sought to rebel? Why were avant-garde artists so self-obsessed? What persuaded a few bold collectors to buy difficult modern art? And why did others pay so much money for Old Masters at the same time?

Modern helps us answer these questions and more—and to see how avant-garde artists marshaled their genius (and oftentimes their madness) to create works of such profound consequence, they still reverberate today—and which, taken together, made for a movement more influential than even the Renaissance.

这是一部具有启示性的、快节奏的著作，记述了艺术史上最激动人心、最狂热、最具革命性的十年——1905年至1914年，以及那些不可磨灭地改变了我们视觉景观的先锋艺术家们。

“现代”始于一个特定的日子：1905年3月22日，在一个特定的地点：巴黎的“独立者沙龙”，我们公认的现代艺术作品在这里首次展出。作者菲利普·胡克（Philip Hook）以他40年的美术生涯为基础，阐明了这种新艺术是如何产生的，以及它到底有多令人震惊。

在胡克的专业指导下，我们见证了一个又一个令人眼花缭乱的运动的爆发。野兽主义、表现主义、原始主义、象征主义、立体主义、未来主义和抽象艺术。当胡克穿越欧洲，来到伦敦、德国、莫斯科、斯堪的纳维亚，以及所有正在制造现代艺术的地方时，他生动的叙述为毕加索、马蒂斯、莫迪里阿尼、康定斯基、马列维奇、克里姆特、席勒、蒙克以及其他近200位与他们一起绘画、雕塑和展览的艺术家的作品和时代注入了新的活力，这些集体天才在当时很少被理解和欣赏。

胡克从一系列新的角度重新审视这十年。现代主义试图反叛的传统艺术是什么？为什么先锋艺术家会如此自恋？是什么说服了少数大胆的收藏家购买难懂的现代艺术？又是什么原因让其他人在同一时间为古代大师的作品支付了那么多钱？

本书帮助我们回答了这些问题，甚至更多的问题，也帮助我们看到先锋艺术家是如何调动他们的天才（通常还有他们的疯狂），创作出具有如此深远影响的作品，这些作品至今仍在回荡——综合起来，形成了一场甚至比文艺复兴更有影响力的运动。