Evolution of art, philosophy and architecture without the world wars

How would the pre ww1 artistic trends have developed without the disruption of the world wars? Would futurism become even more important? Does modernism still arise? What about art deco?
 

Driftless

Donor
No "Lost Generation" with it's extreme disillusions and anger. IF the social structure of pre-WW1 stays in place, I'd think the evolution of the arts would be more incremental; especially with writing, graphic arts, and theater. Movies and music probably develop even faster, with technological advancement expanding both capability and exposure to a wider audience.
 
This POD would change everything. The twentieth century started with this great mood of optimism and progress that WW1 crushed. Cynicism became a fad that has never gone away in Western Culture.

I feel that arts and literature would change the fastest after any POD since many artists use what is happening "right now" and put it into their work. So basically by TTL 1924, ten years after WW1 broke out in OTL, everything would be different. There might be some similar kind of stuff to OTL, but no exact copies, even though most people we wold know would still be alive. They might have similar careers but forget about them doing the same stuff.
 
The mood of optimism had its gaps, though. You had decadents, symbolists and others who questioned the belief in rationality and progress that was the dominant ideology.
 
No "Lost Generation" with it's extreme disillusions and anger.

And no dadaism. Which may or may not mean that absurdism as an artistic trope is considerably less prominent throughout the rest of the 20th Century. This could actually butterfiy away a lot of the cultural items we take for granted on an everyday basis, eg. Steve Martin's arrow-through-the-head.
 

Driftless

Donor
And no dadaism. Which may or may not mean that absurdism as an artistic trope is considerably less prominent throughout the rest of the 20th Century. This could actually butterfiy away a lot of the cultural items we take for granted on an everyday basis, eg. Steve Martin's arrow-through-the-head.

Interesting thought.... On that line, I wonder how music hall/vaudeville type theater would have evolved? Or, non-realistic movie comedy such as the Three Stooges, through Buster Keaton or The Marx Brothers. In the Stooges case (or others like them) the violent slap-stick humor could be traced back to very old puppet theater like Punch and Judy shows. Keaton tapped into the technical wizardry of filmmaking with his insanely complicated and choreographed stunt work built into his story lines. And the Marx Brothers..... those were usually brilliant absurdities. Would there have been the historical underpinnings for their work?

I do not know enough about Kafka and the impact of his work. I believe some of his works pre-dated WW1, but I don't know when they really got traction in the literary and mainstream world.
 
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