Cubism was the most influential movement in the history of modern art. The cubists introduced radically new approaches to rendering form and space.
Cubism began in France, where it flourished as a movement between 1907 and 1914. The leaders of the movement were the Spanish-born artist Pablo Picasso and the French artist Georges Braque. Other cubists included Juan Gris of Spain and Robert Delaunay and Fernand Leger of France. The aims of the movement were first expressed in a 1912 book by two other French cubist painters, Albert Gleizes and Jean Metzinger.
The cubist painters shunned conventional treatment of space and form. A typical cubist painting analyzes the subject in basic geometric shapes and elementary signs. By reorganizing these elements and freeing them from direct reference to objects seen in nature, the cubists developed a new language of representation.
Excerpt from the "Cubism" article , The World Book Encyclopedia © 1999