Lucas Gandy, Carina Segredo, Laura-Bethia Campbell
When we consider contemporary art, an easy solution would be to label it ‘the art of today’ (spurred by the groundwork of globalization) and move on. But to gain a better understanding of art’s rapid following of current social, cultural and political transformations, it is helpful distinguish the major elements between modernism and postmodernism.
In very simple terms, modernism arose at various times around the world and holds context-specific meaning but can generally be understood to have been sparked by the Industrial Revolution. The period is marked between the 18th-19th centuries and clearly shifted the art world towards the expression of direct experience. According to the MOMA, the popularization of the subconscious occurred along with Freud’s publication of The Interpretation of Dreams in 1899, which subsequently opened the exploration of symbolism and iconography as motifs of the subjective experience (MOMA). Non-traditional techniques, colour variations and materials quickly expanded and artists came to challenge the previous assumption that they were ‘meant’ to depict the world as framed by realistic intent. Essentially, innovation and personal expression became emphasized and largely valued.
Julian Stallabrass draws upon Jameson’s work on defining postmodernism, in order to delineate the importance of understanding “the present in terms of this successful characterization of the past, and vice versa” (Dumbadze). The depthlessness of the contemporary is underlined, and the postmodern era can be considered an aesthetic populism, where digital culture plays a major role in speed and accessibility which allows artwork to join the stream of churning information. Stallabrass also makes the noteworthy point on distraction caused by the temporality and the state of flux in which the virtual world continuously moves. The prolific richness of cyber information and entertainment holds a powerful shift in aesthetic overload and has vast potential to ‘regurgitate’ historicized work, rework the present and contemplate the future. A key difference between modernism and postmodernism is that the former delved into the romanticized aspect of technological advancement while the latter seizes technological reproduction by its reins. The synthesis of production and reproduction compose postmodernism. We are becoming increasingly networked and have (arguably) entered an era of inescapable collaboration.
In order to apply the differentiation between modernism and postmodernism the artists Carl Andre and Gerhard Richter will briefly be discussed. Andre is most widely known for his sculptural work produced in the 1960’s and 70’s and is now considered a leading figure of the Minimalist movement. A prominent theme in his work is that of simplifying construction, working with the idea of place-making simply by positioning and ordering material. Andre focuses on the properties of matter and looks to the subtleties of arrangement to compose his work. By reinventing place, the artist walks the line between physical and psychological spaces and traverses the poetics of geometric dimensions. Frank Stella was influential towards Andre, both sharing a passion for the constructivist approach in working with identical, discrete units as building blocks. Although he has been highly criticized for the lack of meaning in his work, he intends precisely that; to master reduction and simplicity to the point of literalness. Andre refutes the need of our linguistic culture for everything to be explained, arguing for silence to be appreciated. In short, minimalism can be understood as a reaction against Abstract Expressionism in working with quiet reiterations of geometric abstractions and always looking for reductive methods.
Gerhard Richter on the other hand is considered a postmodern artist most commonly for his ‘photo-paintings’ in which he works to bridge more traditional with newer mediums. For example, by playing with the sharpness of an image by projecting a photograph onto his canvas, Richter explores industrial processes as he looks to rework the original shot. His work blurs the line between mechanical and handmade reproduction, already highlighting the synthesis and co-working of mediums in this transformative age. Richter plays with the autonomous quality of the photography; transposing ‘the unconditional image’ so that the definition of a picture becomes blurred in its new form. Oscillating between painting and photography, Richter continues to work with the replacement of objective reality through both media. The theme of recycling in his work allows the viewer to move between the signifier and the signified, photorealism and its replication. Richter is adamant on disregarding the need for ‘style’, intending to create images to be seen in their purity. Unexpectedness, chance and randomness are also motifs in his work that allow his subconscious to play before any visual logic must happen. Richter’s conception of production stems from his desire to work across mediums to discover ways of depicting something of which it is not.
Bibliography
- Dumbadze, Alexander Blair, and Suzanne Perling Hudson. “Welite Art in an Age of Populism” Contemporary Art: 1989 to the Present.p.: Wily-Blackwell. Print
- “MoMA Learning.” MoMa, N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Sept. 2015
