Lecture notes// What is Postmodernism? #2

Post modernism is the reaction to Modern life and its advances in technology and materials. Modernism is concentrated on experimentation, which was thought to lead to Innovation, Individualism, progress, purity and originality. Whereas Post Modernism is a binary opposite, there was no such things as new ideas, everything was a blend of various sources; exhaustion, Pluralism, Pessimism, disillusionment with the idea of absolute knowledge.

Form Follows Function...La Corbusier- Villa, 1928-9

It's an area of contradiction, does the age of post modernism exist? there is no conceptual definition, 'Generaly postmodern artists like to mix the highbrow and the populist, the alienation and the accessible, and to 'sample' elements from different styles and eras". Form follows Function.


Postmodern aesthetics; Complexity, Chaos and a mix of styles. There was a shift in the thought and theory approach, investigating a 'crisis in confidence'.  Jean Tinguelys artwork, 'Homage to New York' emphasises this idea against the typical approach of artists, instead of creating a piece of work that can be continuously observed. He created a piece that ultimately blew up and destroyed itself....maybe this was an attack against technology, suggesting how it will ultimately crush us.

 'Homage to New York' 1960- Musuem of modern art

Origins of Postmodernism
1917 German writer Rudolf Panniwitz

1960- Beginnings
70s  -  Established as term (Jencks)
80s  -  Recognizable Style
90s -  Dominant theoretical discourse.

Post modern artists like to mix the highbrow and the populist, the alienating and the accessible, sampling from different era's. 

Examples of Post modernism include; Las Vegas, Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein. Lichtenstein created the following....RED PAINTING. Which was a recreation of the brushstroke using technology.

Advertising was seen as the greatest form of art in the 20th century.

CHARLES JENCKS declared that on the 5th July 1972 at approximately 3:32pm that MODERNISM HAD DIED.