Relevant to my research and practice
Arguable the emergence of Postmodernist art started with Pop art and was anticipated in a pioneering exhibition in 1956 at the London Institute of contemporary Art called " This Is Tomorrow", the exhibition could be described as a parodical look at 20th century western society. One of the pieces exhibited was Richard Hamilton's collage "Just What Is It That Makes Today's Homes So Different, So Appealing" the contents of which could be read in this quote on postmodernism by the " high priest of Postmodernism" (Freeland, 2001,P193) French philosopher Jean Baudrillard “Postmodernity is said to be a culture of fragmentary sensations, eclectic nostalgia, disposable simulacra, and promiscuous superficiality, in which the traditionally valued qualities of depth, coherence, meaning, originality, and authenticity are evacuated or dissolved amid the random swirl of empty signals”. (Baldick, 2008, P266)
I can see many of the things he is referring to in Hamilton's piece, it has a jumbled collection of nostalgic images such as the cinema in the window, the collection of brands like the Ford emblem, promiscuous superficiality is arguably present with the muscle man holding a phallic symbol entitled POP along with the female model on the sofa, all of which can mean absolutely nothing together to one person or everything to another. It anticipates a throwaway take it or leave it, materialistic and commercialized society, that is, arguable, what Pop art is to become, along with the recognizable beginnings of Postmodernism.
Richard Hamiltion, "Just What Is It That Makes Today's Homes So Different, So Appealing", 1956, Kunsthalle, Tubingen.
To further explore my argument of what postmodernism art is, or is not, opposed to what modernism art is, or is not, I have examined two pieces of art that depict a similar object, a Bed, Robert Rauschenberg's "Bed" and Tracey Emin's "My Bed". We all see a bed as a place to sleep, but is it more than that? personally I see it as yes a place of rest, but it is a place of refuge, a place of melancholy reflection, a place of despairing thoughts, a place of happy thoughts, a place of ecstasy, a place of dreams and nightmares, a place of lazy days and a place of sadness and death and it is how all these same thoughts and emotions behind a piece of art, the world around, the time of life, the concept or context and the mediums used to define these thoughts and emotions that can define a work as a modernist or postmodernist piece.
Robert Rauschenberg, "Bed", 1955, Mr & Mrs Leo Castelli.
There is an argument that Rauschenberg's Bed is Postmodernist because it challenges the modernists of the time, the abstract expressionists. The piece is a collection of found material, Rauschenberg used the term Combine to describe this art, some of the materials are said to have belonged to Rauschenberg himself, which could be argued is a Postmodernist trait in that he has bought together fragments of personal objects or fragments of his mind, " Rauschenberg's willingness to appropriate from his surroundings, whatever the limitations imposed by circumstance" (Rauschenberg, 1977, p83), its Neo Dada with strong influences from Duchamp's Fountain, a 1917 piece that anticipated post-modernist art, but I see Rauschenberg's Bed as what I understand modernism to be, firstly the term Neo Dada places the piece within an art movement, to place a piece within a movement is modernist, Neo Dada was the foundation movement for Pop art, an art movement yes, but it was the bridge to postmodernism, Neo Dada was the foundation for that bridge and it is on the modernist side of that bridge. Bed is a piece made from the artist state of mind and his surrounding, it’s a statement on the time, it’s a thought process that is accessing and using the environment around him, it is said that Rauschenberg used some of his own material, the pillow and blanket, because he couldn't afford a canvas, he is using the materials he has found and arranged them to look like a bed but is using the bed as a frame and platform to add paint, he then displays the piece vertically on a wall as a whole single piece, so the bed can't be used as a bed instead it becomes something else, it is recognizable as a bed but it is something to hang on the wall, it is a painting and collage, it is confined with in the limits of its frame, a piece made to look at as art. The emotion from the piece is declared by the action of adding the paint onto the found objects and is the result of a process, in contrast and firmly in the postmodernist era is Tracey Emins 'My Bed'.
Tracey Emin, My Bed, 1998, The Saacthi Gallery.
Tracey Emin is probably one of today's most famous and recognizable postmodern artists and has emerged from a group of artists known as the YBA's. "My Bed" is a conceptual installation piece and is what I would describe as art that is an immediate response to a single moment, a response to a lifestyle that is born from the postmodernist period, a result of modernism. It is the artists actual bed with the artists actual belongings, a refuge, it is real, it is what it is, complete with dirty laundry, empty bottles, stains from a mixture of body fluids, the artist has had a thought rolled out of bed captured the scene and placed it for all to see, the artist is exposing her vulnerability for all to see. The bed is still a bed, the viewer sees it as a bed, the bed can still be used as a bed, it is not confined in a frame, it has no boarder, it has no end. The piece has no meaning other than the thought of the artist at the moment she laid in that bed and reflected. Jean Baudrillard said of postmodernity "That of postmodernity, which is the immense process of the destruction of meaning" (Bauldrillard, 1994, p161). My Bed reflects postmodernism described in the quote, Emin's work has no meaning to the world outside other than to the artist herself, the outside world may relate to it and take from it a reflection of their own lives or come to a conclusion about the artists personality, but the meaning is the artists privilege. "My Bed now circulated in an economy of excess. For her British critics it expressed Emin's sluttish personality and exemplified the detritus of a life quintessentially her own; it was, above all, confessional. Emin's art was Emin" (Merck & Townsend, Eds, 2002, p134)
Post modernism has broken down the barrier between the arts and popular culture, Emin has said herself in an interview "ask a group of 17 year old's what artist do you like?, they will say Tracey Emin, then you get a the pompous git saying (about Emin's work) there is no remediating process, say that to them and see what they say". (Emin, 2003/05, CD) The quote highlights Emin's celebrity within popular culture and the unimportance attached by that culture to serious artistic thought, popular culture says its good because its Tracey Emin, she's cool, just like us!
In conclusion postmodernism art is a result, an evaluation and ultimately a rejection of a largely patriarchal western society that relied on mass industrial manufacture controlled by a political elite. The Postmodern world is a society of mass produced media, film and commercial must have products, geared to simulate. Post modernism questions and reacts against this simulation this falsehood of propaganda, Baudrillard said "in a new era in which technologies, media, cybernetic models and steering systems, computers, information processing, entertainment and knowledge industries and so forth, replace industrial production and political economy as the organizing principle of society" (Kellner, 1991 p61).
Bibliography
Books
Baldrick, Chris. (2008) The Oxford Dictionary Of Literary Terms, Oxford University Press.
Baubrillard, Jean. (1994) Simulacra And Simulation, University Of Michigan Press.
Elliott, Patrick & Schnabell, Julian. (2008) Tracey Emin 20 Years, National Galleries Of Scotland.
Hughes, Robert. (2005) The Shock Of The New, Art And The Century Of Change, Thames & Hudson.
Freeland, Cynthia. (2001) But Is It Art, Oxford University Press.
Kellner, Douglas. (1991) Jean Baudrillard From Marxism To Postmodernism And Beyond, Polity Press, Blackwell Publishers.
Merck, Mandy & Townsend, Chris (Eds). (2002) The Art Of Tracey Emin, Thames & Hudson.
Rauschenberg, Robert. (1977) Robert Rauschenberg, The Smithsonian Institution.
Taylor, Brandon. (1995) The Art Of Today, Everyman Art Library, Calmann & King Ltd.
CD/DVD
Emin, Tracey. (2003, 2005) The Eye, Illuminations, University Of Gloucestershire Library.
Online
