Contemporary Studies Essay
" What have been the connections between fine art and design? Choose one specific decade and the design/designers must relate to your own pathway and link their work/s to relevant Postmodern ideas and theories."
The reason I chose this more difficult question was to allow me to get a better understanding of Postmodernism and how it came to be. I chose the 1970s for the reason that cultural change in the west would heavily influence art and design in an explosive fashion that had never been seen before.
I would like to start this essay by outlining my understanding of Postmodernism as I see it.
Indeed the more I looked at the subject of Postmodernity the more I questioned its very existence. This is especially pertinent to the subject of graphic design as I outline later.
It is to me an aesthetic used to describe changes to institutions and conditions. We can look back to the art movements of the 1920s for example Dada and Constructivism to see cultural and intellectual change. Artists’ began to express themselves in ways never seen before commenting on society and politics.
New ideas were presented to the people emphasising arts new responsibilities. The Russian avant-garde artist Alexandra Rodchenko stated he was fed up with belly button shots. He engineered a new angle of vision. Postmodernism can be described as a distrust of theories and ideologies commonly accepted by Western Capitalist culture.
Postmodernism is generally accepted to have taken place in the West in the early 1960s, although I would like to outline the fact that it is questioned by some critical theorists of its very existence, especially within the Modernist movement.
It could be described as a radical reappraisal of modern assumptions, culture and identity especially in Western society. This period was the start of the democratisation of fine art and design.
Although it is impossible for me to give a true opinion of this ambivalence without first experiencing Modernism and its so-called demise.
I intend on discussing the period of the 1970s to show the connections between fine art and design. I will link fine art and design through relevant Postmodernist theories and ideas.
The 1970s were a period when little known photographers such as Cindy Sherman and Barbara Kruger had the opportunity to communicate their oppositional comment on power, language and representation.
It was in this period that art galleries that exhibited photography particularly fine art photography were suddenly presented with the radical change in direction that postmodernism signified.
Critical theorist, Douglas Crimp, suggested that photography challenged contemporary issues that ruptured modernist assertions of the autonomy of art. Crimp for me tends to be preoccupied with the death of painting as the foundation for his essays on Postmodernism, this is one of the most obvious idea that separates and distinguishes the shift from Modernity. He also suggested that postmodern photography would contribute centrally to the museum and art gallery.
In Crimps view, the then-emerging artists Jack Goldstein, Sherrie Levine, Robert Longo and Cindy Sherman successfully used photography, film, video and practices based in these media to do what painting had failed to do. I believe that the essay ‘Pictures’ is a wonderful comment on Postmodernism here is a brief extract from it.
One formalist critic in the mid-60s (Michael Fried) denounced one specific movement (Minimalism) for its operation outside standard genres of artistic practice (sculpture, painting, etc.) and for the shifting, durational qualities that characterized the experience of the work. In the late 70s, a handful of young artists, though engaged in work nothing like Minimalism, showed an interest in duration, shifting experiences and subverting categories, as well as critiquing representation via the use of representational images. Through these multiple interests, these artists rejected Fried and his formalist formulation of Modernism. Thus, they demonstrate a distinctly postmodern break, and because Modernism, museums and painting are intertwined, all three were called into question.
Postmodernism challenged the conceptions of fine art through it photography and its design, advocating radical change in what fine art represented as it forced its way into the consciousness of society.
Building upon the work of literary theorists like Roland Barthes, Jacques Derrida, and Jean-François Lyotard, design’s postmodern theorists pointed out a slippage and contingency of meaning that exists in a society barraged by images that seem farther and farther from the real. They sensed that the universal truth and personal expression that modernism seemed to promise were romantic delusions that had been co-opted and defiled by corporate power. Those who attempted to apply these theories tried to tear apart grand historical narratives through the juxtaposition of purposefully discordant historical styles in nonhierarchical, interwoven compositions. They broke modernism’s rules of logic and legibility with dizzying layered images fragments of type, and indecipherable signs. (www.springerlink.com)
Crimp was fearful of formalism, which was the formulation for Modernism
Another key concept is the view that people are, essentially, blank slated linguistically, and that social acclimation, cultural factors, habituation and images are the primary ways of shaping the structure of how people view the outside world. For this reason Postmodernism in language is associated with post-structuralism and associated theories of nurture-driven intellectual development.
Postmodernism in language has often been identified with poor writing and communication skills. Another characteristic and one that I recognize as being the most define of Postmodernism was to re create previous works that modernity initially considered unimportant.
Where modernists hoped to unearth universals or the fundamentals of art, postmodernism aims to unseat them, to embrace diversity and contradiction. A postmodern approach to art thus rejects the distinction between low and high art forms. It rejects rigid genre boundaries and favors eclecticism, the mixing of ideas and forms.
Partly due to this rejection, it promotes parody, irony, and playfulness, commonly referred to as jouissance by postmodern theorists. Unlike Modern art, Postmodern art does not approach this fragmentation as somehow faulty or undesirable, but rather celebrates it. As the gravity of the search for underlying truth is relieved, it is replaced with 'play'. As postmodern icon David Byrne, and his band Talking Heads said: "Stop making sense."
As fine art was looked upon as elitist, Postmodern art was accessible to a broader audience. It’s also embraced the mixing of words with art and its artists regarded the mass media as a fundamental subject of art. Groups of video monitors, found art and depictions of media objects. I do relate Postmodernism with rebellion and for this reason I have chosen a piece of work that I feel is a particularly fine example of what it represents
I have chosen Jamie Reids,’ God Save the Queen, as an example of Postmodern art. It is depicting a defaced picture of Queen Elizabeth II and is a mixture of eclecticism, parody and double coding.
This piece of art is a fine example of radical eclectism and irony by bring together the traditional style of the monarchs’ portrait with typography sourced from newspapers in a way never seen before one that was to shock and offend. Especially as this record cover was controversially released on the same day as the Queens silver jubilee 11th June 1977. The use of parody here cannot be disputed as this is an obvious mocking of tradition there is a message that was intended to evoke sympathy for the English working class, and a general resentment of the monarchy. This could be analyzed as sending a message to the working class that you love them and they should be proud of themselves. The picture is, I would say an example of double coding.
Indeed, some would argue that this continuous re-evaluation is also just a component of the design process - happening for most of the second half of the 20th C. in the profession. Since it was ultimately the work of graphic designers that inspired pop artists like Warhol, Liechtenstein, and architects Robert Venturi and Denise Scott-Brown, it could be argued that graphic design practice and designs may be the root of Postmodernism.
One can also look back to the ‘ready-mades’ of Marcel Duchamp and his ‘Fountain’. Was this possibly the start of Postmodernism?
I have found that studying postmodern theories and ideas is not possible without using Modernism as its older brother. Postmodernity born from being the rebellious younger brother always pushing the boundaries and refusing to conform even if it is just for the sake of being disobedient. It questions and brings into contempt arts Modernist institutions.
Postmodernity embraces installation art, performance art, appropriation art and globalization. Its existence is probably better explained in the work that has followed its proclivity to always look and think outside the box accepting no boundaries in its quest to exist.
Tutorial Draft
" What have been the connections between fine art and design? Choose one specific decade and the design/designers must relate to your own pathway and link their work/s to relevant Postmodern ideas and theories."
The reason I chose this more difficult question was to allow me to get a better understanding of Postmodernism and how it came to be. I chose the 1970s for the reason that cultural change in the west would heavily influence art and design in an explosive fashion that had never been seen before.
I would like to start this essay by outlining my understanding of Postmodernism as I see it and how it connects fine art and design.
Indeed the more I looked at the subject of Postmodernity the more I questioned its very existence. This is especially pertinent to the subject of graphic design as I outline later.
It is to me an aesthetic used to describe changes to institutions and conditions. We can look back to the art movements of the 1920s for example Dada and Constructivism to see cultural and intellectual change. Artists’ began to express themselves in ways never seen before commenting on society and politics.
New ideas were presented to the people emphasising arts new responsibilities. The Russian avant-garde artist Alexandra Rodchenko stated he was fed up with belly button shots. He engineered a new angle of vision. Postmodernism can be described as a distrust of theories and ideologies commonly accepted by Western Capitalist culture.
Postmodernism is generally accepted to have taken place in the West in the early 1960s, although I would like to outline the fact that it is questioned by some critical theorists, of its very existence, especially within the Modernist movement.
It could be described as a radical reappraisal of modern assumptions, culture and identity especially in Western society. This period was the start of the democratisation of fine art and design. Postmodernism sought to break down these barriers and blur the boundaries of elitist fine art and the more accessible design.
I intend on discussing the period of the 1970s to show the connections between fine art and design. I will link fine art and design through relevant Postmodernist theories and ideas and I have chosen the graphic designer Jamie Ried and his work ‘God Save the Queen’ to highlight this.
One formalist critic in the mid-60s (Michael Fried) denounced one specific movement (Minimalism) for its operation outside standard genres of artistic practice (sculpture, painting, etc.) and for the shifting, durational qualities that characterized the experience of the work. In the late 70s, a handful of young artists, though engaged in work nothing like Minimalism, showed an interest in duration, shifting experiences and subverting categories, as well as critiquing representation via the use of representational images. Through these multiple interests, these artists rejected Fried and his formalist formulation of Modernism. Thus, they demonstrate a distinctly postmodern break, and because Modernism, museums and painting are intertwined, all three were called into question.
Postmodernism challenged the conceptions of fine art through it photography and its design, advocating radical change in what fine art represented as it forced its way into the consciousness of society.
Building upon the work of literary theorists like Roland Barthes, Jacques Derrida, and Jean-François Lyotard, design’s postmodern theorists pointed out a slippage and contingency of meaning that exists in a society barraged by images that seem farther and farther from the real. They sensed that the universal truth and personal expression that modernism seemed to promise were romantic delusions that had been co-opted and defiled by corporate power. Those who attempted to apply these theories tried to tear apart grand historical narratives through the juxtaposition of purposefully discordant historical styles in nonhierarchical, interwoven compositions. They broke modernism’s rules of logic and legibility with dizzying layered images fragments of type, and indecipherable signs. (www.springerlink.com)
Another key concept is the view that people are, essentially, blank slated linguistically, and that social acclimation, cultural factors, habituation and images are the primary ways of shaping the structure of how people view the outside world. For this reason Postmodernism in language is associated with post-structuralism and associated theories of nurture-driven intellectual development.
To make this a little clearer Postmodernism sought to engage with society and its radically changed culture of consumerism and material therapy. It was willing to challenge what Modernism simply refused to recognize.
Postmodernism in language has often been identified with poor writing and communication skills. Another characteristic and one that I recognize as being the most define of Postmodernism was to re create previous works that modernity initially considered unimportant.
Where Modernists hoped to unearth universals or the fundamentals of art, postmodernism aims to unseat them, to embrace diversity and contradiction. A postmodern approach to art thus rejects the distinction between low and high art forms. It rejects rigid genre boundaries and favours eclecticism, the mixing of ideas and forms.
Partly due to this rejection, it promotes parody, irony, and playfulness, commonly referred to as jouissance by postmodern theorists. Unlike Modern art, Postmodern art does not approach this fragmentation as somehow faulty or undesirable, but rather celebrates it. As the gravity of the search for underlying truth is relieved, it is replaced with 'play'. As postmodern icon David Byrne, and his band Talking Heads said: "Stop making sense."
As fine art was looked upon as elitist, Postmodern art was accessible to a broader audience. It’s also embraced the mixing of words with art and its artists regarded the mass media as a fundamental subject of art. Groups of video monitors, found art and depictions of media objects.
I do relate Postmodernism with rebellion and for this reason I have chosen a piece of work that I feel is a particularly fine example of what it represents.
I have chosen Jamie Reids,’ God Save the Queen, as an example of Postmodern art. It is depicting a defaced picture of Queen Elizabeth II and is a mixture of eclecticism, parody and double coding. Ried seen this as an opportunity to use the punk rock movement merely as a way of getting his cultural protest into the mainstream. He felt that all he had ever done is re-adapt his work from the late 60s and early 70s into different context.
One of rock-and-roll’s most iconic images – defaced by blackmail style lettering this piece of graphic art is a fine example of radical eclecticism and irony by bring together the traditional style of the monarchs’ portrait with typography sourced from newspapers in a way never seen before one that was to shock and offend. It featured letters from newspaper headlines in the style of a ransom note defining the image of punk rock. Both shocking and provocative it especially offended as this record cover was controversially released on the same day as the Queens silver jubilee 11th June 1977. The use of parody here cannot be disputed as this is an obvious mocking of tradition there is a message that was intended to evoke sympathy for the English working class, and a general resentment of the monarchy. This could be analyzed as sending a message to the working class that you love them and they should be proud of themselves. The picture is, I would say an example of double coding, as it uses the traditional portrait of the monach with the newspaper lettering to convey a unique message.
Jamie Reid's work also did something else. It demonstrated the power of graphic design in the music industry and opened the door to a strong new generation of British designers, whose purpose was different from Jamie's. They used the creative freedom of the music industry as a showcase for vibrant design, not emasculated by corporate compromise. Their influence has spread beyond music to fashion, the media and consumer packaging.
Indeed, some would argue that this continuous re-evaluation is also just a component of the design process - happening for most of the second half of the 20th C. in the profession. Since it was ultimately the work of graphic designers that inspired pop artists like Warhol, Liechtenstein, and architects Robert Venturi and Denise Scott-Brown, it could be argued that graphic design practice and designs may be the root of Postmodernism.
One can also look back to the ‘ready-mades’ of Marcel Duchamp and his ‘Fountain’. Was this possibly the start of Postmodernism?
I have found that studying postmodern theories and ideas is not possible without using Modernism as its older brother. Postmodernity born from being the rebellious younger brother always pushing the boundaries and refusing to conform even if it is just for the sake of being disobedient. It questions and brings into contempt arts Modernist institutions.
Postmodernity embraces installation art, performance art, appropriation art and globalization. Its existence is probably better explained in the work that has followed its proclivity to always look and think outside the box accepting no boundaries in its quest to exist.
Bibliography;
Teach Yourself Postmodernism: Glenn Ward
Post-Post Modernism and the archive
Uncertain Identities and “forgotten” Legacies: Sara Hines.
Postmodern and Cultural Politics in Contemporary
Contemporary studies Essay - Final
" What have been the connections between fine art and design? Choose one specific decade and the design/designers must relate to your own pathway and link their work/s to relevant Postmodern ideas and theories."
The reason I chose this more difficult question was to allow me to get a better understanding of Postmodernism and how it came to be. I chose the 1970s for the reason that cultural change in the west would heavily influence art and design in an explosive fashion that had never been seen before.
I would like to start this essay by outlining my understanding of Postmodernism as I see it and how it connects fine art and design.
Indeed the more I looked at the subject of Postmodernity the more I questioned its very existence. This is especially pertinent to the subject of graphic design as I outline later.
Postmodern an aesthetic used to describe changes to institutions and conditions. We can look back to the art movements of the 1920s for example Dada and Constructivism to see cultural and intellectual change. Artists’ began to express themselves in ways never seen before commenting on society and politics.
John Baudrillard’s proposition that contemtorary culture is characterized by the circulation of “pure information without meaning, signs without referents” which resulted in ”the end of the social”, Philip Auslander argues for the necessity of attacking this progress from within. (Auslander,1994,p181)
New ideas were presented to the people emphasising arts new responsibilities. The Russian avant-garde artist Alexandra Rodchenko stated that “he was fed up with belly button shots”.(Wells, 2004, p235). He engineered a new angle of vision. Postmodernism can be described as a distrust of theories and ideologies commonly accepted by Western Capitalist culture.
Postmodernism is generally accepted to have taken place in the West in the early 1960s, although I would like to outline the fact that it is questioned by some critical theorists, of its very existence, especially within the Modernist movement. In 1968 American art critic Leo Steinberg noticed a change in interest of the representation of nature to the ‘flat’ representation of man-made images. He called this as modern art had been concerned with capturing visual or emotional truth, Pop Art was interested in artificiality.(Ward, 1997, p9)
It could be described as a radical reappraisal of modern assumptions, culture and identity especially in Western society. This period was the start of the democratisation of fine art and design. Postmodernism sought to break down these barriers and blur the boundaries of elitist fine art and the more accessible design.
This essay is intent on discussing the period of the 1970s to show the connections between fine art and design. I will link fine art and design through relevant Postmodernist theories and ideas and I have chosen the graphic designer Jamie Ried and his work ‘God Save the Queen’ to highlight this.
One formalist critic in the mid-60s (Michael Fried) denounced one specific movement (Minimalism) for its operation outside standard genres of artistic practice (sculpture, painting, etc.) and for the shifting, durational qualities that characterized the experience of the work. In the late 70s, a handful of young artists, though engaged in work nothing like Minimalism, showed an interest in duration, shifting experiences and subverting categories, as well as critiquing representation via the use of representational images. Through these multiple interests, these artists rejected Fried and his formalist formulation of Modernism. Thus, they demonstrate a distinctly postmodern break, and because Modernism, museums and painting are intertwined, all three were called into question.
Postmodernism challenged the conceptions of fine art through it photography and its design, advocating radical change in what fine art represented as it forced its way into the consciousness of society.
Building upon the work of literary theorists like Roland Barthes, Jacques Derrida, and Jean-François Lyotard, design’s postmodern theorists pointed out a slippage and contingency of meaning that exists in a society barraged by images that seem farther and farther from the real. They sensed that the universal truth and personal expression that modernism seemed to promise were romantic delusions that had been co-opted and defiled by corporate power. Those who attempted to apply these theories tried to tear apart grand historical narratives through the juxtaposition of purposefully discordant historical styles in nonhierarchical, interwoven compositions. They broke modernism’s rules of logic and legibility with dizzying layered images fragments of type, and indecipherable signs. (www.springerlink.com)
Another key concept is the view that people are, essentially, blank slated linguistically, and that social acclimation, cultural factors, habituation and images are the primary ways of shaping the structure of how people view the outside world. For this reason Postmodernism in language is associated with post-structuralism and associated theories of nurture-driven intellectual development.
To make this a little clearer Postmodernism sought to engage with society and its radically changed culture of consumerism and material therapy. It was willing to challenge what Modernism simply refused to recognize.
Postmodernism in language has often been identified with poor writing and communication skills. Another characteristic and one that is recognized as being the most define of Postmodernism was to re create previous works that modernity initially considered unimportant.
Where Modernists hoped to unearth universals or the fundamentals of art, postmodernism aims to unseat them, to embrace diversity and contradiction. A postmodern approach to art thus rejects the distinction between low and high art forms. It rejects rigid genre boundaries and favours pastiche and eclecticism, the mixing of ideas and forms.( Ward,1997,p17)
Partly due to this rejection, it promotes parody, irony, and playfulness, commonly referred to as jouissance by postmodern theorists. Unlike Modern art, Postmodern art does not approach this fragmentation as somehow faulty or undesirable, but rather celebrates it. As the gravity of the search for underlying truth is relieved, it is replaced with 'play'. As postmodern icon David Byrne, and his band Talking Heads said: "Stop making sense."(knowledge rush.com)
As fine art was looked upon as elitist, Postmodern art was accessible to a broader audience. It’s also embraced the mixing of words with art and its artists regarded the mass media as a fundamental subject of art. Groups of video monitors, found art and depictions of media objects.
I do relate Postmodernism with rebellion and for this reason I have chosen a piece of work that I feel is a particularly fine example of what it represents.
I have chosen Jamie Reids,’ God Save the Queen, as an example of Postmodern art. It is depicting a defaced picture of Queen Elizabeth II and is a mixture of eclecticism, parody and double coding. Ried seen this as an opportunity to use the punk rock movement merely as a way of getting his cultural protest into the mainstream. He felt that all he had ever done is re-adapt his work from the late 60s and early 70s into different context.
One of rock-and-roll’s most iconic images – defaced by blackmail style lettering this piece of graphic art is a fine example of radical eclecticism and irony by bring together the traditional style of the monarchs’ portrait with typography sourced from newspapers in a way never seen before one that was to shock and offend. It featured letters from newspaper headlines in the style of a ransom note defining the image of punk rock. Both shocking and provocative it especially offended as this record cover was controversially released on the same day as the Queens silver jubilee 11th June 1977. The use of parody here cannot be disputed as this is an obvious mocking of tradition there is a message that was intended to evoke sympathy for the English working class, and a general resentment of the monarchy. This could be analyzed as sending a message to the working class that you love them and they should be proud of themselves. The picture is I would say an example of double coding, as it uses the traditional portrait of the monarch with the newspaper lettering to convey a unique message.
Jamie Reid's work also did something else. It demonstrated the power of graphic design in the music industry and opened the door to a strong new generation of British designers, whose purpose was different from Jamie's. They used the creative freedom of the music industry as a showcase for vibrant design, not emasculated by corporate compromise. (bbc/dna/collective).
Their influence has spread beyond music to fashion, the media and consumer packaging.Indeed, some would argue that this continuous re-evaluation is also just a component of the design process - happening for most of the second half of the 20th C. in the profession. Since it was ultimately the work of graphic designers that inspired pop artists like Warhol, Liechtenstein, and architects Robert Venturi and Denise Scott-Brown, it could be argued that graphic design practice and designs may be the root of Postmodernism.
One can also look back to the ‘ready-mades’ of Marcel Duchamp and his ‘Fountain’. Was this possibly the start of Postmodernism?
I have found that studying postmodern theories and ideas is not possible without using Modernism as its older brother. Postmodernity born from being the rebellious younger brother always pushing the boundaries and refusing to conform even if it is just for the sake of being disobedient. It questions and brings into contempt arts Modernist institutions.
Postmodernity embraces installation art, performance art, appropriation art and globalization. Its existence is probably better explained in the work that has followed its proclivity to always look and think outside the box accepting no boundaries in its quest to exist.
Bibliography;
knowledgerush.com
bbc/dna/collective
A Critical Introduction: Liz Wells, 2004
Teach Yourself Postmodernism: Glenn Ward,1997
Postmodern and Cultural Politics in Contemporary
American Performance: Philip Auslander ,1994
Word count: 1609
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