Introducing Post-Modernism

• With post modernism there is a feeling that everything has been done before, there are no original ideas, instead ideas are recycled and re quoted.
• Late modernism was born out of optimism, with a view to improving peoples lives, but the rules of modernism actually limited people, preventing individuality.
• Modernism was experimental, looked forwards, was original and meant for the individual to advance society.
• Post modernism is almost the complete opposite to the associations linked with modernism. Progress is doubted, while a jokey light-hearted attitude replaces seriousness. It is impossible to be original.
• The new modern world is seen as a bad route, as people are fed up with technology.
• The new hasn't saved us, but made our lives worse.
• Post modernism is fundamentally related to modernism, as it is often a negative or sarcastic reaction to the characteristics of the modern world, where modernism is an expression of these.
• This crazy construction (Homage to New York) is anti-aesthetic, against modernism, however, it could be argued that there is a truth to materials with the junk. It was a work of art that was designed to blow up and destroy itself, which relates to the idea of new technologies destroying New York.
• Post modernism is thought of as starting in the 1960's
• Jameson thinks we are in late modernism, and that capitalism is about to fall
• Hip hop is an example of post modern music. It is an eclectic mix, a strange modern mash up hybrid. It contains samples of old with new beats.
• The idea of a global village started with modernism, now everything is linked, so the idea of an individual nationality is lost
• The Pruitt building was bulldozed. It was a social housing project with modernist design. It was based on modernist society values. However, it quickly became a ghetto, rife with crime, drugs and prostitution, rather than building a community. It was a failed Utopian project.
• Post modernism believes that modernism got it wrong, and failed us.
• Technological determinism proved to be wrong, not everything is improved with new technology. This is proved by the Internet, while it has brought people together, it has also allowed for fraud, pedophiles and crime.
• Post modernism is not all negative, it realises that everyone is unique, and everyone should have their own voice. There is a cultural space where new directions can be opened.
• Society starts to get confused and lost with the dizzying array of options
• The international style of architecture is shown in New York. Every skyscraper is true to form following function.
• Park Hill flats in Sheffield are an example of the modernist community, with an aggressive aesthetic. They became slums, but cannot be demolished because the government say that the flats are important examples of modernist architecture. Post modernists have a 'colourful' solution to beautify the flats.
• The AT&T building is an example of post modern architecture. It is an irregular skyscraper, mixing the old with the new. The part at the top references the Greek temples.
• Post modernist architecture is more human, fun, less serious and individual.
• Classical references are updated in a modern way. In this example, the skyscraper grid is turned wobbly and wavy. The building seems to be falling apart although it is brand new. There is bright colour. It is a mix of seriousness with joking.
• Prince Charles dislikes modernist architecture and shows bad examples in his book.
• Leeds magistrate court is an example of ill thought out post modern architecture, which just looks tired and ugly.
• Leeds College of Art building is another example. The exposed pipework inside is a reference to the industrial culture.
• People now realise that the modernist belief system was lies, as it was never the whole world's vision, but an elitist unattainable ideology.
• Post modernism is an undermining of the structures that have guided us in the past. Without that foundation, people are left confused with a mess of a society. This allows for individual narratives and sub-cultures.
• Pop art is often attacked for not being serious. There are jokey examples of the proposed Utopian future. "This must be the place." - An example of a piece that is sarcastic rather than celebratory.
• People have no idea what is high or low culture anymore.
• Las Vegas is the destruction of modern vision. Modernists would be distraught, post modernists would celebrate.
• Dystopia - an ultimate loss of order and self. Failure of human progress.
• Warhol is an example of the artist being replaced by celebrity. He was not about creativity, his art was an attack on what it means to be artistic. For example, the Marilyn's contained mistakes and smudges but were still used.
• Pollock painted on to canvas with expression, emotion and gesture. Warhol has a jokey attack on this style by weeing on a canvas.
• Piero Manzoni has a jokey attack on the art world with his "Artist's Shit", which is literally him selling his poo in a can.
• Art seems superficial, all about the money. Everything seems to only have surface value, with no deeper emotional meaning.
• Advertising has a greater social effect in the post modernist era than fine art.
• People are now defined by material things rather than any greater sense.
• Post modernist artists are about mixing high brown and populist.
• The Memphis Group are a group of post modernist graphic designers. Their work is a mix of silliness with modernist styles, such as sans serif typography.
• David Shrigley's drawings are a jokey attack on art today.
• Modernism was always only about the Western world.
• It is difficult to conclude post modernism, as everything is so vague.

New Media & Visual Culture

• Emergence of new technologies
• Before the invention of the Internet, McLuhan said that the world is now like a village, connected by mass communication
• In 1450 printing techniques developed, so that people didn't have to print only using wood blocks. Printed material slowly becomes available to masses
• Newspapers and books become a circulation of knowledge and information
• Computers become vehicles for the consumption and production of material. They have changed the way we exist, and the way we engage with information
• Will the 'reader' be the end of books?
• You can now read newspaper stories online, which contain forums so people can discuss the article, and challenge it. There is a shift in power from the editor to the reader.
• New technology is democratic, allowing us to shape and change the information we receive
• There is a false sense of freedom and control with this new technology, where you can get lost in the hyperspace information
• Several senses are stimulated with hypermedia, but there are hazards, as too much on the page can be dizzying
• Books force us to engage in a way that the Internet doesn't, as you can so easily skip through with hyperlinks
• A small group of people control the information given out to a large amount of people on a web page
• A con with new this is that there is no presence between the communicator and audience, it depersonalises the experience
• Also, new technology allows for superficiality, such as 'reality' programmes such as X factor
• TV Voting gives the illusion of control
• Viewer call ins seem as if there is true interaction, but in reality, producers can cut off the caller whenever they want
• There are pro's with new technology too - more people can access information now it is mass spread
• It is democratic, also it means art is no longer elitist
• The Benetton campaign traded on images of unity, black and white people together, horror, clothes of shot solider, exposing HIV. The adverts are not socially controlling, they are more about politics than advertising.
• Leeds 13 Scam - A group of art students pretended that they used their university grant for a drinking holiday and leaked the story to a newspaper. They used mass media to gain status.
• Pollock's art is about aesthetic freedom, not about politics and without an agenda. However, there is a conspiracy story that the CIA paid him to paint these images that gave the illusion of independence in art to show Russia that capitalism was best.
• Picasso used and exploited mass media
• Lichtenstein made comic book images, which were regarded as a lesser form of art, sophisticated. He presented this art form to the elitist.
• There was a backlash against pop art, it was criticised with the mass media, as pop art was a challenge to the elitist value system.
• Warhol's prints of Marilyn Monroe are not just pop art images of the famous celebrity, there is much more to them. He has used her as a commodity, as she was represented as being like a product. The print of the Marilyn's is the same style as Warhol's print of Coca Cola bottles - another commodity. The colours used in the Marilyn print aren't realistic art colours, as this image is anti aesthetic.
• Once repeated, shocking images lose their value. Repetition causes indifference.