Friday, 3 August 2012

Post Modernism, Week 2 Blog.



POST-MODERNISM






1. Define Post-Modernism using 8-10 bullet points that include short quotes.


- was a movement in architecture that rejected the modernist, avant garde, passion for the new. -James Morley.
- the project of rejecting tradition in favour of going "where no man has gone before" or better: to create forms for no other purpose than novelty- James Morley.
- this was an ironic brick-a-brack or collage approach to construction that combines several traditional styles into one structure.- Unknown.
-"Well according to Billy Corgan, Postmodernism is whatever the fuck you want it to be"- Unknown
-"The first dificultly in defining postmodernism, is that everyone. Everyone gets a crack at it." - Bruce Ellis Benson.
-A recent French philosopher defined Postmodernity as "incredulity towards all metanarratives. Thats a mouthful, but basically what it means, is a kind of sceptical attitude towards all claims of absolute truth. - Bruce Ellis Benson.
-Metanarratives; now the word he actually uses in French, really translates into English as "Big Stories". Now there are all kinds of big stories. One kind of big story might be 'human beings, by way of human reason, are capable of knowing... everything. - Bruce Ellis Benson.
- Postmodernism is a broad term used to describe movements in a wide range of disciplines, including art, philosophy, critical theory, and music.












2. Use a quote by Witcombe (2000) to define the Post-Modern artist.(page 24)
" The post modern artist is "reflexive" in that he/she is self aware and consciously involved in a process of thinking about him.herself and society in a deconstructive manner "demasking" pretensions, becoming aware of his/her cultural self in history, and accelerating the process of self-conciousness."


3. Use the table on pages 47 and 48 in your ALVC handbook to summarize the list of the features of Post-Modernity.




- Social & Cultural pluralism and disunity. Paying attention to surfaces and textures rather than Depth. Art as a process, or performance/production. Recycling culture authenticated by the audience to share identity with the artist. Irony, seriousness.




Use this summary to answer the next two questions.


4. Research Chinese artist Ai Weiwei's 'Han Dynasty Urn with Coca-Cola logo'(1994)
in order to say what features of the work could be considered Post-Modern.




Ai Weiwei is an amazing contemporary artist who is very active in a wide range of Art's, including instalation and sculpture, as well as being involved in Political and Cultural Criticism. He stands up for his rights, and has been beaten by the Police, arrested, and put in secret detention. ALL because of how his art affects the public. In Ai Weiwei's spare time, he literally designed the Beijing Olympic Stadium. 


In Ai's work titled "Han Dynasty Urn with Coca-Cola logo"(1994) he has taken what appears to be quite a historic, old looking vase, and put the Coca Cola Logo on to it. By doing this, is he putting today and the past into one clear format, just by looking at the pot you instantly know that the Coca Cola logo seems almost to modern for the style of the Vase. What he has done could be seen as quite disrespectful because this Urn appears to have alot of cultural meaning to it, it's not just a standard Urn - it has history behind it, it stands in representation to something or someone. So by putting a Coca Cola logo on it, it's almost like Ai was taking the piss out of the Urn, in the process. He's mixing two known things together- this historic Urn, and a Coca Cola logo. The Urn is so historically important, and the Coca Cola logo represents merely a fizzy drink, which the whole world recognises in seconds. Doing this, he has created a very Post-Modernist work.


The Photo of Ai dropping the Urn, shows that today, cultural importance is not as important as it used to be. By Ai dropping this Urn he is disregarding the object to the fullest extent, he's telling us that there aren't any people that would worry about what is occuring in this photo. And that is basically what Post Modernism is, adapting to cultural differences and making something out of it, but i think by dropping it he is telling the viewer that because of time, cultural aspects have been thrown out and forgotten about because thing's such as Coca Cola, for instance, have been designed for everyone, to bring cultures together. Also the way he drops the Urn, he shows no care in what is about to take place, and i think he is doing this to show China that traditional objects are no longer important to us because of Post Modernism, as in post modernism you are combining these cultural ideas into a sort of Melting Pot.


"If we look at history, nothing can give us more vivid a lesson than those pieces of evidence. You can talk about Greek or Roman civilization, or India or China or whatever. The image is still the most powerful. If we think about the United States, we think about Coca-Cola or McDonald's. And those things are so strong and so clear that we almost don't need another explanation. I suppose that's why art projects are needed - to reveal how history and reduced everything into such a nonsense image" - Ai Weiwei.




'Han Dynasty Urn with Coca-Cola logo'(1994), Ai Weiwei





Ai Weiwei dropping a Han Dynast Urn.


6. Research British artist Banksy's street art, and analyze the following two works by the artist
to discuss how each work can be defined at Post-Modern.(Use your list from question 3.)


Banksy is a very famous artist, who has been doing stencil graffiti art for many years, while hiding from the public to this day, nobody knows his name. But they do know that he makes work for meanings, to make change to the world. In his work "Flower Riot", he has put a human figure as a stencil, in a aggressive stance, similiar to one of a real person at a riot, tossing a molotov through the air. So you have this sense of anger and destruction, and what is to cause this "destruction"? Flowers. Banksy has replaced the "molotov" or a "brick" or whatever was in this person's hand, and replaced it with Flowers which shout "friendship" and "compassion". Its quite ironic really because why would one throw flowers at things to cause destruction? This is why Banksy, to this day, is still my favourite artist. Its not about money for him, it's about making a point. In terms of post-modernity, I do believe that there once apon a time no such thing as violence, and anger and destruction, and instead there was a constant energy of happiness that surrounded us. By doing this piece, Banksy may be saying that instead of breaking people's stuff, and destroying their belongings etc, why not give them Flowers? If you think about it, no matter what you throw, if you throw it in anger it does the same job. Throwing a book at the ground can involve the same anger as one that throw's a brick at a car. Maybe Banksy is just saying that if we are angry, pick something soft up and throw that. It seem's stupid, but it could easily be that simple. Post-Modernism involves the past and the present in one aspect, the flowers could represent that attitude that the public had years ago, verses the stenciled man throwing the flowers, which represents anger and destruction. 
'Flower Riot', Banksy


In Banksy's work "Los Angeles (2008), Banksy", he has taken a Prehistoric caveman, and shown this Caveman holding something that we can all recognise - a tray of Fast Food. Titling this "Los Angeles" shows that when Banksy thinks of Los Angeles, or pictures it in his mind, he see's fast food. This could be because of the large amount of obesity in America, or merely the fact that Fast Food is everywhere in America itself. The Previous artist, Ai Weiwei, did say that "If we look at history, nothing can give us more vivid a lesson than those pieces of evidence. You can talk about Greek or Roman civilization, or India or China or whatever. The image is still the most powerful. If we think about the United States, we think about Coca-Cola or McDonald's. And those things are so strong and so clear that we almost don't need another explanation. I suppose that's why art projects are needed - to reveal how history and reduced everything into such a nonsense image" - Ai Weiwei.

What Ai Weiwei was meaning was that when people get used to something for to long, we see it as being represented by an object or logo, for instance in Ai Weiwei's Dynasty Urn Work, people are more likely to recognise what the logo is, before they understand the background of the Urn itself. So maybe thats what Banksy is referring to, the fact that America is such a Fast Food Country, that eventually all it's really known for is Fast Food's, rather than the sight-seeing oppertunitys that they have available for tourists. He also could be using the stencil of the Fast Food to represent Fast Food in general, like it doesn't take much skill to look at this art and know what the Caveman is holding. The shapes in the Fast Food are very typical for a Mc Donalds order, as sad as it is i can easily tell that there is a Frozen Coke, Chips, and probably a Big Mac. It is alot easier to characterize which is what, unlike Ai Weiwei's art. Banksy is straight to the point with this Art by keeping it simple, to state that Fast Food is like second nature to us, we've known what it is since your first day you can remember, the Caveman represents history/age, so all in all he is saying that nowadays even cavemen know what Fast Food is, because it's everywhere, literally.
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)