| Hegel, Georg |
“The highest act of reason, the one through
which it encompasses all ideas, is an aesthetic
act”.
Called the “Father of Art history” by
Gombrich; the visual arts was for Hegel the embodiment
of social, and personal issues, he believed that art
was like a language and its usage was dependent on the
conventions applied. Looking at art was for him in fact
engaging in a conversation, creating a dialogue between
the viewer and the artwork just as much as it is a dialogue between the artist with the artwork.
‘Dialectical theory of Art’ is central to
Hegel, who suggests that understanding has been gained
through the development of opposites such as the
development of a thesis and antithesis to develop a concept or synthesis. He suggested that the basis of
art theory was the development of ongoing argument that
contested validity, perhaps this concept is best
demonstrated through the development of art movements
within modern art where manifestoes were proclaimed as
antithesis to the thesis of the previous art
movement’s aim. For example, Cubism, with its new
way of looking at the world was the
“antithesis” (using Hegel model of
dialectics) to the thesis of Impressionism which was
the aim of recording the sensations of the world the
painters saw. It was Hegel who identified successive
styles that occur throughout the history of art. In
Phenomenology of Spirit (1807) Hegel has
turned his direction towards criticism. Hegel in his
development of dialectics of art investigates the roles
of artist, artwork and audience in terms of intention
of the artist and artwork and interpretation by the
audience.
Hegel also attempts to differentiate art into three
categories similar to Aristotle. Hegel saw art as:
- Symbolic art – the examination of art that suggests a representation of a power or being beyond its physical presence
- Classical art – art that is or refers to ancient Greece and Rome.
- Romantic art – what Hegel called "infinite subjectivity", this is art that is connected to a sense of spirituality and transcendental. It goes beyond rationalism and reality.
|
| Wolfflin, Heinrich |
Extended what Hegel discussed in terms of the
historical determinant that influences and dictates
the production of an artwork. Art is a result of the
ideas, concepts and technology of its time; it
provides evidence of how perception and style were
bound to notion of history. Artists within different
cultures and histories maintained their own artistic
conventions and ideals. This is demonstrated in the
interpretation of space by Western artists compared
to rural Indigenous Australian painters. |
| Baudelair, Charles |
“The whole question, then, if you insist that
I confer upon you the title of artist or connoisseur of
the fine arts, is to know by what process you wish to
create or feel wonder.”
Most notably recognised as a poet and for his
critical writings (particularly Salon 1846)
his work contextualised the situation of the
contemporary art world during the emergence of
modernism. Baudelaire embraced the radical changes that
modernist painters introduced. He attempts to validate
new styles and artists to the general public.
Baudelaire recognised and criticised the power of the
institution known as the “Salon” in Paris
during the 19th century. His opinions were
candid and radical in their time prefacing that art is
personal, subjective and idealistic, totally against
the positivist belief of the established “art
world” of that time.
Similar to the aims of the Impressionist artists,
his writing was shocking and new. He formulated a style
of criticism and critical thinking that was
idiosyncratic and candid. As the impressionists sought
to depict the sensation of light he sought to discuss
the perceptions within the logic of modernism. He cites
his criticism as “partial, passionate,
political”; Baudelaire examines the significance
of what he calls a “naiveté” (a personal temperament on the artist’s behalf)
compared to that of the “romantic” (an
interest in the sublime, intimate and spiritual). His
writings on art embrace the coming of a new age in
painting, what he calls "modernity". He sees
Impressionism as the style that negates tradition in
favour of the pioneering spirit to create a new from of
perception. |
| Ruskin, John |
Ruskin believed that art and ethics were tied up
together and that art had a moral obligation to the
individual and also to society. He distinguished the
relationship of art to society in three features:
- Relationship between God and man as each is
involved in a creative act, God creates nature and
man creates art.
- Art reflects the value of society, artistic
styles and considerations are attributed to social
and historical attitudes
- The distinct relationship between the viewer and
the artwork, investigating the interaction of meaning
and how a premise of knowledge about the artwork
arises in the viewer. He was responsible for
developing the term the “innocent eye” in
reference to art appreciation, which highlights the
balance between interpretation and recognition. He
sees that certain knowledge about art can contaminate
perception as well as strengthen it. This idea can be
equally applied to both artist and viewer, perhaps
the statement often heard by uneducated viewer,
“I might not know much about art but I know
what I like!” This demonstrates the concept of
the “innocent eye” in a very general
manner.
He wrote comprehensively on examining and
interpreting what “beauty” is in art,
dividing this concept into two categories
“Typical Beauty”, being the appearance of
beauty and “Virtual Beauty” the ephemeral
experience of beauty.
Ruskin greatly favoured the paintings of John
Turner, believing him to be the greatest living painter
of their time.
His studied architecture and believed that seven
specific virtues must be identified in architecture. He
titled these the “ Seven Lamps of
Architecture”: truth, beauty, life, memory,
power, sacrifice and obedience. |
| Nietzsche, Fredrich |
“Truth is ugly. We possess art lest we perish
of truth.”
Nietzsche examines the important links between life
(physical/metaphysical) and art. Nietzsche celebrates
and criticises the use of art in society. He
understands the coming of a new age known as
“modernism” and the anxieties associated
with it. His renowned statement “god is
dead” epitomises the ideological shift in the
consciousness of society.
He highlights the importance of a thorough knowledge
of classical art and suggests there are two forms,
Apollonian and Dionysian. Apollonian art refers to the
radiant beauty of art, whilst Dionysian refers to the
tragic component within art, this is to say tragedy
makes the viewer aware of what is beyond reality. Art
for Nietzsche resonates within Apollonian and Dionysian
expressionism. |
| Bell, Clive |
Clive Bell was influenced by the impact of Post
Impressionism and the artists’ attempts to
synthesise spirituality into their
“impressions” on canvas. In 1914, he wrote
Art in which he coined the term
“significant forms”. These identified the
importance of an artwork to have the ability to provoke
an emotional response. Bell suggested that significant
forms could be identified in the structure of the
artwork. Significant forms acknowledged how vital and
constant such visual interplay are throughout the
history of art. Bell sees art as the manipulation of
line, colour combinations and form to create an artwork
rather than its importance of representing something
real. Formal qualities were important in conveying
meaning and ideas. His writing suggests a bridge from
realism to abstraction in terms of formal and
structural considerations. Later the writer and critic
Clement Greenberg would take up Bell’s ideas of
abstraction as being the most expressive form. |
| Dewey, John |
Known as a philosophical pragmatist, Dewey offered a counter theory to that of Clive Bell. For Dewey, art
was to be considered in terms of it social implications
rather than being treated as an isolated object. For
Dewey, art and life were entwined. He sees the
experience of art as personal and social, recognising
that art develops and enriches our lives through its
dialogue with the viewer. For Dewey it is the
“aesthetic experience” that is the greatest
and most complete experience for the individual to
encounter and artists best demonstrate such experiences
in their art works.
Writings:
Art and Experience (1934)
Experience and Nature (1925) |
| Fry, Roger |
He saw art as a type of transmitter and the viewer
was the receiver, meaning is only clear if the receiver
is tuned into what is being transmitted. It is
necessary to appreciate what is being conveyed in an
artwork to gain its true meaning the meaning that
resides deep in the subconscious of the artist. He saw
the artwork as a “significant form” from
which meaning resonates, the emotive work of the Post
Impressionists, particularly Van Gogh and Gauguin
demonstrate, the significance of art as language.
He was interested in connoisseurship and how meaning
is developed form particular knowledge of an artwork.
He was greatly influenced by the aims of the Post
Impressionists and saw their paintings as a radical
renewal within the tradition of art. He was keenly
interested in the “purity” of the artwork
and wrote extensively on this subject, favouring the
new aesthetic sensibility proclaimed by the Post
Impressionists |
| Apollinaire, Guillaume |
“I must point out that the fourth dimension
– this Utopian expression should be analysed and
explained… in anticipation of a sublime
art”.
Poet, art writer and philosopher, Apollinaire was a contemporary of the Cubists and Surrealists. He coined
the phrase Cubism in 1911 and wrote Les Peintres
Cubistes a year later which sought to outline the
aesthetic principles of Cubism. His writings were also
instrumental to the development of the Surrealist
movement. In many ways Apollinare served as a muse for
many artists of his time. |
| Breton, Andre |
“Surrealism, n.m. Pure psychic automatism
through which it is intended to express, either
verbally or in writing, the true functioning of
thought. Thought dictated in the absence of all control
exerted by reason, and outside any aesthetic or moral
pre-occupation.”
The cornerstone of the Surrealist movement, Breton
delivered manifestoes and was the guiding intellectual
light for artists interested in psychoanalysis and the
subconscious. He saw art as the window into the
unconscious mind and worked towards an artistic
realisation of his theories and concepts.
Writings:
Surrealist Manifesto, 1924 |
| Kandinsky, Wassily |
“It is evident therefore that colour harmony
must rely ultimately on purposive playing upon the
human soul: this is the guiding principle of internal
necessity.” (The Effect of Colour,
1911.)
“All the arts derive from the same root.
Consequently, all the art are identical. But the
mysterious and precious fact is that the
‘fruits’ produced by the same trunk are
different. The difference manifests itself by the means
of each particular art – by the means of
expression.” (Concrete art, 1938)
Kandinsky was writer, teacher and philosopher of the
visual arts. He believed art alluded to a metaphysical
quality which he termed as spiritual. His synthesis of
this idea is seen in his ‘Proto-abstract
expressive” work. He was an instrumental teacher
in the Bauhaus in which he attempts to quantify
emotional and sensational responses to art.
Concerning spirituality and art, both as an
intellectual and painter he is one of the most
influential painters for Abstract Expressionism.
Writings:
Concerning the Spiritual in Art |
| Mondian, Piet |
“Pure science and pure art, disinterested and
free… Art makes us realise that there are also
constant truths concerning forms… which creates
dynamic equilibrium and reveals the true content of
reality” Plastic Art Pure Art,
1937
Mondrian presents the artist was an idealised
manufacturer of truth through the use of logic and
integrity. He believed that abstract painting best
represented such ideas without the distraction of
surface appearance. He states there are two priorities
in making art “direct creation of universal
beauty” and the “aesthetic expression of
oneself”. |
| Klee, Paul |
"reveal the reality that is behind
things"
Klee was interested in showing how art was nothing
but a “simile of Creation”, where art makes
visible things that are not necessarily seen with the
eye but rather felt, thought or experienced on some
other level. He was interested in the connection
between art and its reception to the unconscious.
Writings:
Pedagogical Sketchbook, On Modern Art and The Thinking Eye |
| Freud, Sigmund |
Through his writings, Freud legitimised the
activities of psychoanalysis as a science. For many
artists, particularly the Surrealists, this proved to
be the fertile source of information. In his book
Interpretation of Dreams 1900, Freud offers a methodology to unlock the unconscious. Art and
psychoanalysis would from this point developed into a partnership, which explored the inner mind as well as
providing a critical tool for the analysis of artworks.
Imagery could now be identified as images that exist
beyond a physical plane. Fantastic imagery was the
development of the unconscious; images were symbols
that manifested meaning. Salvador Dali developed his
“paranoiac-schizophrenic” method of
painting through the readings of Freud.
Images would no longer be read as simple visual
language. Symbolism and psychological projection would
be a constant reference point in art criticism.
Writings:
Interpretation of Dreams, 1900
Totems and Taboo, 1913
An Outline of Psychoanalysis, 1938
General Introduction to Psychoanalysis, 1915-17 |
| Jung, Carl |
Jung trained under Freud but went on to develop his
own method of “Analytical Psychology”. He
stated that there are four innate states of
consciousness:
Thinking / Sensation / Feeling / Intuition
This category led to his development of archetypes
of - Ego and shadow / Persona and Soul-image, which
appear as either anima (female) or animus (male) in its
psychological manifestation. In other words males have
a psychological female counterpart i.e. Anima whilst
females have animus.
Jung proposes that aspects of spirituality be
regarded as important as psychology. The artist Jackson
Pollock utilises Jungian psychology in the development
of his Abstract Expressionist style.
Writings:
Man and HisSsymbols
Archetypes |
| Stein, Gertrude |
Stein provided historic and bibliographical accounts
of Cubist artists such as Picasso and assisted in
establishing the cult of the “artist as
hero”. Development of modern biographies of
artists through memoirs is a key feature in term of
writings about the visual arts. |
| Duchamp, Marcel |
"When I discovered ready-mades I thought to
discourage aesthetics. In Neo-Dada they have taken my
ready-mades and found aesthetic beauty in them. I threw
the bottle rack and the urinal into their faces as a challenge, and now they admire them for their aesthetic
beauty!" (Duchamp to H. Riveter in 1962)
Duchamp developed the process of conceptualisation
within art as the paramount activity in artmaking. His
“Ready-mades” exemplify the dynamism of
ideas over the technical skill in the production of an
artwork. In many ways postmodern aesthetics owe much to
Duchamp’s artistic activities. |
| Panofsky, Edward |
For Panofsky, defining and deducing the
hermeneutical values (innate truths) within the
categories of perception and interpretation, it was the
dominion of the “iconological and the
iconographical”. Utilising these two divisions,
Panofsky has allowed for other fields and territories
to be marked out by other historians and theorists.
Iconology is the tracing of the style or the genre
of the artwork whilst iconography examines the possible
modes of interpretation that can be applied to the
artwork in terms of developing a critical account of
the artwork.
In many ways ,Panofsky develops the operation of the
practice of art history and art criticism in terms of
the operation of Iconology. Broadly speaking, the
historical development of style, in terms of subject
matter/genre/medium, relates to the iconological study
of art. Whilst iconography is associated with critical
readings of the artwork informed by varying theorists
and philosophers. |
| Benjamin, Walter |
Most notably his Art in the Time of Mechanical
Reproduction highlights his historical materialist
approach and his concerns about aesthetics in a time
where imagery can be commercially copied and the image
robbed of its potency through the process of
reproduction. In a time when cinema and photography
were gaining credence as an art form it is interesting
that Benjamin should write this article.
Writings:
Illuminations.
Aesthetics and Politics.
Reflections: Essays, Aphorism, Autobiographical writings |
| Ardorno, Theodore |
“No work of art of any consequence has ever fitted perfectly into its genre.”
Aesthetic Theory |
| Gombrich, Ernst |
“There really is no such thing as Art. There
are only artists.”
What Gombrich called “illusions” can
also come to mean forms of
“representations” or what is called
expressive forms in the HSC. Gombrich was interested in
examining how the visual arts had psychological
influence and historical impact on society and the
individual. He reviews and critiques the significance
of art history as a method that reports and assesses
art as a communicative language organised in differing
styles. He situates both social conditions and the
dominant style as the provision forces on the artist;
art is evidential of the artist’s worth and
activities.
Gombrich sees the production of art as something
that goes beyond personal expression. Art becomes a signpost of the ideas and concepts of the time. Art
reflects the Zeitgeist in terms of its production and
readership, and this is what Gombrich cites as the crux
of art history. Both physical and psychological
recognition of traditions and past styles are important
for interpreting artworks as well as appreciating the
value of art history. Gombrich uses the term
“conventions” to describe the formulae used
at any historical events. There are many cases where
social determinants reveal some influence in the
development of styles. For instance the visual
conventions used by Pre Renaissance artists such as in
the Medieval period, distinctly reflect a lack of
perspective, whilst after the Renaissance it is seen as
an accepted convention. Gombrich points out that
historical determinants of conventions shape
styles.
Writings:
The Story of Art
Illusion and Visual Deadlock
Expression and Communication |
| Itten, Johannes |
“… the self discovery of the individual as a creative personality"
He developed theories about colour and design.
Examining the structural and psychological aspect that
envelops an artwork and how the viewer responds. He was
a key figure in the Bauhaus school, his paramount
concern was the ability of artists to express
themselves with honesty and finesse. |
| Danto, Arthur |
"Now if we look at the art of our recent
past… what we see is something which depends more and
more upon theory for its existence as art, so that
theory is not something external to a world it seeks to
understand: hence in understanding its object it has to
understand itself. But there is another feature
exhibited by these late productions which is that the
objects approach zero as their theory approaches
infinity, so that virtually all there is at the end is
theory, art having finally become vaporised in a dazzle
of pure thought about itself, and remaining, as it
were, solely as the object of its own theoretical
consciousness"(p. 31). Arthur C. Danto: The
End of Art (published in a collection of
essays entitled The Death of Art, ed. by Berel
Lang, New York, 1984).
Danto wished to come to terms with exactly what were
the mechanisms within art, questioning whether art was
predominantly concerned with
“representation” or to turn this process of
viewing and producing art so that the big question
becomes one concerned with
“interpretation”.
He was keenly interested in what Duchamp did with
his artwork Fountain (1917), he wished to
understand the difference to the properties of the
everyday object to those that have been nominated as an
artwork. Duchamp’s "Ready-mades"
highlighted a turn in aesthetic conventions; Danto was
interested in this development and questioned how
representational art really was? Was legitimacy
contingent on the interpretation of the object rather
than what it represented?
Art in Danto’s terms is no longer evolving
from aesthetic considerations but mutating in the
development of media and employing theory as a scaffold
for its “new aesthetics”. |
| Read, Herbert |
“REVOLUTIONARY ART IS CONSTRUCTIVE
REVOLUTIONARY ART IS INTERNATIONAL
REVOLUTIONARY ART IS REVOLUTIONARY”
What is Revolutionary Art?
Read was an English critic who believed modern art
was evolving into a form that took concern and impetus
from society as much as from the artist’s
imagination. He was influenced by of Jungian psychology
(particularly archetypes) and the aesthetic development
within post Marxist theories. He examines the issues of
materialism, idealism and persona expression within
artistic practice. He developed theories that
synthesise the ideology of the time with formal
training in the fine arts. He was a key figure in
introducing modern art to a wider European audience
during the post war period. |
| Clark, Kenneth |
Historian and critic, Clark provided formal analysis
of artistic practice in contexts of the social and
cultural conditions that surrounded the artists and
artwork. His book Civilisations utilises art
as a signpost for development. Art becomes a litmus
paper for cultural development.
Clark also extensively wrote on the history of the
human form in visual arts examining issues of visual
conventions, taste/connoisseurship and the historical
development of the depiction of the human body. |
| Greenberg, Clement |
“… the guarantee of its standards of quality
as well as of its independence’ is to be found
”Modernist Painting, 1960
Abstract expressionism
Greenberg celebrated the development of
non-representational work, such as Abstract
Expressionism, as the true spirit of Modernism in its
attempt to become aesthetically autonomous from all
traditions and references to reality. He called this
“self referential autonomy”, and it refers
to the evolution of aesthetic conventions that are not
reliant on the artist’s perceptions of the
physical world which are illusionistic (see Plato). But
rather, art is the search for the absolute, which is
found in the conceptual or emotive world of the artist
and viewer not a physical reality.
He saw the concept of avant-garde, as a process that
insured it would keep culture alive and dynamic, art
was an important tool for shaping and defining society,
and art gave a sense of uniqueness to society.
Writings:
Avant-garde and Kitsch
Art and Culture 1961 |
| Feldman, Edmund |
Feldman writes with theoretical perception on the
development of formal and critical analysis of visual
arts. Feldman is interested in teaching the audience
how to respond to an artwork in an informed and
intellectual manner. |
| Berger, John |
“An image is a sight which has been
recreated or reproduced. It is an appearance, or a set
of appearances, which has been detached from a place
and time… Yet when an image is presented as a work of
art, the way people look at it is affected by a whole
series of learnt assumptions about art. Assumptions concerning:
- beauty
- truth
- genius
- civilisation
- form
- status
- taste etc.
“Many of these assumptions no longer accord with the world as it is.”
Ways of seeing: video and book
Berger developed a Marxist perspective to viewing
and critiquing visual arts, in terms of individual
response and social attitude to the production of art.
He provided a critical framework that analysed the
production and reception of art in terms of capitalism
and patriarchy. Ways of Seeing was an attempt
to call for critical considerations of Feminism and
Marxism as powerful tools for reviewing art works.
Writings:
The success and Failure of Picasso, 1965
Ways of Seeing, 1973 |
| McLuhan, Marshal |
“Any one of our new media, is in a sense a new
language, a new codification of experience collectively
achieved by new work habits and inclusive collective
awareness.”
McLuhan is responsible for describing video and
television as a “hot medium” due to the
very dynamic nature of this art form. He critiques the
importance between language and electronic media. His
work Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man
(1964) developed the ideas that communications is
a means unto itself but it is the “medium that is
the message”, highlighting the impact of
technological media in a contemporary world. Electronic
and video art took up this catch phrase in the
legitimisation of this new field of art practice. He
fully appreciated the impact digital technology would
have on society. Many artists credited his
understanding of popular culture as a signpost for
future practices within the visual arts.
Writings:
The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man
Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man)
The Medium Is the Message: An Inventory of Effects |
| Hofmann, Hans |
Both a scholar and painter, Hofmann sought to
develop a better structure of understanding art, in
particular painting. He knew Picasso, Delaunay and
Maitisse and was later very interested with what
Abstract Expressionism offered as an expressive style.
He sought to examine the systems of representation
within painting and the mechanism that exist within the
artwork itself. He saw art as a development from
“Mimetic” to “Expressive” and
finally to “Conceptual” formulae for
producing art. |
| Said, Edward |
Said highlights the issues of ethnicity and
geo-politics and their effects on art. This is to say
that Said examines the cultural constructs that exist
and how dominant culture assimilates and marginalises
other cultures. He examines how western cultures have
developed a system of colonisation.
Said critiques the West’s attitude and how it
devises practices that view all art outside Western
cultures as inferior and worthy of colonisation. He
examines the commodification of art outside the western
world. It is his work that has been instrumental in the
recognition of how museums operate as cultural centres
that offer particular accounts of history as well as
giving a voice to the “cultural other”. |
| Popper, Frank |
Similar to McLuhan, Popper was interested in the
development of aesthetics with the advent of digital
technology. He sees computers as rewriting the visual
conventions that were established in photography.
Popper suggests that computers are the newest art
medium, which have completely radicalised art practice
and the perception of art.
Writings:
Art of the Electronic Age |
| Greer, Germaine |
A feminist writer who examined and critiqued aspects
of “sexism” within the historical and
critical accounts of art. The author of the Obstacle
Race in which Greer demonstrates, through historic
practice, the gender bias that is apparent in the
historical account of “great artists”.
Extending from the premise of Linda Nochlin’s
seminal book Why have there been no great
Female Artists? Greer examines the historic and
social conditions throughout particular artistic
periods. She highlights that indeed there were female
artists of notable talent however their gender made
them “invisible” in art historical accounts
until the Feminist movement. |
| Pollock, Griselda |
“Shifting the paradigm of art history involves
therefore much more than adding new materials –
women and their history – to existing categories
and methods. It has led to wholly new ways of
conceptualising what it is we study and how we do
it”
Pollock demonstrates that particular biases can
arise within art history. She is renown for her
examination of art history in terms of a feminist
revision, pointing out the dominant language of
patriarchy and its operation to suppress female
artists. She could be identified as a social and
critical historian who reviews the operation of
art.
Extending Marxist theories about influencing factors
within society and the alienation of self, Pollock has
written a number of works that address issues of gender
representation and developed specific women’s
studies which reclaim much territory lost throughout
history.
Pollock critiques the readership of art and the
operation of the audience in terms of gender
representation and modes of decorum. Pollock is
reclaiming and establishing strategies that celebrate
the position of women artists as well as examining
dominant trends within the contemporary art world.
Writings:
Vision and Difference: Femininity, Feminism and
the Histories of Art (1988) |
| Burgin, Victor |
Artist and theorist, Burgin is interested in
aesthetics and social theories. He corrects the viewer
in any bias to considering that art lives in a social
or cultural vacuum. Similar to Barthes, Burgin is
interested in the close association of art and
language. His work examines theories of representation
in terms of historical traditions and mass media manipulations. He situates post modernity as an
aesthetic issue of legitimacy and discusses how the
ready acceptance of visual conventions within Modernism
have been overthrown in Postmodernist practices. |
| Celant, Germano |
An Italian art writer who was influential in
widening the appreciation of art practices in Europe,
particularly Italy introducing such innovative styles
such as “Arte Povera” and
“Transavantgardism” to a wider audience. He
was one notable European voice at a time when art
writers were notably American and theorists were
French. |
| Bourdieu, Pierre |
“When all is said and done, what counts for
true art lovers is the pleasure they feel in seeing a Van Gogh painting. And isn’t this the very thing
that sociology desperately tries to ignore through a sort of reductive and disillusioning
agnosticism?”
He examines how art becomes an incubator for
historical reference and a touchstone to specific
ideologies; similar to Barthes, Bourdieu examines how
significance and meaning resonates. For Barthes it was
through the investigation of popular culture for
Bourdieu it is the establishment of galleries and
museums. These theorists investigate how meaning is
transmitted and what structures are utilised in this
process of developing meaning. |
| Gablik, Suzi |
“To the postmodernist mind, everything is
empty at the centre. Our vision is not integrated
– it lacks form and definition. It is any wonder,
then, that art has fallen prey to difficulties of
legitimacy – or that, like a dark body which
absorbs everything and gives out nothing, it should be
undergoing what seems, by now, like a permanent crisis
of credibility?” p117, Has Modernism
Failed? 1984
Gablik is recognised as a postmodern critical
historian who, in her book Has Modernism
Failed, attempts to situate artistic practice in
the 1980s, particularly examining the blurring of
highbrow and low brow art as exemplified in graffiti
art. She takes a post-Marxist approach where she
investigates the agencies of the art world such as the
viewer, curator, artist and critic and examines how
they influence each other and the visual conventions of
that period in America.
She attempts to map out the transformation of
Modernism into Postmodernism. |
| Lyotard, Jean-Francois |
“What then, is postmodernism?… In an amazing
acceleration, the generations precipitate themselves. a work can become modern only if it is first postmodern.
Postmodernism thus understood is not modernism at its
end but in the nascent state, and this state is
constant.”
Lyotard was a French theorist who developed concepts
about post modernity in terms of cultural and
historical contexts. He examines both the social and
personal issues that arise with this rupture and the
end of modernist thought. |
| Sontag, Susan |
She had been actively involved in feminist issues in
the 1980s questioning the validity of censorship. But
she is probably also recognised as an innovative
theorist and writer on contemporary photographic
practice. Sontag acknowledges both historical and
critical practices within her analysis of photographic
practices. She has done a great deal towards
establishing a critical dialogue solely concerned with
specific photographic aesthetics. |
| Krauss, Rosalind |
“… to think the expanded field was felt by a number of artists…(they) had entered a situation, the
logical conditions can no longer be described as
modernist. In order to name this historical rapture and
the structural transformation of the cultural field
that characterises it, one must have recourse to
another term. The one already in use in other areas of
criticism is postmodernism” p287 The
Originality of Avant Garde
Krauss’ critical grounding is founded in her
experience as a social historian who critiques the
contemporary situation of art in the postmodern age.
Informed by structuralism, post-Marxism and feminism,
Krauss has informatively navigated the conceptually
dense terrain of post modernity, providing insights
within social, political and aesthetic strategies that
are in operation. |
| Virilio, Paul |
“We are entering a world where there
won’t be one but two realities: the actual and
the virtual.”
Virilio is interested in the impact technology has
had on society, as well as examining how cinema and
digital technology shapes individual perception. He
views the rapid nature of technology and speed of
information exchange as being part of the evolution of
space and territories. He suggests that virtual reality
will replace physicality already suggested with the
growth of the Internet, electronic surveillance and
“cyberspace”. Many artists have used his
writings as a basis to examine and explore the power of
technology to demolish and construct virtual spaces as
in CAD, architecture and art.
Writings:
Semiotext[e], 1995)
The Lost Dimension
The Vision Machine 1988
The Aesthetics of Disappearance 1989
War and Cinema |
| Foucault, Michel |
Foucault examines the development of history in its
disjunctions rather than it being a steady development
of ideas and concepts. He calls these breakages in
history – epistemes, which are echoed, in
stylistic development found within art. |
| Derrida, Jacques |
He is known as a Post Structuralist who seeks
meaning through an understanding of language. His
critical analysis of language has been applied to
visual arts, as it is another form of language. He
unpacks the meaning and significance of an
“object” (this could include an artwork) by
deconstructing the context(s) in which
the “object” gains recognition. This
process of analysis allows for close inspection of
influencing factors that arise and a deeper
understanding is reached when many elements that
contribute to the “object” are stripped
away and analysed as separate features. |
| Bhabha, Homi |
Race and ethnicity are the central concerns for this
social theorist who has greatly influenced many artists
examining their own cultural identity. Indigenous and
minority racial groups have suffered under the
conditions of “Post-colonisation”, Bhabha articulates these conditions and acts as a catalyst for
many to empower their situation and identify and value
their cultural heritage. |
| Baudrillard, Jean |
Similar to Virilio and McLuhan, Baudrillard is
fascinated with popular culture and the changing
social, political and material conditions within the
postmodern world. He sees a contemporary culture as a media saturated world that no longer desires the real
thing but instead prefers the “simulacrum”.
The simulacrum according to Baudrillard is the object
that has been copied with no original in existence.
This is to say it is the idealised object that is shown
in advertising, in cinema and found within the virtual
reality of the World Wide Web. He situates the
simulacra in a world that is known as
“hyper-reality” a world that is more real
than real. Cinema, advertising and art are all
practices that can adopt “hyper-real”
worlds. It is this theory that has greatly influenced
many artists utilising temporal or digital media. |
| Zizeck |
Zizeck combines psychoanalysis with cinema theories
to provide a revealing window into our subjective and
cultural world. He sees popular media such as
television and cinema as a mirror of the ideology of
our time as well as the neurosis of society. Many
contemporary artists, particularly those working with
temporal media have reviewed Zizeck’s
writings. |
| Collings, Matthew |
Writing in an intimate and popularist fashion,
Collings attempts to decipher much of the difficulty
associated with dealing with contemporary art practice.
His work predominantly centres around the activities of
the Young British Artist as he explains and
contextualises the development of contemporary
practices by offering particular themes of
investigation such as “Shock, Horror”,
“Nothing Matters” and “The Shock of
the Now” in his television series This is
Modern Art. Collings attempts to explain in a “non-alienating” manner the strategies and
conventions of artists who have been instrumental in
the development of modern and postmodern art.
Writings:
What is Modern art?
Blimey! From Bohemia to Britpop: the London Art
World from Francis Bacon to Damien Hirst.
It Hurts: New York Art from Warhol to Now |
| Bois, Yv-Alain |
“… one hears endless diagnosis of death:
death of ideologies (Lyotard); of industrial society
(Bell); of the real (Baudrillard);of authorship
(Barthes); of man (Foucault); of history (Kojeve) and,
of course, of modernism (all of us when we use the term
post-modern).”
Bois examines the condition of artistic practices,
particularly painting within a contemporary context. He
acknowledges the dominant theories and maps out their
effect on the art world today. He articulates the
stylistic and intellectual transition of art in a postmodern world. |
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