Postmodernism emerged as a reaction against modernist formalism in art, which was seen as elitist. Postmodernism is more inclusive, accommodating a wide range of styles, subjects, and formats. Postmodern art often includes irony and reveals an awareness of art-making processes and the workings of the art world.

1. Art Since 1970
postmodernism: a reaction against modernist
formalism, seen as elitist . Far more encompassing and
accepting than the more rigid confines of modernist
practice, postmodernism offers something for everyone
by accommodating a wide range of styles, subjects, and
formats, from traditional easel painting to installation and
from abstraction to illusionism. Postmodern art often
includes irony or reveals a self-conscious awareness on
the part of the artist of art-making processes or the
workings of the art world.
-from Gardner’s Art Through the Ages
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdO9orWQ-Nk

2. Art Since 1970
Themes & Styles:
• Appropriation
(pastiche)
• Multi-media works
• Blurring of boundaries
between high vs. low
• Self-consciousness
• Deconstruction
(destabilizing
meaning)
• Socio-political nature
• Inclusiveness &
individuality
Kehinde Wiley
Napoleon Leading the
Army over the Alps, 2005,
oil, American
Jacques-Louis David
Napoleon Crossing the St.
Bernard
Pass, 1801, oil, French
Painting is about the
world that we live in.
Black men live in the
world. My choice is to
include them. This is
my way of saying yes
to us.
-Kehinde Wiley
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jNKBOMOTPA

3. Feminist Art
JUDY CHICAGO, The Dinner Party,
1979. Fig. 15-21.
CINDY SHERMAN, Untitled Film Still
#35, 1979. Fig. 15-22.

4. Ingres, Grande Odalisque, 1814, oil
Fig.12-3
“The Gaze” & Feminist Art
Picasso, Les
Demoiselles
d’Avignon,
1907, oil

5. Barbara Kruger, Untitled (Your Gaze Hits
the Side of My Face), 1981
Photo/collage, fig.15-23
“The Gaze” & Feminist Art
• Trained as graphic
designer
• Incorporates mass media
techniques in order to
subvert them
• Large scale
• Image and text (black &
white)
• Red frame
• Questions assumptions
about beauty and
femininity, objectification
of women

6. Site-specific Art
ROBERT SMITHSON, Spiral Jetty, 1970
Site-specific Art - Earthworks

7. Site-specific Art - Earthworks
• Concern for environment
(American SW)
• Draw attention to land
(entropy)
• Question role of
museums and galleries in
art (resists art market)
• Shape and color
determined by site =
spiral salt molecules
• Not always visible
• Envisioned as return to
primordial beginnings
ROBERT SMITHSON, Spiral Jetty,
1970. Fig. 15-38.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCfm95GyZt4

8. Maya Lin, Vietnam Veterans
Memorial, Washington, D.C.
1981-83, fig.15-34
http://video.pbs.org/video/1237561998/
Architecture (Modernist)

9. Maya Lin, Vietnam Veterans
Memorial, Washington, D.C.
1981-83, fig.15-34
Architecture (Modernist)
• Result of juried
competition held in 1981
• Selected while Lin was an
architecture student at Yale
• Highly Controversial
• Didn’t glorify the war;
focus on individual cost of
war
• Selected minimalist (and
modernist design) over
classical forms
• List of names of dead,
chronologically from the
center
• Like a black, polished
“cut” into the earth
• One end points at
Washington Monument,
other at Lincoln Memorial

10. RICHARD ROGERS and RENZO
PIANO, Georges Pompidou National
Center of Art and Culture, 1977.
Fig. 15-36.
Architecture (Postmodernist)
ALEXANDRE-GUSTAVE EIFFEL, Eiffel
Tower, 1889. Fig. 13-19.

11. Architecture (Postmodernist)
FRANK GEHRY, Guggenheim Bilbao Museo, 1997. Fig. 15-37.

12. • Deconstructivism
= deconstructing
the nature of
building
• Challenge
expectation of
materials and
appearance
• Creative freedom
& signature style
• Curvilinear vs.
rectilinear forms
FRANK GEHRY, Guggenheim
Bilbao Museo, 1997. Fig. 15-37.
Architecture (Postmodernist)
FRANCESCO BORROMINI, San Carlo alle Quattro
Fontane, 1665–1676. Fig. 10-7.

13. Performance & Conceptual Art
JOSEPH Beuys, How to Explain
Pictures to a Dead Hare, 1965,
fig. 15-41
JOSEPH KOSUTH, One and Three Chairs
1965. Fig. 15-41.

14. New Media
Bill Viola, The Crossing
1996, video/sound
Fig. 15-43http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHqhaH6m9pY
• Video/sound installation
• Companion videos (men
engulfed in water &
flames)
• Reflects back on the
viewer’s own body
(sensations) immersed in
a image-sound space
• Spiritual & religious
meanings
• Uses elements (fire,
water) as allegories of
personal transformation

15. JEFF KOONS, Pink Panther, 1988. Fig. 15-30.
Social and Political Art
MARCEL DUCHAMP, Fountain (second version),
1950 (original version produced 1917).
Fig. 14-13.

16. • Postmodernism
• Neo-Pop? Neo-Dada?
(Duchamp’s readymade)
• Commodity culture
• Cartoon character and
centerfold
• Kitschy material (mass-
produced, cute,
sentimental objects)
• In The Banality Show
• Ironic commentary or
love of popular culture? JEFF KOONS, Pink Panther, 1988.
Fig. 15-30.
Social and Political Art

17. Social and Political
Art
Chris Ofili, The Holy
Virgin Mary, 1996,
mixed media

18. Final Exam Review:
Comparative Essay
• What are the individual characteristics of
each work in terms of style & subject?
• How do they relate to the particular historic,
artistic and cultural contexts in which they were
made?
• With what artistic movements are they
associated?
• Why compare the two art works? What are their
similarities & differences?

19. #1.
Picasso, Les
Demoiselles
d’Avignon,
1907, oil
WILLEM DE KOONING, Woman I, 1950–1952.

20. #2
DONALD JUDD, Untitled, 1969. Fig. 15-10.
Maya Lin, Vietnam Veterans
Memorial, Washington, D.C.
1981-83, fig.15-34

21. #3
JEFF KOONS, Pink Panther, 1988.
Fig. 15-30.
ANDY WARHOL, Marilyn
Diptych, 1962. Fig. 15-17.

22. #4
JACKSON
POLLOCK,
Number 1,
1950
(Lavender
Mist), 1950
VASSILY
KANDINSKY,
Improvisation
28 (second
version), 1912