Artistic development of modern art

The appearance of postmodern art did not appear in 1960' s.

Just when the power of science and technology swept everything and the elite and pure art were at the end of their tether, new artistic activities appeared. These activities were quite different from the trend at that time, which made western art turn for the better and opened up a new situation. The following are several new artistic activities at that time:

(1) LandArt (Landart or Earth Art) can be regarded as the result of the outdoor development of indoor installation works. The earliest styles can be traced back to the pyramids in ancient Egypt and the circular pillars in Si Tong, England. The vast land of America provides a stage for contemporary artists to display their talents. Taking deserts, mountains and grasslands as raw materials, trimming or attaching huge geometric figures is an early feature of earth art, and the most famous work is r smithson's Spiral Breakwater. The dam is 65,438+05 feet wide, and the audience can walk along it several times, but it has no practical function.

(2) The device is a non-artistic material. Few three-dimensional exhibits that can be displayed indoors for a short time will also be collected by museums. It is a way to arrange exhibits, not artistic features or styles, so it can serve many art schools. The original installation comes from discarding traditional sculpture materials, and its main definition is: "(1) They are assembled, not painted. Describe, shape or carve; (2) All or part of its components are pre-formed natural or artificial materials, objects or fragments, which are not artistic materials ". The representative of early installation art is the German Dadaist artist Kllrt schw-Itter, who filled his house with various materials in the1920s.

(3) BodV art refers to the material that the creator uses his own body as artistic expression, combined with painting, photography, video recording or other on-site recording means. A non-dramatic performing art, "non-dramatic" means that there is no fiction, performance and affectation. For example, Barry Lewa's works are running between two walls that are more than ten meters apart until they are exhausted. Another Vito Acconci used to be a poet and tended to be psychologically abused. For example, he tried to bite the part of his body that he could bite until he bit the trace. He also masturbated in public, erected loudspeakers to spread the sound, and forced the public to become "peeping tom" in an attempt to break through social taboos. The other is Chris Burton. Another masterpiece of "shooting" is to let his friend shoot him in the left arm from seven feet away. This shocking technology made him win the world reputation immediately.

(4) ConceptuaI Art, which originated from Dada art in the early1920s, holds that art has no sacred and lasting value, and its essence is thought or concept, and concrete works in physical form are not important, so it is also called Ideaart, post-object art or materialized art. Conceptual artists explore the relationship between art and thought or art and knowledge. The end point of this inquiry is writing, mathematics or aesthetics and philosophy. Theoretically speaking, this kind of works is not for viewing, and the traditional exhibition form is not applicable. But it is still a long-term problem to express inner thoughts and avoid external forms. Those works regarded as conceptual art are mostly temporary installations in public places such as art galleries, such as piling up some wood, bricks or other sundries casually. One example is a huge birdcage with some live birds and other objects in it, and another concept art group is people who write papers. Representative figures include Joseph kossuth, May Botshner, Hanne Dabofen, etc.

(5) Process art, which holds that the production process of art is more important than the conception in advance. It is better to experience the passage of time than to watch static and lasting objects and try to express fleeting existence. This kind of art mostly uses soft materials that easily reflect the changes of time. The original source is the pigment splashed by Pollock and Dekunin in their creation, and the creative process is mostly the author's arbitrary change of the display materials. The representative figure is robert morris. One of his works is to pile up some worthless mixed materials in the exhibition hall He changes the placement of these materials every day and puts them away at the end of the exhibition.

There are many reasons why modern western art did not transform in the1960s, which are generally considered to be related to the following social background:

(1) The defeat of the United States in the Vietnam War led to a high anti-war sentiment. Coupled with the cold international environment, people do not have much hope for human society and real life, and further begin to despise the existing norms of human life. There is a tendency to oppose the mainstream and deny eternal value in the cultural field.

(2) Side effects of industrial development. The progress of industry shows a bright future for human society, but the side effects are becoming more and more obvious. Environmental pollution, energy shortage, toxic waste and the danger of nuclear weapons have made people realize that science and technology have brought new problems while solving some problems. People have begun to look at the advantages and disadvantages of industrial progress soberly and have doubts about scientific methods.

(3) Social problems are outstanding. Rich material life can't solve mental problems, and a "beat generation" appeared after the war. From 65438 to 0968, there was a student movement upsurge in Europe and America.

(4) The emergence of new ideas. Many European philosophers have put forward new views on contemporary culture, which have had an impact on the art world. These philosophers include roland barthes, Foucault, Derrida, Lacan, Lyotard and others. They question the existing theory of social tremor, which leads people to doubt any single theoretical framework and final judgment. In the field of art, their reaffirmation of concrete value leads to the separation from the metaphysical pursuit of modern art.

New artistic ideas spread rapidly. Around the year of Sichuan, American art magazines were no longer full of plastic steel and geometric figures. Natural materials, action process, the involvement of environment and audience, semantic analysis and photographic records have gradually become the main reports of art media. At this point, great changes have taken place in the concepts, methods and forms of modern art, and what people call postmodern art began at this time. However, the change of art history is not a military handover. The next meeting will form a completely opposite situation. The so-called new and old, the ending and the opening often exist at the same time, just for the convenience of narration, and the discussants are used to separating the intertwined facts. Therefore, we often see that scholars have many views on the beginning of many so-called genre movements. This paper discusses post-modern art because we have to deliberately look for the order of time, and it is impossible to take into account the division of space at the same time, which readers should pay attention to.

In addition to the above external factors, excessive rationality and technology are the internal reasons for the change of artistic direction. We should know that the spiritual world of human beings, like the natural ecology, is changeable and balanced. If one of the prisoners is overdeveloped, there will be the opposite force to overcome it. If science is mostly involved in art, there will be anti-science forces. 1After the 1980s, with the United States as the center, post-modern art surged and became a new worldwide art trend. Combining these artistic phenomena, we can clearly perceive that new values are growing now, mainly in the following aspects:

(1) Not seeking purity, contemporary art is not limited to visual forms, language, music and drama, and mass media. Digital cinema, acousto-optic electrification, anything that can convey specific information. Painting transcends plane restrictions, sculpture integrates landscape and architecture, and exhibition venues are not limited to galleries and museums. In the contemporary west, the so-called visual art has been difficult to distinguish from other kinds of art.

(2) Good service tradition. Human beings are rich in traditional cultural resources, and it is a pity to abandon them. Contemporary artists are not against tradition, but use the past to renew themselves. The old symbols may have new meanings after the changes of time and environment, such as the "heavenly book" for dividing ice, and Cai Guoqiang's "grass boat borrows arrows". Always like this.

(3) impersonality. On top of art, except for1from the late 9th century to the middle 20th century, "personal expression" is not the main goal of creation and explosion. Post-modern art emphasizes social function, which makes art go out of the ivory tower and close to public life. Artists take the world as their responsibility, care about social problems and actively participate in social activities, so they are no longer maverick figures.

(4) A variety of standards, "diversity" is the core concept of contemporary art. Although there are still mainstream artistic trends in the world, they are no longer judged by unified standards, such as recognizing the artistic value of different countries, nationalities and regions, female art, indigenous art and art in underdeveloped countries. But there are also complicated and chaotic situations, which are difficult to systematize.

Based on the above discussion, perhaps we can have a superficial understanding of post-modern art: it stems from the rebellion against modern art, develops new methods of expressing ideas and transmitting information, changes concepts and technologies, and reflects the development trend of western contemporary culture. However, due to the differences in region, culture and system, China art circle can't integrate into this global art movement in a short time. "Ice starts with water, which is cooler than water, and shines on you better than blue". Postmodernism is a reverse movement from modernism and a rebellion against the pure reason of modernism. People are tired of facing the cold and inflexible design all day, which expresses people's desire for humanized and humanized products. Modernism and postmodernism are two extremes in style, but they have similarities and differences in many aspects. For example, Hassan made the following comparison between these two parts in The Turn of Postmodernism:

philosophic

Modernism is based on rationalism and realism, while postmodernism is based on romanticism and individualism.

interiorly

Modernism emphasizes the worship of technology and the rationality and logic of function, while postmodernism advocates high technology, high emotion and people-oriented.

In methodology

Modernism follows the absolute role of physical attributes, standardization, integration, industrialization, high efficiency and high technology. Postmodernism follows the dominance of human experience, the unity and continuity of time and space, the interpenetration of history, individuality, laxity and liberalization.

On design language

Modernism follows the form of function determination, "less is more" and "useless decoration is a crime" (Russian); Post-modernism follows the diversity, fuzziness and irregularity of forms, with a double interpretation of one or the other, emphasizing historical context, image metaphor and "less is boring" When Duchamp's inspiration involves the topic of western post-modern art, we can't help but mention that the French painter Marseille Duchamp is described as the father of western post-modern art. Understanding his art and life is of great help to understand many wonderful phenomena of western post-modern art (but understanding Duchamp is a difficult problem), because his works and life are too far away from ordinary people; It's hard to explain.

Although Duchamp's artistic practice ended in A.D. 1930 and died in A.D. 1968, his short artistic activities during the drought period had a lasting impact on later generations. 19 13 years, he completed his first ready-made artistic work "Bicycle Wheel" to express his contempt for the structure in traditional works. This also implies that the most important factor in artistic creation is concept rather than production skill. Chocolate Grinder No.8 is almost Duchamp's last work on the shelves, which is a mockery of academic oil painting. Duchamp 19 15 settled in new york, and it was completed as a urinal in the spring of 19 17; Another work is L.II.O.O.Q (19 19), which adds a moustache to the print Mona Lisa. Duchamp's most important work is Big Glass, also known as The Bride Was Stripped by Her Man. This work was made from 19 15, and it was still not finished until 1923. After 192O, Duchamp's interest in optics and movies increased day by day. After the Sichuan era, he turned his interest to chess.

Duchamp's most important contribution is "ready-made" art. Although it is absurd to put ready-made industrial products or other items on art exhibitions from a secular point of view, in fact, it has changed the whole view of human beings on art and even the world, and people have begun to question the necessity of traditional values and artistic creation models, at least. In western post-modern art, the influence of "ready-made goods" is everywhere, which inspires people from the following aspects:

Form and beauty are not important. Since ancient times, artists have made it their bounden duty to create beautiful forms, and endowed this kind of work with lofty status and value. However, Duchamp believes that beauty does not exist, and there is nothing particularly lofty about art and people who create art. He tells people that there is no difference between ordinary objects and works of art, and fruit art is beautiful; Ordinary goods are also beautiful. If ordinary goods are not beautiful, works of art are not much better. The so-called aesthetic value of art is just people's prejudice. He sent the urinal to the exhibition, which played a great role in breaking this prejudice.

(2) Environment and time are more important than works, and the decisive factors for the finished product to be a work of art are environment and time. Has nothing to do with the work itself. This shows that under certain conditions. Everything and even behavior can be art; On the other hand, when conditions change, nothing or even behavior can be art, according to China's words, this is right and that is wrong. Because the environment and time are always changing, the classic Mona Lisa of the Renaissance can be painted into the 20th century and become a joke. Bicycle wheels and stools put into art galleries are equivalent to structuralist sculptures.

(3) Let art return to a spontaneous and natural state. The initial artistic activities of human beings are spontaneous and natural, and there is no difference between artists and non-artists without special training. But then there was a division of labor, and art became a special job, so there was a special standard about art. Obviously, this division of labor and standard was the product of the previous system. Hinder the sound development of human nature. Under the changing social conditions, it is unreasonable to regard these existing standards as the supreme law. And "ready-made art" is to completely ignore the existing artistic standards and even cultural standards, and use a seemingly ridiculous but profound thought to mock the formality and craftsmanship of human beings in the cultural field, thus calling for the arrival of a new era full of freedom and creative spirit.

(4) cancel the technical restrictions. People have long been accustomed to artistic creation as a special technical operation, so there are fine arts institutes and professional painters. "Ready-made" art has nothing to do with the author's personal technology, but only needs a choice, and choice is a thinking process, which has nothing to do with the production technology of material products. Duchamp told people here that the value of art lies in thought. With thought, any material product can become a work of art. This method of equating art with thought objectively cancels the traditional art discipline and implies the theoretical judgment that art and art history are coming to an end.

De Kunich, an American painter, said: "Duchamp himself launched a movement-this is a real modern movement, which implies everything: every artist can get inspiration from him." This seems to be a "ready-made product", which easily reversed the development direction of western art and is the pioneer image Duchamp left to future generations. After Duchamp, he opposed all established artistic models and norms, and took the unrestrained spirit of freedom as his artistic creation goal, which became the knowledge of western art circles. Abstract expressionism, which originated from American painting in the 20th century, marks the shift of the center of modern western art from Paris to new york. If this school of painting is actually a continuation of European modernist painting in the United States, then the various schools of painting that have emerged in the United States since then are entirely created by Americans themselves. Pop art is the earliest painting school with American characteristics. Pop art appeared in the middle and late 1950s. According to Lichtenstein, "applying the theme of commercial art to painting is pop art." Its materials are popular, its visual image is simple and direct, and it rejects the expression of individuality. Acrylic, enamel and other materials create a smooth texture effect on the screen, which reminds people of the cover of magazines and is very typed. In the eyes of pop artists, art is life, and life is art, and objects in real life can be directly used as subjects, and objects in real life can also be directly used as pop art works. After pop art, various painting schools appeared in American painting circles. Photographic realism, light effect, hard edge painting, etc. Come in succession, dazzling. Light effect art was very popular in the 1960s. Through the special arrangement of lines, shapes and colors, it creates people's optical illusion and creates the effect of moving on a still picture. Photographic realism was mainly popular in the 1970s. It draws pictures according to photos, and the image is vivid and meticulous.

John is a representative figure of early pop art. He was born in South Carolina and moved to new york in 1952. His paintings abandoned the short-lived emotional expression of abstract expressionism, and created a "new Dada" style that used pure painting forms and even real objects in life to delicately deal with daily realistic themes. This style has played a decisive role in the development of pop art. John chose the American flag as the only theme of this painting. This theme has a strong symbolic significance for the ordinary American public. "No other social symbol is as powerful as the American flag and can resist the change of aesthetics." However, Johns insisted: "This is not a flag." This is reminiscent of a sentence written by Magritte with a pipe in a painting: "This is not a pipe." Indeed, this is not a pipe, but just a picture. What Johns is going to say here must mean the same thing. In this painting, he actually wants to show the boundary between image and reality. Although he painted the three flags very realistically with highly realistic skills, they looked unnatural. They don't feel fluttering and drooping, as if suspended in mid-air. It can be seen that there is a certain distance and space between them, but there is no connection between them. If they still feel a little touched, it is that the red, white and blue colors on the national flag are not flat monochrome, but slightly undulating. People may ask whether the painter is painting portraits of these three flags, which must only exist in the painter's mind. Therefore, what this painting depicts is by no means a real reality, but only a fantasy reality. When we first saw this painting, we never thought it would make people feel so strange.

Marilyn Monroe, andy warhol, 1967, prints, 90x90 each, Hiroshima, modern art collection.

In pop art, the most influential and representative painter is Andy Warhol (1927-1986). He is the initiator and main advocate of American pop art movement. 1962, he was famous for exhibiting "sculptures" of soup pots and Blillo soap boxes. His painting patterns are almost the same. He used images from the mass media, such as Campbell's Soup Pot, coca-cola bottle, US dollar bills, Mona Lisa and Ma Lilian Monroe's heads, as basic elements, to appear repeatedly in his paintings. He tried to completely cancel the manual operation factor in artistic creation. All his works are made by screen printing technology, and the images can be repeated countless times, bringing a unique dull effect to the picture.

As for his works, Harold Rosenberg once jokingly said, "The columns made of numbing and repetitive canned Campbell Soup are like a humorous joke that has been told repeatedly." He likes to repeat and copy. "I have had the same breakfast for twenty years," he explained. "I guess it's the same thing over and over again." For him, there is nothing "original". His works are all replicas, and he just wants to replace the original position with countless replicas. He deliberately eliminated the color of personality and emotion in his paintings and quietly listed the most common images. He has a famous motto: "I want to be a machine", which is in sharp contrast to Jackson Pollock's claim that he wants to be natural. His paintings, almost inexplicable, "can arouse infinite curiosity-it is a slightly terrible vacuum that needs to be filled with small talk and empty talk." In fact, the monotony, boredom and repetition of andy warhol's paintings convey a feeling of indifference, emptiness and alienation, and show people's inner feelings in a highly developed commercial and civilized society.

The portrait of Marilyn Monroe is one of the most interesting themes in Warhol's works. In the painting "Marilyn Monroe" by 1967, the painter used the heads of unfortunate Hollywood sexy movie stars as the basic elements of the picture and stood in a row repeatedly. The simple, neat and monotonous portrait of Monroe reflects people's helpless emptiness and confusion in modern commercial society.

Girl by the piano, Lichtenstein, 1963, Oil on canvas, new york, private collection.

Royallichtenstein (1923i) is famous for drawing cartoon images. Like andy warhol, he not only prefers ordinary trifles in daily life and vulgar images in modern commercial society, but also likes to deal with these images in an impersonal and neutral way. For them, he neither criticized nor flattered, but simply stated that this is the city we are immersed in, and these are the images and symbols that make up our lives. 196 1 year, he began to put the image in the most inconspicuous comic book into his big picture. He used oil paint or acrylic paint with relish to enlarge those comic books as they are, and even took pains to copy dots in the process of cheap color printing. In terms of exquisite pictures and rigorous production, its painting style is very classical.

The Girl by the Piano is a work with typical Liechtenstein painting style. The whole painting reproduces a cartoon, which is more than 500 times larger than the original. The painter not only accurately copied the composition and characters of the original, but also carefully imitated the brushwork and screen printing of the original author. He borrowed the enlarged grid of the advertising painter, and constantly transferred the graphics on the comic book from the small grid to the large grid of the canvas. He also used a special metal sculpture with neat holes and regularly arranged large dots on a huge screen, deliberately imitating small dots in the printing process to show the pop culture color of his enlarged comics. He claimed that this painting is not a mechanical imitation, and its painting method is only for formal reasons: "I think my work is different from newspaper comics ... I do modeling, and newspaper comics are not modeling according to my explanation."

Flow, by Riley, 1964, board and mixed materials, 149.5x 148.3cm, OPArt of new york Museum of Modern Art, also known as "optical illusion art" or "light effect art", was popular in 1960s. This kind of art mainly causes people's optical illusion through the special arrangement of lines, shapes and colors, thus making still pictures have dazzling and flowing dynamic effects. It originated from the tradition of Bauhaus and made use of the research results of Gestalt psychology. It is an abstract art closely related to the viewer's visual perception.

The sense of light, illusion and movement of light effect art comes from the special dynamic characteristics of the picture itself. The regular arrangement of lines, such as vertical lines, horizontal lines and curves, the periodic combination of shapes, such as circles, squares and rectangles, and the juxtaposition, overlapping, encircling and gradual change of colors have brought special stimulation to the retina. It confuses people's visual perception and causes sports hallucinations such as flicker, radiation, rotation and bumps. This visual uncertainty will even make the viewer inadvertently pulled into a trance-like unconscious state. It can be said to be a kind of visual magic. Although we know that all painting art involves the gap between physical facts and psychological effects, here we are still amazed at the illusion effect of ups and downs on the static plane.

The creation of light effect painting is a bit like a visual scientific experiment, which has nothing to do with emotion. This kind of painting is not only limited to the picture itself, but also calls for the participation of the viewer. Only when people look at it can it gain integrity and realize its value in the interaction with the viewer. In fact, this tendency can be traced back to Impressionism and Neo-Impressionism. Those painters try to avoid mixing pigments, but let the primary colors be juxtaposed on the canvas. When the viewer retreats to a proper distance, people will feel the flicker of light due to the unique compound effect of retina. Light effect painters further promoted this technology, making it a practical theme and content. Light effect art can arouse people's interest. It is used in design, decoration, advertising and other aspects, and has become a popular label. The representative figures of light effect painters are Victor Vasavely and Bridget Riley.

Bridget Louise Riley (1931-) is a creative British female painter. Before 1960, she mainly painted people and landscapes. Later, she devoted herself to the art of lighting effects and created many dynamic works. Liu, written on 1964, is one of his famous black and white painting series. The relationship between lines seems to have been carefully calculated and arranged, resulting in twists and turns in the picture. Eyes fixed on it, the picture constantly fluctuates, creating the illusion of "flow".

John, by Close,1971-1972, acrylic canvas, 254x228.6 cm, collected in new york Wildunstein Gallery. Photographic realism, also known as surrealism, is a popular artistic style in the 1970s. It is almost entirely based on photos and is objectively and clearly reproduced on canvas. As ChuckClose said, "my main purpose is to translate the information of photography into the information of painting." It has reached an amazing degree of realism, even worse than a camera.

Realistic photographers don't sketch directly. They often capture the required image with the camera first, and then copy the image to the canvas step by step before taking the photo. Sometimes they will use a slide projector to project photos onto the curtain, get bigger and more accurate images than the naked eye can see, and then describe them exactly the same. Some unclear details in the blueprint have also been revised by the painter, which is also true and clear. Such a detailed and accurate picture, in a sense, has become a provocation to people's conventional observation methods.

Because in general, people's visual perception of images will not be meticulous and will not let go of any details. Usually, due to the influence of occupation, emotion, personality, pragmatism and other aspects, the eyes will selectively respond to images. Some may be clear impressions after careful observation, some may just pass by, and even many times, people's eyes are only roughly clear. The realism of photographic realism can be confused, but its clear handling of all details also implies its distance from reality and the unreality under reality. In addition, photo realistic painters deliberately hide all traces of personality, emotion and attitude, and quietly create a dull and indifferent picture. Under this superficial indifference, it is actually a social concept, which reflects the alienation and indifference between people in post-industrial society.

Photographic realistic works are often huge, which brings a certain shock to the vision. According to ChadesBell, "changing the size of everyday things greatly enables us to enter it more easily and explore its surface and structure." Large-scale paintings are made in a unique way. Painters often divide photos into many small squares and then carefully copy them into small pieces in proportion. Obviously, you can't see the overall effect of the picture until it is finished. Photographic realism has a wide range of subjects and vivid pictures, and all subjective factors are abandoned without exception. On the surface, it is a reply to realism, but in fact it is an inspiration to contemporary society. Realism has become a modern artistic technique that keeps pace with abstraction here.

The emergence of photographic realism once attracted imaginable criticism and attacks. With the support of art dealers and the enthusiasm of the public, it gained a firm foothold and became famous in one fell swoop. Among the painters of this style, Close takes portrait as the only theme, Esther likes to depict city street scenes, Goins is interested in cafes and fast food restaurants, charles bell spends his energy on depicting game toys, and Robert Becketler is committed to balancing the relationship between photos and paintings ... Although not many people are engaged in photographic realistic painting, its influence is endless, and even some people are interested in it.

ChuckClose (1940 I) is a representative figure of photographic realism. Born in Washington, he studied at Washington University, Yale University and Vienna Institute of Plastic Arts. When he engaged in abstract expressionism in his early days, he found that his works were exactly the same as others' and lacked his own characteristics. In order to pursue his vision and ideas, he turned to painting people, drawing people with the help of photos. He began to paint portraits from 1964, and two years later he painted according to photos. He quipped: "Abstract expressionist painters paint very handsome, so I use the stupidest one." Their paintings are very thick, so I only use black and white and draw them very thin. Of course, I also used color later. "He finally found himself and made a change. Close describes all his familiar relatives and friends, and he knows their voices, smiles and personality psychology. But in the picture, not only do the characters have no expression and do not convey any of their own characteristics, but Close also erases their feelings and does not show any tendency. He used a fountain pen and an electric eraser instead of a brush that might expose his personality, wasting time and energy at work. " John is his work in the early 1970s. This portrait is lifelike and very subtle. Skin, hair, eyes, glasses, etc. Are depicted with rich texture. Such a large scale, coupled with such a strong sense of reality, will give people a real "fake" feeling.