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Caught in Between Modern & Contemporary A
Caught in Between Modern & Contemporary A
MODERN AND
CONTEMPORARY ART
“
In everyday language, the terms
“modern” and “contemporary” are
often used interchangeably. In the
context of art, however, they
designate two distinct moments in
art history. There are specific
definitions for both terms, and these
definitions will help us to establish
an understanding of the images and
themes that emerge in both styles of
art.
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Modern Art
Modern art is a term that signifies
the philosophy and style of the
artworks produced during the 1860-
1970 era.
This art broke with convention,
dealt with new subject matter,
focused on conceptual concerns,
and changed the position of the
artist within society.
Modern Art
The main objective of Modern art
was to set aside the traditions of
the past and put more emphasis on
experimentation with a new
perspective of seeing the world.
Many styles of art developed during
the modern period, including
impressionism, fauvism, cubism,
expressionism, surrealism, pop art,
op art, art nouveau, and art deco.
HOW MODERN ART USHERED A NEW
ERA IN THE WORLD OF ART?
The Modernism movement
introduced many fresh concepts in
the world of art. All of a sudden
many artists started exploring
dreams, symbolism, and personal
iconography as their signature.
Modern artists also experimented
with the expressive use of color,
non-traditional materials and
mediums.
Contemporary Art
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Contemporary Art
The year 1970 is the cutoff point for two reasons:
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Contemporary Art
It also implies art that is made by
living artists, but essentially
contemporary art is seen as
something that has never been
done before
It emphasizes a rejection of the
commercialization of the art
world, but it is often connected
to the contemporary consumer-
Contemporary Art
The Contemporary Art era is
known to produce more
experimental works and tackles
a wider variety of social,
economic and political issues. It
made art as a whole to reflect
the current issues that hound
our world today, such as racism,
globalization, third-world
WHAT DO MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY ART
HAVE IN COMMON?
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CONTEMPORARY ARTS
Napoleon Leading the Army over “Pictures of Garbage,” by Vik The Weather Project by Olafur
the Alps by Kehinde Wiley Muniz Eliasson
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CONTEMPORARY ARTS
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MODERN ARTS
Country Road in Provence by At the Moulin Rouge: Two The Large Bathers by Paul Cézanne
Night by Vincent Van Gogh Women Waltzing by Henri de
Toulouse-Lautrec
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MODERN ARTS
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ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM
Broad movement in American painting that
began in the late 1940s and became a
dominant trend in Western painting during
the 1950s. The most prominent American
Abstract Expressionist painters were
Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning,
Franz Kline, and Mark Rothko.
It is the term applied to new forms of
abstract art.
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SOCIAL CONTEXT: IN BETWEEN
MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY
ART
SOCIAL CONTEXT: IN BETWEEN MODERN AND
CONTEMPORARY ART
Modern art refers to the period
that began in the 1880s and that
lasted until the 1960s.
Artists like Van Gogh and Manet are
credited with revolutionizing the
art in the 1880s and giving a new
realm to it.
They emphasized on the subjective
representation of subjects rather
than focusing on realism that was
SOCIAL CONTEXT: IN BETWEEN MODERN AND
CONTEMPORARY ART
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Action painting
Jackson Pollock and Willem De
Kooning who focused on an
intensely expressive style of
gestural painting
It used a style that involved
streaks and overlapping lines of
paint which implied movement in
the artwork.
Action painting
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Action painting
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Colour-field paintings
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OPTICAL ART
is a form of abstract art
(specifically non-objective art)
which relies on optical illusions
in order to fool the eye of the
viewer.
It is also called optical art or
retinal art.
It relates to geometric designs
that create feelings of movement
OPTICAL ART
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OPTICAL ART
By Jesus Soto
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OPTICAL ART
By Guenther Uecker
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OPTICAL ART
By Enrico Castellani
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OPTICAL ART
By Carlos Cruz-Diez
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KINETIC ART
is art from any medium that
contains movement perceivable by
the viewer or depends on motion
for its effect
kinetic art is a term that today
most often refers to three-
dimensional sculptures and figures
such as mobiles that move
naturally or are machine
KINETIC ART
By Naum Gabo
“Constructed Torso”
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KINETIC ART
By Alexander Calder
“Pyramid”
“Circles and Waves”
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KINETIC ART
By Jean Tinguely
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KINETIC ART
By Theo Jansen
“Strand Bees”
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MINIMALISM
also sometimes referred to as ABC
art, Cool art, Literalist art,
Object art, and Primary Structure
art
emerging in a coherent form in New
York during the 1960s
MINIMALISM
it was a major movement of post
modernist art, specifically a style
of abstract painting or sculpture
characterized by extreme simplicity
of form: in effect a type of visual art
reduced to the essentials of
geometric abstraction.
Minimalism
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Minimalism
Box with the sound of its
own making (1961) by
Robert Morris
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Pop art
Great American Nude #21 (1961) by
Tom Wesselman
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POST MODERNISM
the most pertinent movement tjat solidfied
the move to contemporary arts
asociated with scepticism, irony and
philosophical critiques of the concepts of
universal truths and objective reality.
it embraces many different approaches to
art making, and may be said to begin with
pop art in the 1960s and to embrace much of
what followed including conceptual art,
neo-expressionism, feminist art, and the
Young British Artists of the 1990s.
POST MODERNISM
the most pertinent movement tjat solidfied
the move to contemporary arts
There are several characteristics which
lend art to being postmodern; these
include bricolage, the use of text
prominently as the central artistic
element, collage, simplification,
appropriation, performance art, the
recycling of past styles and themes in a
modern-day context, as well as the break-
up of the barrier between fine and high
Post MODERNISM
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Post Modernism
La Trahison Des Images (The Treason of President Elect, 1961 by James Rosenquist
Images, "This is not a pipe"), 1929 by Rene
Magrite
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OTHER CONTEMPORARY
ART MOVEMENT
NEO-POP ART
⬗ During the 1980s there was a revival
of interest in Pop Art - a
phenomenon known as Neo-Pop (or
"Shock Pop-Art").
⬗ Is a postmodern art movement of
the 1980s. The term refers to artists
influenced by pop art and pop
culture imagery.But remember not
to overload your slides with
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content.
NEO-POP ART
⬗ Neo-Pop Art is more of a repetition.
⬗ Thus Neo-Pop artists continue to
employ "readymades" and pre-
existing items in their worksand also
rely heavily on celebrity icons like
Michael Jackson, Madonna, Britney
Spears, Paris Hilton, and so on.
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The leading exponent of Neo-Pop is Jeff Koons
Iconic works of Neo-Pop, both by Jeff Koons, include:
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List of Neo-Pop Art Works
Keith Haring
Radiant Baby (c.1980) Street art image, Crack is Wack (1986) mural, Harlem,
New York. New York.
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List of Neo-Pop Art Works
David Wojnarowicz
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List of Neo-Pop Art Works
Yasumasa Morimura
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List of Neo-Pop Art Works
Matthew Barney
Cremaster 4 (1994)
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List of Neo-Pop Art Works
Katharina Fritsch
Rat-King (1993)
Mann und Maus / Man and Mouse (1991-92)
Pistol (2006)
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List of Neo-Pop Art Works
Daniel Edwards
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List of Neo-Pop Art Works
Daniel Edwards
Paris Hilton Autopsy (2007)
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PHOTOREALISM
⬗ The term "photorealism", "photo-
realism" or "photographic
realism", describes a style of
highly detailed 20th century
realist painting in which the
artist attempts to replicate an
image from a photograph in all its
microscopic exactness. As a
movement, photorealism,
sometimes also referred to as
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PHOTOREALISM
Most photorealist painters work directly from
photographs or digital computer images - either by
using traditional grid techniques, or by projecting
colour slide imagery onto the canvas.
The aim is to recreate the same sharpness of
detail throughout the painting.
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Two of the known photorealist artists are:
Chuck Close
• (b.1940), who specializes in gigantic-
scale pictures of expressionless
faces
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Two of the known photorealist artists are:
Chuck Close
• (b.1940), who specializes in gigantic-
scale pictures of expressionless
faces
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Two of the known photorealist artists are:
Gerhard Richter
• German painter (b.1932)
Mund (Mouth)(Brigitte Bardot's Lips) (1963) Erschossener 1 (Man Shot Down 1) (1988)
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CONCEPTUALISM
⬗ Modern form of contemporary art
which gives priority to an idea
presented by visual means that are
themselves secondary to the idea.
⬗ Conceptual art, while having no
intrinsic financial value, can deliver
a powerful message, and thus has
served as a vehicle for socio-
political comment, as well as a
broad challenge to the tradition of
a 'work
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of art' being a crafted
CONCEPTUALISM
⬗ The ideas behind this form of visual art were
explored by Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968), the so-
called father of Conceptual Art, although the
term was first used by Edward Kienholz (1927-94), in
the late 1950s.
⬗ Conceptual Art is all about "ideas and meanings"
rather than "works of art" (paintings, sculptures,
other precious objects).
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CONCEPTUALISM
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Some of the major conceptual artists are:
Jenny Holzer
Damien Hirst
Ai Wei Wei.
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PERFORMANCE ART
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PERFORMANCE ART
Artworks that are created
through actions performed by
the artist or other
participants, which may be
live or recorded, spontaneous
or scripted
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PERFORMANCE ART
Related to conceptual art
Well known artists:
Marina Abramovic
Yoko Ono
Beuys
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Marina Abramovic, 1974
RHYTHM O
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Marina Abramovic, 2002/2005/2010
Nude with Skeleton
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PERFORMANCE ART
YOKO ONO
Yoko Ono Lennon
born February 18, 1933, Tokyo, Japan
Japanese artist and musician who was an influential
practitioner of conceptual and performance art in the
1960s.
known for her avant-garde and expressive oeuvres
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Yoko Ono,1964,
Cut Piece
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PERFORMANCE ART
BEUYS
German-born artist active in Europe and the United States from the
1950s through the early 1980s.
associated with that era's international, Conceptual
art and Fluxus movements.
German avant-garde sculptor and performance artist whose works,
characterized by unorthodox materials and ritualistic activity, stirred
much controversy.
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Beuys, 1965
How to Explain Pictures to a
Dead Hare
Beuys, 1971
Feet Washing
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INSTALLATION ART
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INSTALLATION ART
relatively new genre of
contemporary art - practiced by an
increasing number
of postmodernist-artist - which
involves the configuration or
"installation" of objects in a
space, such as a room or
warehouse. The resulting
arrangement of material and space
comprises the "artwork".
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INSTALLATION ART
Kind of an immersive work where
the environment or the space in
which the viewer steps into or
interacts with is transformed or
altered.
Usually large-scale
It makes use of a host of objects,
materials, conditions, and even
the light and aural components.
Site-specific, temporary or
ephemeral in nature
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INSTALLATION ART
WELL KNOWN ARTISTS:
- Allan Kaprow
- Yayoi Kusama
- Dale Chinuly
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Chip Lord, Hudson Marquez
and Doug Michels, 1974
Cadillac Ranch
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INSTALLATION ART
ALLAN KAPROW
American Performance Artist and Theoretician
August 23, 1927
was a pivotal figure in the shifting art world of the 1960s;
his ”happenings” a form of spontaneous, non-linear
action, revolutionized the practice of Performance art.
forefather of today’s installations and performance artists
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Allan Kaprow , (1967),
Yard
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INSTALLATION ART
YAY O I K U S A M A
born March 22, 1929, Matsumoto, Japan
Japanese artist who was a self-described “obsessional
artist,” known for her extensive use of polka dots and for
her infinity installations
She employed painting, sculpture, performance art, and
installations in a variety of styles, including Pop art and
minimalism.
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Yayoi Kusama, 1965
Infinity Mirror Room—Phalli’s
Field
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INSTALLATION ART
D A L E C H I H U LY
best-known artist associated with the post–World War II
studio crafts movement
Born 20 September 1941
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Dale Chihuly, 2011,
Aqua Blue and Amber Chandelier
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EARTH ART
“Land Art”, when the natural
environment is transformed by
artist.
Kind of human intervention into
a specific landscape or terrain.
Different form environmental art
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EARTH ART
WELL KNOWN ARTISTS:
Robert Smithson
Christo
Andy Goldsworthy
Jeanne-Claude
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EARTH ART
R O B E RT S M I T H S O N
American artist known for sculpture and land art who often used
drawing and photography in relation to the spatial arts.
Born January 2, 1938
His large-scale sculptures, called Earthworks, engaged directly with
nature and were created by moving and constructing with vast
amounts of soil and rocks
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Robert Smithson, 1970
Spiral Jetty
Robert Smithson
Broken Circle/Spiral Hill
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EARTH ART
C H R I S TO
Christo Javacheff
Bulgarian-American Sculptor, Photographer, and
Conceptual Artist
Born June 13, 1935
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EARTH ART
JEANNE-CLAUDE
Jeanne-Claude de Guillebon
born June 13, 1935, Casablanca, Morocco
environmental sculptors noted for their controversial
outdoor sculptures that often involved monumental
displays of fabrics and plastics.
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Christo and Jean
Claude, (1968-1969)
Wrapped Coast
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EARTH ART
RICHARD LONG
British Sculptor and Land Artist
Born June 2, 1945
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Richard Long, 1967
A Line Made by Walking
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EARTH ART
A N D Y G O L D S W O RT H Y
Born July 26, 1956
British sculptor, photographer and environmentalist who
produces site-specific sculptures and land art situated in
natural and urban settings.
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Andy Goldsworthy, 1989
Touching North
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STREET ART
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STREET ART
Related to graffiti art as it is
a by-product of the rise of
graffiti in the 1980s.
Artworks are informed by the
illustrative, painterly, and
print techniques and even a
variety of media.
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EXAMPLES:
STICKER
MURALS
Untitled (Boxer)
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KEITH HARING
“American Dreamers”
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BANSKY
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