See also: [Feminism]
[Modernism] [Modernism]
[Post-modernism] [Post-911 Era
[Art Talk, by Cindy Nemser]
Post-post-modernism
On this page: {Intro}
{Stuff}
{Post Appologist}
{}
{The Usual Suspects} (modernist terms)
Intro
One of the key ideas in our now, post post-modernist world is that we
have (yet again) steped off the cliff of a previous reality. And of
course THAT reality (ie, post-modernism) "should have" been enough
-- and yet here we are again.
Let's take a simple example:
Say we are in a group of people - some of which we know (slightly)
and some of which we "think" that we've seen before. It should be
at some place that isn't really taken as a "social situation"
(eg, a book store that we frequent). Someone begins acting
odd (not quite hysterical but definitely odd). Now of the course
being modern, we get a bit worried. But then the behaviour continues
and a police officer is called and they (they always travel in twos)
shows up and begins questioning the person. Their behaviour continues
to be erratic - but *does* "connect" with the officer's (or officers'
in the case of "tag team" operations) questions. Eventually an
ambulence is called and the person is taken away.
Now this scene has played itself out again and again in MOVIES
and we (as viewers) take almost no notice of it - it is such a
standard for plot exposition and development that we've almost
come to expect it. And of course the people in the movie act
in a certain (again expected) way.
But.
The reality of our experience in such a case is something that
we rarely think about.
That lack of introspection is what (i would say) is what post post-modernism
is all about.
{
Stuff
In the introduction (actually the back-cover blurb
- hmm, "blurb" IS a word isn't it? What about
"blurble" as in "more of the same old blurble" ?;
alas; i, digress.)
The publication in France of
Simacrula and Simulation in 1981
marked Jean Baudrillard's most
important step toward theorising
the post-modern. Moving away from
the Marxist/Freudian approaches
that had concerned him, earlier,
Baudrillard developed in this book
a theory of contemporary culture
that relies on displacing economic
notions of cultural production with
with notions of cultural exdpenditure.
Hmmm, from this my mind (see map) jumped to the idea
of art, originality, and ownership. On the one hand
i can't own the Mona Lisa (to a certain extent as
an inhabitant of Space Ship Earth [Buckminister Fuller]
i "own" it as much as any other entity - including the
Louvre (or should it be "including La Louvre"?).
Regardless, it enough for me to know that it exists,
and (post-modernly; or at least pre-post-modernly)
that "the Mona Lisa with the Moustache" exists. Thus,
i can take a copy of an art book with the Mona Lisa
in it and tear it out (or cut it out) and draw my
own goatee and then i *do* own Duchamp's work. In
fact, i would say that that is the *only* way that
we can appreciate the *intent* (or what we wantonly
presume to be THE intent (or at least part of it)
of the work.
So, again we return to the object as having value
(even if it is "only" a copy) because of the IDEA
that it represents. Thus, Guernika represents
Guernica and vice versa. And the 9/11 towers represent
the turning point in America's innocent entry into
the 21st century, etc.
So, how do i as an artist get paid? Where is the
"production value" of even say a series of numbered
and signed prints (refer to the example of Richard
Serra's *update* re-print to one of his prints to
which a collector objected (i believe *legally* -
again with capitalism) and so Serra had a marksman
shoot holes into the entire edition; or so i heard.
So, now the original is the authentic. But, what if
i post it on my web site and people download and
print it on nicely textured paper? The moment of
authentication occurs if they email me a picture
of them next to the copy. Or an email to me about
that. (You understand that i'm only using myself
as an example of the artist.) And the original object
- clearly scanned or photographed, pixelated, and
posted and then transmitted via the internet, and
then re-constituted onto paper (via either ink-jet
(g;clea, pigment, laser?). And if that is then the
intent of the art - is there any harm done?
hmmmm...
Art in a box.
Instant art.
Paint by numbers.
Or the xerox, scan, etc.
Or the artist at art school studying and consequently
producing art based on those studies and exposures.
START AGAIN
But, again this idea of "consistency" of the created
image/environment. For humans, we require (well,
presently for the most part sticks-in-the-mud that
we tend to be when not gad-flied into THINKING, etc)
a "reasonable world", a set of predictable patterns.
In fact it is this very supposed "predictability"
that is the basis of both hope and frustration of
the film "The Cube".
We see patterns (not necessarily in the chaos), but
we as pattern-using beings seek out to make sense of
the real world. And of course most of the failures of
that pattern matching and prediction process is due
to aberent behaviours by either groups of people,
or countries, their leaders, etc. This IS the political
problem of survival. And yet, into that is (and i'm
so tired of saying this) the 65 million year lottery
of the next "dinosaur killer" meteror. But, to worry
about that simply is beyond the capacity of those that
wish to control the future and thence the fates of
others.
But, in the world of the simulated, there is no real
need for any predictability - indeed we would probably
agree that these surprises are the very essence of the
charm of the world about us - and especially entertainments.
But, again we "expect" a resonable explanation at the
end of things: "Oh, that's what *that* thing meant,
and that's why the 'story' turned out as it did."
But, as to pure creativity, we know not from whence it
comes. Chanse encounters, a small twiddle of the minor
variables - and LO: Beethoven's 5th (we might have
been able to predict the 7th and 8th from his going
deaf), but how was he able to throw off that dispair
-- he'd already composed his guernica (the 3rd/4th),
and then that 9th - and no sign of stoping there.
Thus, the creative act is in and of itself the modern.
It has always been. And yet once cast into the "pool"
of common experience, we find it difficult to consider
a world without it. Thus, it is as if creativity is
outside of any process that we might think of as
modernisation, evolution, progress (whatever *that*
means) - and yet it is the creative process that is
(at times) modern, evolving, reactive, progressing
(even when clearly de-evolving, anti-creatively,
or anti-artly, etc. doing).
Post Appologist
http://digitaldiaspora.blogspot.com/2005/10/mcluhans-hot-and-cold-mediums-not.html
the main prob with backward looks is that stand on the
other side of 9/11 -- so of course mcluhan's, piaget's,
skinner's. meade's, etc etc etc
views arent goint fit perfectly into our little world.
(not to be too nasty about this, but i;m taking a course
on (among other things) EDU theories. and people are
crit'ing neg about the structuralists and such and no acct is
taken of "but, that's all they knew" - and oif course just
discovering that specific parts of the brain controlled/etc
certain funcs (eg, "Broca's Region" - language) just
about flkoored them, SO NATCH: there mifgt be a part
of the brain where the soul is (say the Jesuit (etc)
structuralist), etc etc etc
everything in context.
only a v. few scientists (philo'r's, etc) refused to
finally accept new evidence when it fimnally was shown
to have validity - one who didn't was Ernest Mach
(ie, ach 1 = speed of sound) - he was so opposed to
einstein's thry (1st one) that he SHOWED how it could'n
be true (speed of light) his theory gaves us trans-sonic
flight, mach cones, etc. Great thry for sound
(needs a medium to move in), but not light
alas, i digress. and my left hand is killing me,
\
nigth all,
frank
Quotes
The Usual Suspects
(modernist terms)
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Chronology