Postmodernism brought about a plethora of new and exciting forms of artwork either through photography, illustration or through many other media. I found many of these artworks particularly useful in relation to my personal practice in regards to style and artistic techniques. They are also however very useful to interpret the reasons that the artists made the decisions they did when making them.
One of the notions I have been most excited by in postmodernism, is the idea that art can be found anywhere and recreated many times. Marcel Duchamp is a key artist to study when questioning this idea. The piece that Duchamp is most well known for is a sculpture named ‘Fountain (1917).’ The reason this work is so interesting is because the sculpture is essentially a found object. The sculpture is in essence, a urinal. At the time, when it was first exhibited, this caused outrage at how an object such as this could be displayed as a piece of ‘artwork.’ To understand this, we need to understand Duchamp’s rational for creating the work. His intension was to ‘rattle’ art critics by challenging the definition of a ‘piece of artwork.’ Could something as simple as a urinal be classed as a piece of artwork just because it had a signature at the bottom and be standing on a plinth? And even though he encountered some opposing opinions, the artwork is seen as one of the most important works of the period.
Man Ray’s ‘Indestructible object (1933)’ is another piece that is incredibly interesting to me as, similarly to Duchamp’s work, it has evolved and changed over the course of it’s exhibited history; After the original sculpture, entitled, ‘An object to be destroyed (1922)’ was vandalised, Man Ray endeavoured to recreate the sculpture using the insurance money. In response to the event, he changed the name to ‘the Indestructible object.’
However, the artist who has made the largest impression on my personal practice is Rene Magritte through his surrealist painting. ‘The Son of Man’ (1946) is one of Magritte’s most well known works. I find this style of work unique because of its combination of imagery and similar forms which, to me (someone interested in graphic elements of images) can find very interesting. Magritte himself stated that he wanted to obscure the face of the man, as it was a selfportrait. He stated, ‘There is an interest in that which is hidden and which the visible does not show us.’ His interest in obscurity and the unknown draws people in and is what I feel I have taken into my own practice.
Bibliography:
- Smithsonian American Art Museum – Smithsonian Institution: https://americanart.si.edu/artwork/indestructible-object-33672, Laura Baptiste, visited 2/12/17
- historia-arte.com , Miguel Calvo Santos, viewed 2/12/17
- www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/p/postmodernism, written by tate patrons team, viewed 2/12/17