In the 19th and 20th centuries, there were two major movements in the visual fine arts, which are Modernism and Postmodernism. Some people believe that postmodernism was a response to modernism and therefore consider them as two aspects of the same movement. The relationship between modernism and postmodernism is often complicated as both genres share certain similarities as well as differences. In this essay, we will discuss how they are similarities and differences in order to help us understand more about these movements.
As everyone knows, in modernism, they think that their arts are always true absolutely in everything. It rejects the tradition and the religious, and it is the rejection of past convention. Especially in visual art, the painting often is very flat and not creating pictorial space. Also, the modernism shows the belief of idea in Avant-garde which means create something different. Beginning in 1863, the artists begin to use art for art sake, they begin to combine elements and pick just for beauty or they think it look good.
In modernism, the reality of the artist is the reality of the art. On the other hand, the postmodernism is a movement away from the viewpoint of modernism. The art is a rejection of idea. It tends to against the new idea, new practice or movement and focuses on the traditional elements of the arts, which are the social issues, multi-culturalism. Postmodernism emphasizes the role of language, power relations, and motivations. Postmodernism has influenced many cultural fields, including literary criticism, sociology, linguistics, architecture, visual arts, and music.
The Essay on The Arts and Crafts Movement
The Arts and Craft movement was a social and artistic movement, which began in Britain in the second half of the nineteenth century and continued into the twentieth spreading to continental Europe and the USA. Its adherents-artists, architects, designers and Craftsmen sought to reassert the importance of and craftsmanship in all arts in the face of increasing industrialization, which they felt was ...
Additionally, postmodernism rejects the distinction between high and popular art which was important in modernism, and believe in excess, and in gaudiness. Besides the differences, both modernism and postmodernism have some similarities which represent a break from 19th century realism. They explore subjectivism, and fragmentariness in character construction. Moreover, even though they are in competition but they are also part of a flow in the same direction, a flow of artistic movement toward change within a technological age.
The postmodernism is actually a orm of the modernism; however, it is more academic than the modernism which is only focused on the absolute truth and the absolute value in the society such as authority, unity, nationality. Overall, modernism and postmodernism are concepts which have their own characteristics. All of these concepts have their own values, and principles. Even though there are a lot of similarities and difference between modernism and postmodernism but they are the beginning of the other movement such as cinema, journalism, marketing, drama, architecture, and science.
