Art Report - Quarter 3

Contemporary art

Contemporary art is art produced at the present period in time. Contemporary art includes, and develops from, Postmodern art, which is itself a successor to Modern art. In vernacular English, "modern" and "contemporary" are synonyms, resulting in some conflation of the terms "modern art" and "contemporary art" by non-specialists.

 

The classification of "contemporary art" as a special type of art, rather than a general adjectival phrase, goes back to the beginnings of Modernism in the English-speaking world.

Modern and Contemporary Art

In London, the Contemporary Art Society was founded in 1910 by the critic Roger Fry and others, as a private society for buying works of art to place in public museums. A number of other institutions using the term were founded in the 1930s, such as in 1938 the Contemporary Art Society of Adelaide, Australia, and an increasing number after 1945. Many, like the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston changed their names from ones using "Modern art" in this period, as Modernism became defined as a historical art movement, and much "modern" art stopped being "contemporary.”

Contemporary just means "art that has been and continues to be created during our lifetimes." In other words, contemporary to us. And the works the Contemporary Art Society bought in 1910 could no longer be described as contemporary.

Now do not be confused.  Modern art and Contemporary art are two different eras of art. The Modern Art  (art from the Impressionists) was from around 1880 up until the 1960s-1970s. Contemporary art, however, is art from the 1970s up until this very minute.

 

 

Particular points that have been seen as marking a change in art styles include the end of World War II and the 1960s. There has perhaps been a lack of natural break points since the 1960s, and definitions of what constitutes "contemporary art" in the 2010s vary, and are mostly imprecise.

Art from the past 20 years is very likely to be included, and definitions often include art going back to about 1970; "the art of the late 20th and early 21st century"; "the art of the late 20th cent. and early 21st cent., both an outgrowth and a rejection of modern art"; "Strictly speaking, the term "contemporary art" refers to art made and produced by artists living today"; "Art from the 1960's or 70's up until this very minute"; and sometimes further, especially in museum contexts, as museums which form a permanent collection of contemporary art inevitably find this aging.

Many use the formulation "Modern and Contemporary Art,” which avoids this problem.  Smaller commercial galleries, magazines and other sources may use stricter definitions, perhaps restricting the "contemporary" to work from 2000 onwards. Artists who are still productive after a long career, and ongoing art movements, may present a particular issue; galleries and critics are often reluctant to divide their work between the contemporary and non-contemporary.

Most well-known contemporary art is exhibited by professional artists at commercial contemporary art galleries, by private collectors, art auctions, corporations, publicly funded arts organizations, contemporary art museums or by artists themselves in artist-run spaces.

Contemporary artists are supported by grants, awards and prizes as well as by direct sales of their work. Career artists train at Art school or emerge from other fields.

Public Reaction

Contemporary art can sometimes seem at odds with a public that does not feel that art and its institutions share its values.

In Britain, in the 1990s, contemporary art became a part of popular culture, with artists becoming stars, but this did not lead to a hoped-for "cultural utopia.” Some critics like Julian Spalding and Donald Kuspit have suggested that skepticism, even rejection, is a legitimate and reasonable response to much contemporary art.

Brian Ashbee in an essay called "Art Bollocks" criticizes "much installation art, photography, conceptual art, video and other practices generally called post-modern" as being too dependent on verbal explanations in the form of theoretical discourse.

 

Conclusion

Art is dynamic and limitless. It is timeless and it evolves constantly. There shouldn’t be any rules or guidelines to art since each art work poses as an artist’s voice. Artists take upon themselves the responsibility of creating and using opportunities to bring out the message that this generation or maybe even the next will view.

Although there are some artists who are strict about guidelines and categories when it comes to making an artwork, it doesn’t mean there should be guidelines or categories.

Art is a voice that each artist uses differently. No one must ever dictate how an artist gets to use his own voice.