Lecture 12: Postmodernism

The Postmodern condition is characterised by:

• exhaustion
• pluralism
• pessimism
• disillusionment with the idea of absolute knowledge

• Postmodernism has an attitude of questioning conventions (especially those set out by Modernism)
• Postmodern aesthetic = multiplicity of styes and approaches
• Space for ’new voices’

Uses of the term ‘postmodernism’:

• after modernism
• the historical era following the modern
• contra modernism 
• equivalent to ‘late capitalism’ (jameson)
• artistic an stylistic eclecticism
• ‘global village’ phenomena: globalisation of cultures, reaches, images, capital, products

J-F Lyotard ‘The Postmodern'

Modern Movement (dominant post war): • Simplified aesthetic
• Utopian ideals
• Truth to materials

Condition’ 1979

• ‘Incredulity towards metanarratives’

• Metanarratives = totalising belief systems

•Result – Crisis in confidence 

Robert Venturi

‘I like elements which are hybrid rather than ‘pure’, compromising rather than ‘clean’, distorted rather than ‘straight-forward’, ambiguous rather than ‘articulated’, perverse as well as impersonal' 

'Generally post-modern artists like to mix the highbrow and the populist, the alienating and the accessible, and to ‘sample’ elements from different styles and eras....’