Well, maybe I'm beginning to get a little handle on it. Thanks to a lot of talking , reading, and especially trying to digest Harrison and Wood's "Art in Theory" (2007). Believe me, none of the ideas herein are original or unique to me, just a compilation of all of the above.
"Modern Art" defined as an evolving art from the mid 18th century to after the Second World War was a dramatic change from prior art of the Renaissance, the Neoclassic, and Romantic art that preceded it. It was a new paradigm. But in order to call something a new paradigm one must define, articulate and demonstrate the old. Similarly to talk about a new paradigm in art as 'Post Modern' one must first define, articulate and demonstrate the paradigm of 'Modern Art'.
The paradigm of modern Art consists of many concepts which evolved over time. But these primarily focused on the concept of spontaneity, expression, and most importantly on three premises. It privileged art as unique and original and the artist as an autonomous genius while differentiating fine art from craft or low art or as Greenberg would say between "Avant Garde and Kitsch" (1939). Further, that changes in art were progressive and had a continuity with that of the past or a so called 'historical narrative'. Proponents of Post Modern as a new paradigm break with these tenets, namely originality, differentiation, and historical narrative.
More recent critiques and theorists have begun to question the originality and uniqueness of art. They vociferously announce that all of the attributes and tendencies, including the philosophical, psychoanalytic and literary or semiologic ideas are converging onto a single point or concept. Thus they negate the idea of the original. So now we not only have 'death of the object' with emphasis on abstraction, nonfigurative and nonrepresentational art, we also have 'death of the author' in that there is no originality or creativity. This follows Baudrillard's concept of the 'hyper-real' as unoriginal with use of experience of signs and simulacra (1976). This probably began with Duchamp and his 'ready mades', which is why he is probably the most influential artist of the second half of the 20th century , while Picasso was of the first half, with his seemingly abstract but in reality representative or figurative art.
With the comodification of art, combined with mass reproductions, mass media, and fusion of art and craft, we have bypassed or surpassed the difference between 'fine' art and craft/kitsch. From Warhol's "factory" of silk screenings, Koon's legions of engineers and craftsman constructing his designs, and kitsch like objects of Judd's industrially constructed boxes and Mirakami's almost mass produced doll like objects, we now have art in a more generic form and definition.
[Aside: Thanks to a dear friend Koji, ( I hope I am not misstating his thoughts) discussing Judd with me recently, I now have a greater understanding, though not necessarily a better personal appreciation, of his work. How Judd shifted the meaning of sculpture from an object with a a delimited mass with finite borders and reflecting light, created, with his stepped lucite boxes, the idea of a non-delimited form, an infinity. They could go on forever, or as Buzz Lightyear would say "to infinity and beyond". Further, Judd allowed light to not only be reflected and surround the sculpture, but through the sculpture, allowing light to penetrate it directly by constructing the boxes of lucite!]
And finally, the historical narrative of Modern Art as a continuity of painting and culture and moral values is negated by the new paradigm of Post Modern Art with its emphasis on discontinuity, disruption, and revolutionary (and sometimes revolting) aspects.
Thus the major articulations of Modern Art are negated and supplanted by those of Post Modern.
Well, I hope this helps explain my take on Post Modern Art, and hopefully it will stimulate your thinking and discussing it with me and others.
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