Modernism versus post-modernism

Modernists believe society is always moving forward and progress was crucially important to this movement. The period of 1900-1950 gave rise to many ideologies including Marxism and Cubism and the psychology of Freud. This time of collective self-examination brought about great change because especially after experiencing the guilt and deprivation surrounding events during the world wars and out of this time of tremendous flux postmodernism arrived from about 1960 onwards.

The Marxist Dialectic was that the dominant ideas that dominate society are then followed by anti-ideas as people begin to question all that preceded them. 
This then results in new ideas. Thus conflict is supposed to cause new ideas.

Mini was the epitome of a classless, modernist car

Before Porsche developed the 911, Bauhaus embodied technology for design, their motto, 'Function follows Form'.

"The building of the future" was their vision of a Utopian future, to combine all the Arts and crafts, providing specialisation for artists for a new technical civilisation.

Technology was important to this dogma as buildings were fabricated out of concrete and glass. Plastic was involved in the manufacture of home ware and clothes.

Modernism is still going strong as is evident by the same technology giving us yet more progress with the concept of girly concrete.

'The Fall' and the 'Myth of Sisyphus' by Albert Camus extols the notion that life is absurd and has no meaning. This in some way mirrors reflections by Zen Buddhists, 'The point is... there is no point'. All these new ideas are designed to make us question the Grand Narrative, our purpose in life here on earth.

Postmodernists question the supposed progress of man because of the Cold War and breakdown of beliefs. The Hippie movement in particular, questioned the importance of democracy to Vietnam in light of the atrocities.

Subjectivity is an emphasis on impressionism and subjectivity in writing;  on how seeing or reading or perception itself takes place rather than on what is perceived. An example of this would be 'big brother'-a reality based entertainment show.

A movement away from the apparent objectivity provided by omniscient third-person narrators, fixed narrative points of view, and clear moral positions giving rise to ‘Shallowness’ as a definition. The ‘Blair Witch Project’ is a good example.

This emphasises that style and looks matter, that everyone bases their assessment of who you are by how much time you have given to considering how you look and how much time and money has been spent to make sure you look completely different.


According to some commentators, ‘Katie Price’ exploits shallowness. This is in contrast with being judged on the way you dressed in the pre-1950's during the Modern era.

Inter-textuality is a blurring of distinctions between genres, so that poetry seems more like a documentary, e.g. T.S.Elliot or E.E. Cummings. Prose seems more poetic, as in Woolf or Joyce.
 In a Post-modern society, it becomes acceptable and perceptive to merge other people’s ideas into your work as long as you clearly show you are doing it. 

The Non-Linear Narrative is an emphasis on fragmented forms, discontinuous narratives, and random-seeming collages of different materials. Pulp Fiction story is fragmented and starts at the end.

The 'Tree of Codes' by J. Foer .


Knowingness is a tendency toward reflexivity, or self-consciousness, each piece calls attention to its own status as a production, as something constructed and consumed in particular ways.

Minimalism a rejection of elaborate formal aesthetics in favour of minimalist designs and a rejection, in large part, of formal aesthetic theories. Images are hyper-minimalist. Music by S. Wright. E. Satie. Robert Loewy 'Less is more.' 

New Mini is postmodern and minimalist. It and the VWBeetle ape the historical versions - this is intertextuality in play with the reference to 'Herbie' the film of the same name.










‘Anything goes’- A call to reject the distinction between "high" and "low" or popular culture, both in choice of materials used to produce art and in methods of displaying, distributing, and consuming art.

Richard Hamilton’s pop-art is an example of postmodernist art, that anything goes-no need for rules. Signalling a move away from the middle ground.

If 'TV' belonged to the modern age then the iphone belongs to the postmodernist society. It is without a doubt entirely intertextual and minimalist.