Comparison of Modernism & Postmodernism
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Modernism and postmodernism are forces that have been in competition but that are also part of a flow in the same direction, a flow of artistic movement yearning toward change within a technological age. Modernism was part of an effort to create a new environment to replace the old around the turn of the century, following in the wake of similar changes in political, social, literary, and other spheres of society. The application of these ideas to public space in particular shows some of the important dynamics at work in the movement the term describes, and such efforts were used to extend the meaning of public spaces directly to society as a whole, attempting to alter the way we think of ourselves in relation to our external, public environment in keeping with the other changes taking place in human thought and attitude. Postmodernity was a reaction to modernity as modernity was a reaction to what went before, but again a new way of viewing the world and our relationship to it were produced in terms of technological changes and possibilities. We can see that each successive movement in art builds on the what exists at the time, extending it, taking it in a new direction, or rejecting it outright and striking off in a new way. Modernism is a term applied after the fact to several literary and artistic trends from the beginning of this century. The term postmodernism has been applied to culture after 1960. Certain modernist characteristics can be discerned in post-196
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eality we perceive with our senses is not the only reality.
Levin (1988) says that modern art was scientific: "It was based on faith in the technological future, on belief in progress and objective truth" (4). Here again is the identification of modernism with public art and public perceptions, since such art is objective rather than subjective. Postmodernism, by contrast is subjective. Modernism had as one of its tasks the creation of new forms: "For the Modernist period believed in scientific objectivity, scientific invention: its art had the logic of structure, the logic of dreams, the logic of gesture or material. It longed for perfection and demanded purity, clarity, order. And it denied everything else, especially the past: idealistic, ideological, and optimistic, Modernism was predicated on the glorious future, the new and improved" (4-5). In terms of architecture, Harvey agrees with this assessment and notes that one of the interesting elements in postmodernist architecture is its nostalgia. Whereas modernism swept away the old and sought the new as a complete break with the past, postmodernism looks to the past in a nostalgic way. Harvey describes this as catering to the point of pandering to a public taste f
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2024
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)
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