Hello, my name's Tom and welcome back to my channel where I talk a little bit
about theatre, a little bit about being a PhD student and a little bit about those
two things forced to live together in a slightly too small two-bedroom flat. No
long-winded introduction from me today other than to say we're going to
continue our wading through some key terms in cultural theory by looking at
modernism. Also, I have just got back from holiday and that is why I have a
slightly sunburnt nose. Particularly today, we're going to be really
interested in how this use of the word modernism relates to our discussions
about art and culture and society and politics more generally. If you have any
thoughts or questions along the way then do make sure to let me know down in the
comments and, as always, if you think this thing might be vaguely useful then do
consider lending me one of your subscribes. Without further ado though,
here is Modernism: What the Theory?
Colloquially, the term "modern" is something which travels with us as the
years tick by. Take cars, for example, (something I know next to nothing about...)
what was considered to be a modern car in the 1920s is very different to what
was considered to be a modern car in the 1940s and the 1960s and 1980s and the
2000s and today. When used in this regard, we might consider the word modern to
have a lot in common with the word contemporary, meaning something of the
period in which we are speaking. Yet even this use of the word modern is not
completely objective. So, someone with a brand-new 2018 Audi A1 (which Google
tells me is a thing) might consider themselves to have a far more modern car
than someone who drives a 2010 Suzuki Swift despite the fact that both are
functioning completely fine within the year 2018. In this case, we can see that
the term modern actually becomes a subjective opinion or a value judgment.
As we continue our discussion of modernism throughout this video,
both these definitions are worth keeping in the back of your mind. When we use the
word "modern" we might totally, earnestly be using it to describe something that
is simply recent or new or contemporary however, when doing so, we often
subconsciously also invoke the idea that what is new or recent is fundamentally
better than what is older. The term modernism, then, is not used to describe
works of art that are being created now in the year 2018 (or whatever year you're
watching this in depending on how long YouTube lasts), instead it's used to
describe a specific period in art history (and I'm using the word art
incredibly broadly here to mean all different forms of art) from roughly the
end of the 19th century to about the middle of the 20th century. Some people
might describe modernism as an artistic movement however I'd say it's more
accurate to describe it as a collection of movements. For, while there hasn't been a
single artistic movement in history where everyone
involved in it is in total agreement about everything, there is usually a
considerable similarity between the artistic styles (or what we call aesthetic
styles) between all of the artists that're creating work as part that
movement. Among the many, many artists that we might associate with modernism
or consider to be modernists, however, there is a huge deviation in both the
form and content of their work. Let's begin by taking an example from visual
art. So, Monet's water lilies and Picasso's Guernica are both widely
considered to be examples of modernist art. Their styles, however, are incredibly
different. The reason for this is that Monet considered himself to be an
impressionist while Picasso was perhaps the artist who defined the cubism
movement. The Impressionists sought a new way to capture nature within art. They
therefore did away with the process of sketching while outdoors and then taking
those sketches indoors to complete paintings based on that sketch in favour
of taking all their oils and artistic materials out with them to paint in situ.
There were really interested in, rather than catching nature as it appears to
the human eye, capturing the ever-changing colors and
light that happens within nature. The Cubist's, on the other hand, had very
little interest in capturing things as they appeared to humans in the moment
Instead, they were really interested in capturing the totality of the object of
their artwork. They did this, mostly, through taking how it looked through
multiple different viewpoints and placing those together on a single piece
of paper. The resultant pieces of art made by the Impressionists and the
Cubists are vastly different. In fact, their artistic styles and motivations
don't even directly contradict each other and therefore seem like they might
have absolutely nothing in common. Why then do we discuss both in terms of
being forms of modernism? Perhaps it's best to consider modernism, then, not as a
particular collection of thoughts in the way that we might be
able to describe Impressionism or Cubism as a particular collection of thoughts
but instead as a way of thinking. Both Monet and Picasso rejected the artistic
forms and ideas which came before them in the pre-modern era. Most pre-modern
artistic movements considered themselves to be doing art in service of God and,
therefore, they were far more interested in how they could capture their
inspiration on the page rather than being interested in artistic form for
the sake of artistic forms sake. But the Impressionists and the Cubists,
however, are very interested in privileging artistic technique when they're
discussing their ideas with very little thought for divine inspiration. What
modernist movements have in common, then, is first a rejection of the past, what
they also have in common, however, is the idea that they can make art objectively
better and this is true across art forms. Prior to this period visual art was
often created in service of a deity, literature was often (I would argue(
created in order to document history or particular lifestyles as they happened
while theatre and performance were, primarily, used (particularly in the
English context) in service of a king or queen and their ancestors. As such, the
aesthetic style or form that these artworks took was never in the spotlight.
Certainly, particular styles came and went from fashion, however, these were
always viewed as side products of those broader functions. When we look
at modernist movements, then, we begin to see artists become interested in the
practice of art itself and in discussing and exploring the form they might take.
Also, and this will particularly become useful when we want to distinguish
between modernist movements and postmodernist movements, all of these artists
across forms believed that they could make art objectively better. If a
sculptor or filmmaker or musician today were to suggest that they had figured
out a way to make their artform reflect the world around them
better in an objective manner, we'd perhaps treat them with a little bit of
suspicion or consider them a little bit arrogant.
When we're discussing the modernists, however, we're discussing groups of
people who are living at a time where it was very possible for them to very
earnestly and honestly make those statements with the true belief that
they were working towards a better realization of the world through art.
While the developments that occurred during the modernist era can often seem
unrelated and between particular different art forms can sometimes seem
entirely contradictory, what we do see that unites modernism across all the
different art forms and movements is a particular way of thinking. It is a
period of explosive formal experiment and, in particular, we can see this in the
forest loads of manifestos that were published announcing each of the
particular artistic movements throughout this period. And, in mentioning manifestos,
it's perhaps worth turning briefly to politics where we can see a similar
thing happening which might help to synthesize this idea of modernism as a
way of thinking. If the modern period was that in which the "isms" dominated within
art, they also dominated within politics. Again, there had certainly being
disagreements in how to best run a country or a continent or the world in
the past, however it is in this period (from about their end of the 18th century to
the middle of the 20th century) that we begin to see some of our more modern or
contemporary political ideologies develop. We gain socialism, capitalism
gets its name, and fascism takes hold in Europe.
Unlike previous political ideologies which may have seen themselves as just
one idea among many, each of these sees themselves as the defining political
ideology which can take humanity to the best place, to some kind of utopia. When
we talk about modernism, then, we're not talking about a particular movement but
whole array of a movements from Impressionism and Cubism in art to
Futurism and Naturalism in performance, to Anarchism and Socialism in politics.
It's really a period of history in which the way we think about society and the
world and therefore culture and art is operating in a particular way and,
although many of these artistic movements consider themselves to be
breaking with the past and therefore pushing forward human progress, in doing
so they also fall into the trap that we discussed at the beginning of this video
of assuming their objective critique of things which are modern to be
fundamentally better than those which have gone before. They don't engage
critically with this concept and assume it to be a value judgment but embrace it
as an objective fact. And, as we'll find out when we move on to post-modernism in
my next video, this was something that was to become very much questioned after
the world was witness to two world wars in very quick succession. But, as I say,
that's something that we'll look at next time. Thank you very much for watching
this video I hope it's been a bit of a start of trying to crack that quite
difficult-to-crack nut of modernism. I've got some really exciting What The Theory?
videos planned for the future but, as always, do let me know down below if
you've got any particular concepts that you're struggling with that you think
would make for a good video. And, also, if you have enjoyed this one then please do
consider lending it one of your thumbs ups. Thank you very much for watching
once again that's all from me and have a great week!