Contemporary Art: A Reflection

Paper Summary:

The author of this paper discusses contemporary art in the light of a course taken in college. The writer of the paper states that contemporary art is art that is uniquely self-conscious of its time, that it is art that does not aspire to be universal or to offer abstract ideals about truth, but instead speaks about a particular aesthetic or moment in time. In an attempt to prove the validity of his statement, the author examines the works of a number of contemporary artists.

From the Paper:

"Likewise, Barbara Kruger's feminist use of collages, one of which proclaims to the viewer that 'your body is a battlefield' takes photographic images and superimposes ironic labels on top of those images in a way that demands the viewer question his or her assumptions about gender. Work like Kruger's shows how new ways of creating art, namely film, photography, and video, began to flourish at the same time as contemporary art, and many contemporary artists have used new technology to further question what is art, and the ways that art can be created. It can be striking to see what is assumed to be 'real,' namely a photograph, deconstructed and reconstructed, as it is in some of David Hockney's works. This can be, to some extent, even more startling than some of Warhol's deconstruction of advertising and celebrity, although Warhol also embraced film towards the end of his career as part of his artistic project."

Sample of Sources Used:

• "Contemporary Art." The Columbia Encyclopedia. 30 May 2008. http://plus.aol.com/aol/reference/cntmpryart/contemporary_art
• Pioch, Nicholas. "Hockney, David." WebMuseum. 14 Jul 2002. 30 May 2008.http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/hockney/

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