Contemporary Art
Contemporary art covers the practices and debates of art from roughly the postwar period to the present, including conceptual, performance, installation, and global art.
Definition
The branch of art history concerned with art of the present and recent past, conventionally from the mid-20th century onward, marked by pluralism, conceptual approaches, and an expanded field of media and sites.
Scope
This area studies art since about 1945, encompassing the dissolution of medium boundaries, conceptual and performance practices, the rise of the curator and the biennial, the globalization of the art world, and the theoretical frameworks of postmodernism, institutional critique, and relational and participatory art.
Sub-topics
Core questions
- What distinguishes contemporary art from modernism, and when does 'the contemporary' begin?
- How have conceptual, performance, and installation practices expanded what art can be?
- How has the globalization of the art world reshaped its canon and institutions?
- What roles do the museum, market, and curator play in defining contemporary art?
Key theories
- The end of art
- Arthur Danto's thesis that art has reached a 'post-historical' condition in which no single style or narrative is mandated, so anything can be art and the question becomes philosophical.
- Participation and the politics of spectatorship
- Claire Bishop's critical analysis of participatory and relational art, weighing its claims to democratize the viewer against questions of aesthetic and political efficacy.
History
The study of contemporary art grew alongside the art it describes, drawing on October-journal theory, postmodern criticism, and cultural studies. Survey accounts such as Art Since 1900 organize the period through competing frameworks of modernism, antimodernism, and postmodernism, while debates over the very definition of 'the contemporary' reflect the field's proximity to its living subject.
Debates
- What counts as art after the avant-garde
- Following conceptual art and the readymade, scholars debate the criteria for arthood and the institutional and theoretical conditions that confer it.
Key figures
- Arthur C. Danto
- Hal Foster
- Rosalind Krauss
- Claire Bishop
Related topics
Seminal works
- fosteretal2016
- danto1997
- bishop2012
Frequently asked questions
- When does contemporary art begin?
- There is no fixed date, but it is commonly dated from around 1945 or, in other accounts, from the 1960s with conceptual and Pop art.
- Why can almost anything be contemporary art?
- After conceptual art and the readymade, many theorists hold that arthood depends on context, theory, and institutions rather than on a fixed medium or skill.