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Guernica - Pablo Picasso
Likely one of the most famous works of postmodern art, it embodies Picasso's style, this aptitude for subtext and abstract imagery, and showcases the propensity of postmodernist art to comment on the atrocities of war, a core theme throughout the aesthetic movement. As institutions came under scrutiny, so did the well-established ideas of what could be considered fine art. https://www.museoreinasofia.es/coleccion/obra/guernica -
Nausea - Jean-Paul Sartre
One of the most important novels written of existentialist text, the structure is such that we see the world through the eyes of the main character via his journal entries. This tact lets us simmer in the absurdity of common everyday things while attaching those things to the overall absurdity of existence. Huge ideas are hung on a loose narrative of the common man's exploration of the world around him. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1964/sartre/biographical/ -
The Myth of Sisyphus - Albert Camus
Another important work of literature in existentialist text, Camus attempts to rectify the world inhabited by those who have no faith in order to conjure meaning so as to avoid having to kill one's self. Breaking many conventions, and using a classic Greek myth to make his point, Camus effortlessly joins new and old to display a world wrought with meaningless chaos and endless possibilities. -
No Exit - Jean-Paul Sartre
Another hugely influential work by Sartre, the famous line "Hell is other people" sums up this odd absurdist play. The structure is like that of a murder-mystery, where one is meant to try to understand why these three have been paired. The writing is on the nose, but the ideas shine through to illuminate the devastating realization that we are all trapped here together to drive each other mad. https://www.vanderbilt.edu/olli/class-materials/Jean-Paul_Sartre.pdf -
Madonna of Port Lligat - Salvador Dalí
The Madonna and Child iconography is one that is, at this point, timeless in the realm of fine art, and Dali takes this to w wholly personal level. Presented to Pope Pius XII, "Dali explained this 'dematerialization' as 'the equivalent in physics, in this atomic age, of divine gravitation', hardly an orthodox religious position" (dalipaintings.com, par. 2). Again, post-war, absurdist, post-atomic themes. https://www.dalipaintings.com/first-study-for-the-madonna-of-port-lligat.jsp -
Relativity - M.C. Escher
Another famous example of postmodern work that flies in the face of modernist ideals, the work itself being a maze of perspectives in what seems like a dream or a nightmare. Using math to create the disjointed planes, Escher is a household name whose name is synonymous with a specific aesthetic of the mind. -
Rhinoceros - Eugène Ionesco
A personal favorite of mine, this play embodies absurdist drama just as well as Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot. With each character a caricature of Ionesco's scorn, the dramatic propagation of propaganda, and absurdity of society as a whole, the play is a seminal work on the post-atomic era and social climate of accepted antisemitism during WWII through the power of the Theatre of the Absurd. https://www.theguardian.com/stage/theatreblog/2007/oct/03/ionescosrhinocerosisasrele -
4'33'' - John Cage
The no-music musical composition of John Cage is a prime example of the kinds of postmodern ideas that were swirling around in the 1960s. The composition simply consisted of the sounds in the room where it was being "performed", and grasped for the very soul of the postmodern movement. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTCVnKROlos&t=13m38s -
Le Jetée - Chris Marker
A short film about time travel that is entirely composed of a montage of still images. Breaking convention in traditional cinematic form, the film plays out like a documentary, with almost dada-like cuts and editing tempos. Though the narrative is straight forward, the style and impact of the film are unique, also mirroring methods used by the French New-Wave taking place in cinema around the same time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLfXCkFQtXw -
The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade - Peter Weiss
An odd and chatty play, this work is less commentary on absurdity and more on the lengths to which revolution can truly change society. A play much better suited to be viewed than reading and incorporating music without being a musical, this odd work questions even the counter-movements to the modernist establishments that characterized the era. https://www.enotes.com/topics/marat-sade -
Simon of the Desert - Luis Bruñuel
An odd short film about a man trying to get closer to God by standing on a pillar for 6 years, 6 months, and 6 days when he is visited by Satan and whisked away to the 1960s and left there. The whole film takes place in the desert except for the last scene in a 1960s nightclub, the anachronism is jarring and creates a unique visual language to the short supernatural story. https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/1013-simon-of-the-desert-damned-if-you-do -
Mao - Andy Warhol
What would a list of postmodern work be without Any Warhol? Here is an example of his political edge with the colored in and 15 feet tall to emulate the leader's banners hung in China. Warhol always knew how to make a dramatic statement with aesthetic and political sensibilities, along with commentary on pop art culture and popular news, this work is no different. https://www.artbook.com/9780692764473.html -
Saló or 120 Days of Sodom - Pier Paolo Pasolini
Possibly one of the most disturbing films ever made, it flies in the face of social and film convention and is a prime example of Italian Neo-Realism in cinema. Events unfold dismally from the first frame and only get worse as Pasolini uses visual metaphors and a bold statement of an unjust world when fascism runs amuck. Not for the faint of heart, the debated aesthetic value of this film rages on even today. http://www.bbfc.co.uk/releases/salo-o-le-120-giornate-di-sodoma-2000 -
Metamorphosis - Philip Glass
The slow build of this piece is a good example of how he composed his music, slowly building and repeating itself ad nauseam, trying to break away from the highly composed form of traditional chamber music. Glass stood out as a genius of harmony and rose to become a household name for his Avante-guard compositions. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M73x3O7dhmg -
Harold Washington Library
This building shows the spirit of postmodern architecture with few of the criticisms as it does not induce a reaction of 'gaudiness'. The pediment at the top made of steel and glass, along with the decorations reminiscent of Greek temples. The building combines several elements both old and new, and the photo I chose even has that 'colored photograph' look to underline the mid-century qualities and angle.
https://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/740668hwlc.html -
Flower Bomber - Banksy
Still debated over if this is graffiti or art that can be made into a commodity, Banksy's work, Flower Bomber, serves as a perfect example of the postmodern commercialism of art in a capitalistically driven world (year unknown). http://www.onpostmodernism.com/art -
The School of Slavonic and East European Studies
This recent example shows how the ideas put forth in the postmodern movement have shown prevalence even today, especially in academic institutions. On the campus of the University of London, built in 2005, it looks as if it were built in the mid-20th century. The odd lines that follow through the brick and the windows give an odd illusion of movement, a simple but effective design. https://www.dezeen.com/2018/01/23/10-buildings-that-represent-new-age-postmodernism-roundups-architecture/ -
Synecdoche, New York - Charlie Kaufman
An absurdist film with all the markings of Charlie Kaufman's existential style, this film breaks every narrative rule one can think of and combines traditional and postmodern techniques to give a feeling of dread that lives in the heart of every artist, and what is the nature of art itself. This film is almost a cinema version of an aesthetic text, questioning Aristotelian poetics and the very nature of linear time and our experience of it. http://www.sonyclassics.com/synecdocheny/ -
School of the Americas - Bo Bartlett
This odd addition to the postmodern narrative showcases the diversity in combinations of styles. This painting conjures styles of renaissance paintings of middle-class enlightened women in wooded areas with articles of clothing strewn about, with the iconography of 60's teenage angst and Cold War trappings of absurdism, calling itself metamodernism. http://artpulsemagazine.com/beyond-postmodernism-putting-a-face-on-metamodernism-without-the-easy-cliches -
# Crayons 003 - Luke Newton
A simple work that displays the commodity-based art world along with pop art and the movement towards pop culture with art as its mirror. The "hashtag" is a cheap and quick means to gather meaning on social media, a new player on the postmodern stage (date unknown). https://www.widewalls.ch/artwork/luke-newton/crayons-003/#!prettyPhoto
