ABSTRACT
In Chapter 1 we consider the main grounds of continuity and disjuncture between Modernism in the visual arts, and Postmodernism. This is argued to constellate around a single idea – that the relation between the artist and the physical making of the artwork is contingent. He or she may physically make the work, or be involved in the making of it, but does not have to be. Here, the technological model of mass-production offers itself as an additional potential basis for artistic creativity. This contingency thesis is implied in Duchamp’s creation of readymades in 1914, but its full implications only emerged in the 1950s and 1960s – in two different ways, one involving a new set of Modernist practices, and the other arising from a renewed interest in Duchamp and the mass culture of technological society. It is the latter which constitute the first Postmodern tendencies. These two orientations are described in detail, and it is argued that the emergence of Conceptual Art is the last phase of Modernism. It has the effect of logically exhausting the possibility of any further radical innovations in art. Art is locked into a permanent eclecticism. This is a central feature of Postmodern art.
