Contemporary Video Art



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CHAPTER1: INTRODUCTION1

Background1

Theoretical Framework and Methodology2

Analysis4

CHAPTER1: INTRODUCTION

Background

When considering the vast output of contemporary visual art as a whole, one can discern the great amount of contemporary art that conveys certain aesthetics or motifs that indicate a recurrence or a reappearance of 'pop' elements characteristic of the Pop Art movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Signifying the continued esteem for the popular images, styles and accessibility of Pop Art, many contemporary artists continue to draw inspiration from Pop Art's ideas and traditions to add innovation and a 'trendiness' to their own works. The persistence of the pop element therefore generates an inevitability to explore its continuance in contemporary art.

Since the emergence of Post modernism after the 1960s, and in subsequent contemporary artistic production, there has been a segment or division 1 within the arts in which there is a strong recurrence of 'pop', or the pop mindset introduced by the Pop ortlsts? of the 1950s and 1960s. The incorporation of symbols from popular culture, the aesthetics and methods of commercial culture in art production, a postmodern camp mentality, the integration with other areas of the visual arts such as graphic design and animation, and the close interconnectedness with technology, are all amassed in those forms of contemporary art that constitute a prolongation of the pop tradition.

Pop portrays the world of man-made or synthetic culture rather than 'nature' or objective reality, by employing the images and products of commercial culture and treating them as high art. Pop often subscribes to elements of kitsch or camp, frequently containing ironic or subversive undercurrents, and utilises the strategies of appropriation, eclecticism and inter textuality. As an art about popular culture, the inspiration for pop is fed by the media, influenced by the content and stylistics of film, television, magazines, animation, graffiti, advertising, and various forms of graphic design. Pop easily transgresses the lines that separate fine are from more commercial forms of visual production, as it thrives upon the principles of deconstruction and pluralism. It can therefore also be described as an art of the grey oreos.' since pop often re-materialises the difficulties concerning the definition of art, and problematical any clear distinctions between the various disciplines or spheres of contemporary visual production (Baudrillard 2004: 87).

Contemporary art does not carry a single, fixed identity - it takes on many different and unconventional forms and, arguably, it has an equal status with other forms of visual production such as design. In addition, cross-fertilisation between the different domains of visual production is more pronounced in contemporary visual culture than ever before. What is prevalent today is an inter-disciplinary visual production (Walker 1994: 119), with a blurring of the boundaries between different visual media. Already evident in the Pop Art movement is the narrowing of boundaries between artistic visual production and advertising especially, as theorist Jean Baudrillard (2004:87) states:

Today what we are experiencing is the absorption of all virtual modes of expression into that of advertising. The aim of this study then is to ...