What’s the Difference

Between Modern and

Contemporary Art?
• Have you ever wondered about the difference between
modern and contemporary art? Or wondered if there
even is a difference between the two? Well, first of all,
the two terms are not interchangeable. There is a
difference, and it is based on rough date ranges
established by art historians, art critics, curators, art
institutions, and the like, who recognized a distinct shift
that took place, marking the end of Modernism and the
beginning of the contemporary age. Modern art is that
which was created sometime between the 1860s (some
say the 1880s) and the late 1960s (some say only through
the 1950s). Art made thereafter (e.g., conceptual,
minimalist, postmodern, feminist) is considered
contemporary.
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•
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• Beyond the time frames, there are conceptual and aesthetic differences
between the two phases. Art was called “modern” because it did not build on
what came before it or rely on the teachings of the art academies. Many art
historians, notably art critic Clement Greenberg, consider Édouard Manet to
have been the first modern artist not only because he was depicting scenes of
modern life but also because he broke with tradition when he made no attempt
to mimic the real world by way of perspective tricks. He, instead, drew attention
to the fact that his work of art was simply paint on a flat canvas and that it was
made by using a paint brush, a paint brush that sometimes left its mark on the
surface of the composition. While this shocked audiences and critics, it inspired
his peers and the next several generations of artists, each of which, whether in
abstract works or representational, experimented with how to draw more
attention to their medium (think nearly a century later to Mark Rothko).
Modern art encompasses numerous movements: Impressionism, Cubism,
Surrealism, and Abstract Expressionism, to name just a few.
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• Contemporary art means art of the moment, but defining it
beyond that and its open-ended date range is challenging, as the
very notion of defining art became a personal quest in the hands
of each artist, which resulted in ever-expanding possibilities. A
key distinction between modern and contemporary art was a shift
in focus away from aesthetic beauty to the underlying concept of
the work (conceptual art and performance art are good
examples). The end result of a work of contemporary art became
less important than the process by which the artist arrived there,
a process that now sometimes required participation on the part
of the audience. So, the next time you are at a cocktail party and
someone starts talking about modern art, you’ll know not to pipe
up about your favorite Jeff Koons inflated dog sculpture.
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• Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the
• 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a
• globally influenced , culturally diverse , and technologically advancing
• world. Their art is a dynamic combination of materials , methods,
• concepts, and subjects that continue the challenging of boundaries that
• was already well underway in the 20th century. Diverse and eclectic,
• contemporary art as a whole is distinguished by the very lack of a
• uniform, organising principle, ideology, or "-ism ". Contemporary art is
• part of a cultural dialogue that concerns larger contextual frameworks
• such as personal and cultural identity, family, community, and
• nationality.
• Some define contemporary art as art produced within "our lifetime,"
• recognising that lifetimes and life spans vary. However, there is a
• recognition that this generic definition is subject to specialized
• limitations. [2]
• The classification of "contemporary art" as a special type of art, rather
• than a general adjectival phrase, goes back to the beginnings of
• Modernism in the English-speaking world. In London , the
Contemporary
• Art Society was founded in 1910 by the critic Roger Fry and others, as a
• private society for buying works of art to place in public museums. [3] A
• number of other institutions using the term were founded in the 1930s,
• such as in 1938 the Contemporary Art Society of Adelaide, Australia, [4]
• and an increasing number after 1945.
• Many, like the Institute of
• Contemporary Art, Boston changed their names from
ones using
• "Modern art" in this period, as Modernism became
defined as a historical
• art movement , and much "modern" art ceased to be
"contemporary".
• The definition of what is contemporary is naturally
always on the move,
• anchored in the present with a start date that moves
forward, and the
• works the Contemporary Art Society bought in 1910
could no longer be
• described as contemporary.
• Modern art includes artistic work
• produced during the period
• extending roughly from the 1860s
• to the 1970s, and denotes the
• styles and philosophy of the art
• produced during that era. [1] The
• term is usually associated with
• art in which the traditions of the
• past have been thrown aside in a
• spirit of experimentation. [2]
• Modern artists experimented with
• new ways of seeing and with
• Modern art begins with the
• heritage of painters like Vincent
• van Gogh , Paul Cézanne , Paul
• Gauguin , Georges Seurat and
• Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec all of
• whom were essential for the
• development of modern art. At
• the beginning of the 20th century
• Henri Matisse and several other
• young artists including the pre-
• cubists Georges Braque , André
• Derain , Raoul Dufy, Jean
• Metzinger and Maurice de
• Vlaminck revolutionized the Paris
• art world with "wild", multi-
• colored, expressive landscapes
• It reflected
• Matisse's incipient fascination
• with primitive art : the intense
• warm color of the figures against
• the cool blue-green background
• and the rhythmical succession of
• the dancing nudes convey the
• feelings of emotional liberation
• and hedonism.
• Initially influenced by Toulouse-
• Lautrec , Gauguin and other
• late-19th-century innovators,
• Pablo Picasso made his first
• cubist paintings based on
• Cézanne's idea that all depiction
• of nature can be reduced to three
• solids: cube, sphere and cone.
• With the painting Les Demoiselles
• d'Avignon (1907), Picasso
• dramatically created a new and
• radical picture depicting a raw
• and primitive brothel scene with
• Analytic
• cubism was jointly developed by
• Picasso and Georges Braque ,
• exemplified by Violin and
• Candlestick, Paris, from about
• 1908 through 1912. Analytic
• cubism, the first clear
• manifestation of cubism, was
• followed by Synthetic cubism ,
• practiced by Braque, Picasso,
• Fernand Léger, Juan Gris , Albert
• Gleizes , Marcel Duchamp and
• several other artists into the
• 1920s. Synthetic cubism is