Middle Class Art Movement
Now that a new reality has set in, and increasing numbers people find themselves struggling many have found themselves dismounted from their former middle class status. It is this downward shift that will foster a new twist in the art world the likes of which has not been seen for decades in the United States.
Gone are the days when over-inflated contemporary art was the cash cow for galleries. The presumptuous and impetuous, largely meaningless works of art parlay an idea of a marketable commodity into a cultural niche jam packed with groupies, press coverage, and buyers. That allure has ended.
American contemporary art had lost is meaning because there was no struggle that needed to be expressed, only apathy and complacency. The recent 1980s obsession is a perfect example of pure regurgitation - in many ways an effort to literally recreate the image of how something was marketed. You can see those themes in the current “art” of late. This is a byproduct of the relative tranquility in American society over the past twenty or so years. The deeply divided events and attitudes of the 1960s and 1970s and the innovations of the 1980s have aged with those who created them. We simply just haven’t had major social upheavals which are expressed in an artistic way. There were fringe elements related to the war on terror and the bush administration, and various other causes from the 1990s but they paled in comparison to the mobilized and focused movement of previous generations.
In the past decade the advances in technological culture has allowed individuals to export themselves to the world. Effectively in using techniques akin to miniature marketing campaign for their personal lives. Specific items chosen for display to the public gives the illusion of substance and meaning. In a collage images, songs, clippings, desires and attitudes a person has been able to craft an identity - apocryphal or not - using technology as the medium to transmit this ideal persona. This dodging of reality, the side-step from the truth had become a social attitude and it also manifested itself in contemporary art - an identity to be marketed.
The new art movement will be born out of the most devastating idea to hit America in ages - a retrograde motion in status and opportunity for the middle class. This art will based on the perceived attitudes about what the middle class was supposed to be and represent, its expectations and opportunities either lost or placed askew - temporarily or permanently. It will be unique in expressing the middle class perspective and the current struggle set amid a backdrop of commodities that have either slipped out of grasp or have lost meaning. And most importantly it will be set amid a backdrop of a cultural wasteland centered around consumption, excess, and discontinuity. Eschewing the most meaningless archetypes one should expect these artistic manifestations to be straightforward and simple in their presentation but carrying with them a poignant and loaded message. Born out of frustration and the desire for efficiency and meaning this art movement from the middle-class will be some of the most clear and focused art that we have seen in recent years.
Gone are the days when over-inflated contemporary art was the cash cow for galleries. The presumptuous and impetuous, largely meaningless works of art parlay an idea of a marketable commodity into a cultural niche jam packed with groupies, press coverage, and buyers. That allure has ended.
American contemporary art had lost is meaning because there was no struggle that needed to be expressed, only apathy and complacency. The recent 1980s obsession is a perfect example of pure regurgitation - in many ways an effort to literally recreate the image of how something was marketed. You can see those themes in the current “art” of late. This is a byproduct of the relative tranquility in American society over the past twenty or so years. The deeply divided events and attitudes of the 1960s and 1970s and the innovations of the 1980s have aged with those who created them. We simply just haven’t had major social upheavals which are expressed in an artistic way. There were fringe elements related to the war on terror and the bush administration, and various other causes from the 1990s but they paled in comparison to the mobilized and focused movement of previous generations.
In the past decade the advances in technological culture has allowed individuals to export themselves to the world. Effectively in using techniques akin to miniature marketing campaign for their personal lives. Specific items chosen for display to the public gives the illusion of substance and meaning. In a collage images, songs, clippings, desires and attitudes a person has been able to craft an identity - apocryphal or not - using technology as the medium to transmit this ideal persona. This dodging of reality, the side-step from the truth had become a social attitude and it also manifested itself in contemporary art - an identity to be marketed.
The new art movement will be born out of the most devastating idea to hit America in ages - a retrograde motion in status and opportunity for the middle class. This art will based on the perceived attitudes about what the middle class was supposed to be and represent, its expectations and opportunities either lost or placed askew - temporarily or permanently. It will be unique in expressing the middle class perspective and the current struggle set amid a backdrop of commodities that have either slipped out of grasp or have lost meaning. And most importantly it will be set amid a backdrop of a cultural wasteland centered around consumption, excess, and discontinuity. Eschewing the most meaningless archetypes one should expect these artistic manifestations to be straightforward and simple in their presentation but carrying with them a poignant and loaded message. Born out of frustration and the desire for efficiency and meaning this art movement from the middle-class will be some of the most clear and focused art that we have seen in recent years.