An Exploration Into Modernism & Post Modernism
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Volume 1 May 2015
Magazine Contents 5
4 Modernism
Post Modernism
an insight into modernism, its an insight into post modernism, its trends and influential artists trends and influential artists
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6 City in Flux exploring a change in towns and cities through visual language
12 Earth Artefact producing a communication between life forms
18 Typography generate a type face using shapes as inspiration
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Modernism a broad movement of western art, architecture and design
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Modernism was initially started around the 1850s, just as the First World War and Russian Revolution ended, becoming very dominant by the early 1960s, this movement lasted up until the 1970s. It was characterised by industrialisation, rapid social change and scientific advances.
forms of art based on the grounds that the works relate to the present time, associating visions of human life and society and a belief in progress.
The movement is known for it’s innovation, as well as rejection of values such as a realistic depiction of the world, leading to many experiments of form, whilst using an emphasis on process and materials. Because of this, it proposes new
Despite having different styles all of the work shares principles. These being rejection of history, a preference for abstraction and a belief that design and technology could transform society.
It is said that modernism is not a style, but a loose collection of ideas, with many styles within the period.
Post Modernism a controversial reaction to the modernist movement
Post Modernism was considered to be one of the most controversial art movements of all time. The era defied definition, with a mix of the theatrical and the theoretical. Throughout its period it was a visually thrilling style which ranged from the bold and colourful to destructive and the absurd to the luxury. It broke the traditional and accepted ideas of what style was within its designs. It also brought a radical freedom to art and design, whilst raising
a new self awareness about style itself. The key principles of the movement were complexity and contradiction, for example if a modernist piece suggested utopia and futuristic perfection, the post modernist opposite would appear to be somewhat dystopian with a far from perfect future. Designers changed the materials that they were working with to create and urban apocalypse aesthetic.
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City In Flux
“The life of our city is rich in poetic and marvellous subjects. We are enveloped and steeped as though in an atmosphere of the marvellous; but we do not notice it.� Charles Baudelaire
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For the full completion of this brief, I was required to research into the visual language of a town or city. This included how imagery, artefacts and sounds combine with the senses to create visual messages and an all round experience whist in the current town or city.
bustling industrial and student cities such as Leeds, Sheffield and York near to my university in Huddersfield.
Fusing together artists, designers, writers, poets and filmmakers in the initial stages of my research, I was able to grasp a style to work in as well as look at other works that have been influenced by cities.
These subject areas were textures, landscapes, nature, type and architecture. As well as feeling that I could get a good quality piece of work from these, there were plenty of ways to explore the areas in the town.
In order to fulfil the needs of the brief I needed to demonstrate an understanding of what it wanted me to do and show a range of ideas, as well as use a variety of different media in my development. To achieve the best results and final outcome I needed to be able to justify between the strong and the weak ideas that I had come up with.
Secondary research saw me look at artists and designers from all eras. I spotted the work of Mimmo Rotella, an artist and poet who specialised in dĂŠcollage, a style of work that involved taking work apart as opposed to putting it together. I then looked at JeanMichael Basquiat, a musician and graffiti artist.
I decided that the location for this project would be my hometown of Weymouth, A small seaside town along 96 miles of the Jurassic Coast. I chose this place, as not only is it significant to me, but it is a million worlds away from the
My primary research focussed on various subjects of the town. Ones that I felt would be interesting to interpret into a final outcome.
I then went on to the more contemporary artists such as Gemma Correll, Jasper James and Jamie Harkins. Specialists in photography, illustration and 3 dimensional drawings. This then gave me inspiration for how I could portray my work.
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Artists
Clockwise From Top Left: Mimmo Rotella, Jean-Michael Basquiat, Gemma Correll, Jamie Harkins
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Jasper Johns
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Final Outcome
WEYM
1805 |
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MOUTH
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Earth Artefact
“For millions of years mankind lived just like the animals. Then something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination. We learned to talk, we learned to listen. Speech has allowed the communication of ideas enabling people to work together to build the impossible. Mankind’s greatest achievements have come about by talking and its greatest failures by not talking. It doesn’t have to be like this. Our greatest hopes could become reality in the future with the technology at our disposal - the possibilities are unbounded. All we need to do is make sure we keep talking.” Stephen Hawking
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This brief involved me producing a new, contemporary version of the “Voyager Golden Record”, entitled “Earth Artefact”. This should be reflected in the content, layout, format and media of your choice. Throughout all of the stages of this design process it was important that I needed to be inventive with my design and show an ingenuity for generating multiple, creative solutions to bring one forward to a final outcome. Communication was key for this brief to work, and it was one of the main requirements to carry out throughout the work process. It was also necessary that the project be conceptually led, as well as having an understanding of what we were producing. The original golden record was a phonographic record that acted as a kind of time capsule. It was launched in 1977 containing an assembly of 115 images, a variety of natural sounds as well as music from different cultures and greetings in over 50 languages. This would then teach people who came into contact with the Golden Record what Earth was like.
It was my job to recreate this. I came up with 4 initial ideas, a book/poster, a short video or animation, an infographic and an educational children’s toy. After researching, I opted to produce an infographic. I had never made one before and felt that this project would give me the perfect opportunity to try it out as from the start I wanted to create something that would inform and educate. However throughout the main development stages I did not like what I was seeing on the infographic, or where it was leading to, therefore I changed things and produced an information booklet, however still with the information on the infographic. The research undertaken was all very contemporary, mainly looking at modern day designers, illustrators, still life photographers and data journalists. I felt that as I was going to be producing work in a modern style, the more up to date artists that I looked at the better the final outcome.
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Artists
Clockwise From Top Left: Antoine Corbineau, Carl Kleiner, Craig & Carl
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Jack Hagley
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Final Outcome
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Type Face
“If today’s arts love the machine, technology and organization, if they aspire to precision and reject anything vague and dreamy, this implies an instinctive repudiation of chaos and a longing to find the form appropriate to our times.� Oskar Schlemmer
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One of the brief that we received was all based around typography. This was a brief that initially I was nervous to start, however once I had found out the requirements I was excited to get going as it did not seem as hard as it sounded at first.
main influences that went into my typography were the slant of the letter T and the bold, block shape of the U. The style created was solely capital, as I felt that because of the style I was using it would not suit a lower-case letter type. Once I had processed the information digitally, from drawings, I created two options for potential use. One was plain white with no fill, the other black fill.
To get the best out of the brief, I looked primarily at three artists for inspiration, these being Wolfgang Wein Hart, Oskar Schlemmer and Lauri Rosenwald. After looking at pieces by them, I developed some initial letters, to then further into a After completing this brief I was full alphabet. really happy with the results that I had achieved, especially For my final alphabet I chose to as I had never made a typeface focus on a very italicised style, before. influenced by a piece called Utopia, by Oskar Schlemmer. The
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