I would call myself a doodler. Too consistent in drawing and painting efforts over the years to truly be called a beginner — but not skilled, nor even interested in my artistic ventures enough to call myself an artist. I have settled on this middle ground of providing myself a title that won’t draw as much attention. Indeed, the epithet artist often leads to the question, “what do you draw?” Frankly, I don’t know how to describe it. The other day I completed a doodle of, and I’ll try to describe it as well as I can here, a young girl sitting with her legs folded in a bubble floating alongside human-sized flowers and leaves, contrasted against a city landscape… so you can see how I might have trouble answering the previous question. And so, my status as a doodler to avoid such questions has become well-established in my mind (not that the title of this column would give it away or anything). The other part of this choice has to do with the fact that I am uneasy calling my work “art” when I’m not sure what art actually is.
The postmodern era has confused many people into thinking that anything anyone decides is art, is truly art. Defined by the notion that there exists no absolute truth, that traditional methods, scientific inquiries, and long-studied principles don’t offer the full picture of the subjective perception of the world through different individuals’ lenses, and that there exists no way to fully satisfy every person in society, postmodernism can be thought of as the age of skepticism. Postmodern politics have become increasingly worrisome due to the widespread propagation of Critical Race Theory, which aligns itself with the postmodernist stance that one group of people will always dominate another group of people, even if the dominant group changes (think Cuba). The main issue lies in the fact that this thought process provides no solution as to how to dismantle the systematic bias against marginalized groups, thus disproportionately antagonizing the dominant group indefinitely. So here we are left with plenty of criticisms, no foundation to work off of because of rampant skepticism, and no way to define what needs to be fixed. In such a world, who will define what it means for art to be art? What’s more, who will care?
The pessimistic postmodern take on society clearly has its pitfalls. But it has also resulted in some roughly-defined tenets that characterize postmodern art. Allow me to introduce to you possibly the most fitting piece of work I could choose to exemplify the current world stage: Merda d’artista. For those of you who don’t speak Italian, it translates roughly to Artist’s S***. Merda d’artista, completed by Piero Manzoni is quite literally merda: it’s 30 tin cans of his own feces, which, get this, originally sold for around $37.00 for each can in 1961. In 2007, one can sold for 124,000 euros. The art was inspired by Manzoni’s father who told him his work was merda, and who, funnily enough, also owned a tin can factory. Merda d’artista represents postmodern ways of creating through the fact that it employs the element of shock, nontraditional media, and can take on multiple meanings. It’s an extension of Dadaism, which can be exemplified by Meret Oppenheim’s Luncheon in Fur, (a fuzzy teacup, saucer, and spoon setup) which meant to indirectly represent oral sex. The part of postmodernism that explains these works as art lies in the fact that it’s a concerted break away from accepted representations of acceptable topics of conversation. Although postmodernism brings about conversations about radicalized change without properly accounting for the trends and statistics which merit inclusion when discussing large populations, it also allows for the inner-questioning mind to have the space and freedom to put everything on the table, even if it’s feces, or a furrified tea set.
I’m sure many traditionalists are angered by the use of vulgar artistic representations about themes that can’t be brought up around the dinner table. I would also understand why someone trying to understand the evolution of art in modern times might be turned off from it. It certainly made me question what the point of calling something art is at all. But it’s important to remember that art cannot be separated from the time in which it is created. The Impressionist movement, which revolutionized art many decades ago in the form of Monet and Renoir, doesn’t have the same effect as the avant-garde decisions taken today. Ultimately, art can only be characterized by the movements that spur its creation and is best appreciated only after knowing the history of the piece and its context.
All things considered, it’s possible that postmodernism has scared me away from taking on the title of artist as I, alongside many others, grapple with the meaning of art. It’s also possible that I am scared to market the inexplicable doodles of my restless subconscious as something people should perceive as art, especially given the strong reactions to postmodern art which would actually allow me to freely do so. However, while I try to figure it out, and update you all during the process, I am content in my present role of “doodler” and “active observant” of the postmodern art movement.
The Doodling Duck is an Opinion culture column written and created by Pooja Rajadurai to discuss art as it relates to pop culture, trends, and students.
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