With its distinct departure from traditional aesthetic expectations, conceptual art can come across as a revolutionary, and even bewildering, approach to the artistic presentation of ideas. In classicism, painstaking attention is given to achieve perfection in the beauty and form of the subjects depicted. However, in the conceptual approach, it is not so much the perfected presentation that is important as much as the ideas behind the piece: the emphasis lies at the concept rather than the object(s) and/or figure(s). While traditional art may be nice to look at or engage in, conceptual art delves deeper to make you think more about what you’re looking at or interacting with.
So how and why did conceptual art come about? Yesterday I had a conversation about this topic with a colleague and long-time friend of mine, fine artist Christine Gin. While we both have created pieces that deal with ideas of the real and unreal, Christie specializes in more traditional approaches to art while I more often work in conceptual modes. To establish an understanding of the rise of conceptual art from the traditions of classical art, we began by talking about the aesthetic values upheld back in the days of the Renaissance. These values were actually revived from the era of ancient Greek and Roman art, but would at this point be coupled with inspirations from new scientific studies of the human form as well as botany, fueling the popularity of natural elements in art. As distant lands were explored, this aesthetic would spread the world over along with appreciation for it. But a few centuries later, many people’s lives changed as the Industrial Revolution kicked into gear and introduced people to machines, automation, and new technologies that moved affected civilizations away from natural settings and ideas. I also brought up the possibility that there were some practicing artists who may have simply felt it was time for new ideologies to come in to progress art into the future. And with all this change simultaneously happening at the turn of the 20th century, conceptual art was born. From then on, the norm-challenging and even controversial works of conceptual artists such as Marcel Duchamp, John Cage, Piero Manzoni, and Yoko Ono among others have called into question the general public’s notions of what good art is and how it should be presented.
After this, Christie and I moved on to the concern of what major trend would follow next after conceptualism. Considering the ubiquity of digital technologies, as smartphones, tablets, Internet with social media outlets, I think that this would help in not only continuing the popularity of computer-related art, but would also be part of a bridge to a new movement that could involve more futuristic technology or may even revolt against technology altogether, as society becomes weary of having relied on it for so long, and returns to nature.
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