A Contemporarian's Bias

“Contemporary” – the crown jewel of superficial criticism.

It was initially surprising to me that very little is understood about these timeline-based categorisation. Often confused and unwittingly inter-used with movements like Modernist, Antimodernist, and Postmodernist.

I no longer become too surprised when “stylistic” terms get thrown into the mix, such as conceptual art, academic art, minimalist art etc. My worst suspicion is confirmed.

I dare say we are we are now largely intimated by (pseudo)intelligentsias who spoke with confidence, bolstered by the uniform lack of understanding.

No one wants to be that stupid person to ask questions. So we accept, repeat, and here we are.

What I really want to say is not educational. It’s not my job and, to a large extend, it’s really an individual responsibility – we can only blame our educational standards this much, for this long.

Until this intellectual mess is properly untangled; I’d continue to cringe in silence when you try to define the works you see.