I think there's a danger with the past that also lurks waiting for new modernisms.
It would be cruel to leave it at the feet of the internet though, but there's a type of online "museum modernism" that jockeys with fresh ideas and forms.
Take brutalism and its fans. If you visit any of the online groups, or spot it on Instagram. You will see a strange sort of fascination with relics. A fetishisation of a particular kind of modernism. A good looking, photo-ready one, for sure, but one that somehow misses the point.
I know you are talking about modernism within literature, but I think that for these things to arise there needs to be a sort of synchronisation across art forms and architecture as well as cultural conversation.
Ultimately, it's the view that modernism was something that happened. It has been placed in a past tense as opposed to being categorised as an approach.
The same very much holds true in the live arts, where the aesthetics of modernism are used now as a costume rather than a process. Like it's a human shield being held up in front of a very post-modern expression.
And perhaps my issue with this is that it is sometimes hard to spot. This coating of modernism is rather easy to swallow. It is surface, and passive and gives all of the good feelings of modernism without asking the audience/reader to perform their role in thinking.
It's a click like and move on modernism. It's a pretty picture without understanding. Set dressing. Purely an aesthetic engagement.
And that danger is that it is very easy to miss those genuine moments of renaissance, the buds of something new, in all that undergrowth.
I think this is true & good, and there is a parallel to research here -- I often tell students that a good research agenda can be formulated from the discontents of the status quo, as long as one is brave enough to propose something genuinely novel (ie to actually tackle the places where the existing culture or corpus of knowledge has a real lack). I think that is also true artistically.
Oh interesting, yeah I can see that’s the same mindset , and there’s a content/form dynamic that helps too. Lots of new content being put into old forms in art
Good piece. Thank you especially for the last para and its hope. I trust you’re right! I like the grafting plant image. Specific to fruit in particular isn’t it, grafting? Reminds me of that bit in the Book of James about the ‘engrafted word’ being a source of reliability. ‘Semper eadem’ - always the same. Elizabeth I chose that as her personal motto when she came to the throne in turbulent times. I think we’re living through surreal times, actually, and the author I look to, to ‘explain’ to me where we are right this minute is Beckett, ‘Mouth’ - which is quite depressing. Sorry. At least it’s mercifully brief.
Thank you! You can graft a rose, also, so I imagine other things can be grafted too, trees I think. I have Beckett in my pile atm! Shall get to it soon hopefully…
‘Mouth’ isn’t depressing at all really - it’s about the moment when the creative force/poet finds voice and it bursts forth and it’s actually thrilling, if also terrifying. Fruit trees and vines all need grafts to fruit. And roses! My favourite.
I think there's a danger with the past that also lurks waiting for new modernisms.
It would be cruel to leave it at the feet of the internet though, but there's a type of online "museum modernism" that jockeys with fresh ideas and forms.
Take brutalism and its fans. If you visit any of the online groups, or spot it on Instagram. You will see a strange sort of fascination with relics. A fetishisation of a particular kind of modernism. A good looking, photo-ready one, for sure, but one that somehow misses the point.
I know you are talking about modernism within literature, but I think that for these things to arise there needs to be a sort of synchronisation across art forms and architecture as well as cultural conversation.
Ultimately, it's the view that modernism was something that happened. It has been placed in a past tense as opposed to being categorised as an approach.
The same very much holds true in the live arts, where the aesthetics of modernism are used now as a costume rather than a process. Like it's a human shield being held up in front of a very post-modern expression.
And perhaps my issue with this is that it is sometimes hard to spot. This coating of modernism is rather easy to swallow. It is surface, and passive and gives all of the good feelings of modernism without asking the audience/reader to perform their role in thinking.
It's a click like and move on modernism. It's a pretty picture without understanding. Set dressing. Purely an aesthetic engagement.
And that danger is that it is very easy to miss those genuine moments of renaissance, the buds of something new, in all that undergrowth.
I think this is true & good, and there is a parallel to research here -- I often tell students that a good research agenda can be formulated from the discontents of the status quo, as long as one is brave enough to propose something genuinely novel (ie to actually tackle the places where the existing culture or corpus of knowledge has a real lack). I think that is also true artistically.
Oh interesting, yeah I can see that’s the same mindset , and there’s a content/form dynamic that helps too. Lots of new content being put into old forms in art
Good piece. Thank you especially for the last para and its hope. I trust you’re right! I like the grafting plant image. Specific to fruit in particular isn’t it, grafting? Reminds me of that bit in the Book of James about the ‘engrafted word’ being a source of reliability. ‘Semper eadem’ - always the same. Elizabeth I chose that as her personal motto when she came to the throne in turbulent times. I think we’re living through surreal times, actually, and the author I look to, to ‘explain’ to me where we are right this minute is Beckett, ‘Mouth’ - which is quite depressing. Sorry. At least it’s mercifully brief.
Thank you! You can graft a rose, also, so I imagine other things can be grafted too, trees I think. I have Beckett in my pile atm! Shall get to it soon hopefully…
‘Mouth’ isn’t depressing at all really - it’s about the moment when the creative force/poet finds voice and it bursts forth and it’s actually thrilling, if also terrifying. Fruit trees and vines all need grafts to fruit. And roses! My favourite.
Ok, so it’s actually called ‘Not I’ not Mouth! But it’s just a mouth, speaking. Fast.