Reading Comp #7

"Four Male Dancers" by Paul Cadmus (diagram)

The rise of the Postmodernism movement established with it stylistic changes that moved to break all notions of objective truth and narrative to emphasize motivation and subjective truth, "the accent placed on process rather than form" (Massey, pg 216). As such, Postmodernism rejected the ideas of its predecessor, Modernism, criticizing the period's definition of appropriate design as being contradictory to it's self-proclaimed theme of subjectivity. Instead, the movement sought to enrich expressionism while achieving ideal perfection throughout design, seeking to discover harmony through form and function. In the work called "Four Male Dancers" by Paul Cadmus, the drawing illustrates this perceived notion of expressive, yet definitive, form. Not only does Cadmus orient the dancers in organic positions with fluid movement in between them, he emphasizes the expressive aspect of the piece through the use of lines. Instead of using realism to define his subjects, Cadmus uses multiple lines running in unison to effectively bring about the presence of the dancers in subtle form. Respecting the theme of Postmodernism, Cadmus pulls away from the minimalistic ideals of the Modernistic style, manipulating his illustration to compliment negative space to create a highly integrated/complex composition.

The evolution of this period ultimately begins to shatter the unity of Modernism, prompting designers to "challenge, reassess, and reinvent its principles and practices [to] address the complexity, diversity, and plurality of their time" (Harwood, pg 806). From this we begin to see customization, identity, and design stemming from the individual. As seen in Kathe Kollwitz's "Selbstbildnis Von Vorn" (self portrait from the front), emphasis on the individual becomes a common characteristic of Postmodernism. Like the work of Cadmus, Kollwitz manipulates the the patterning of lines to create an image, her individualistic identity permeating throughout the entire piece. The importance of discovering this subjective truth "means burrowing deep, to find out what unconscious premise a text is based on and what the blind in the author's eye cannot see" (Roth, pg 600).

With Postmodernism taking foothold throughout the world in the latter part of the twentieth century, everything from the design of furniture to the design of a metropolitan city-layout meant finding harmony between form and function while nurturing their expressive characteristics beholden to the new-found importance of the individual.

"Selbstbildnis Von Vorn" by Kathe Kollwitz