Literary Criticism

Class #11

Postmodernism1. After modernism?

2. Contra modernism?

Differences (1)

The modernist laments fragmentation while the postmodernist celebrates it.

(Barry 84)

Differences (2)

Postmodernism rejects the distinction between ‘high’ and ‘popular’ art which was important in modernism, and believes in excess, in gaudiness, and in ‘bad taste’ mixture of qualities. (Barry 84)

Habermas, Jürgen. “Modernity versus Postmodernity.” 1981. A Postmodern Reader. Eds. Joseph Natoli and Linda Hutcheon. Albany, NY: SUNY, 1993. 91-104.

“Modernity revolts against the normalizing functions of tradition; modernity lives on the experience of rebelling against all that is normative” (Habermas 94).

“The project of modernity formulated in the 18th century by the philosophers of the Enlightenment consisted in their efforts to develop objective science, universal morality and law, and autonomous art, according to their inner logic.” (Habermas 98)

“At the same time, this project intended to release the cognitive potentials of each of these domains to set them free from their esoteric forms. The Enlightenment philosophers wanted to utilize this accumulation of specialized culture for the enrichment of everyday life, that is to say, for the rational organization of everyday social life” (Habermas 98).

“Enlightenment thinkers . . . had the extravagant expectation that the arts and the sciences would promote not only the control of natural forces, but would also further understanding of the world and of the self, would promote moral progress, the justice of institutions, and even the happiness of human beings” (Habermas 98).

“In sum, the project of modernity has not yet been fulfilled . . .” (Habermas 102).

Lyotard, Jean-François. “Excerpts from The Postmodern Condition.” 1979. A Postmodern Reader. Eds. Joseph Natoli and Linda Hutcheon. Albany, NY: SUNY, 1993. 71-90.

There is a “crisis of narratives” (71).

“I will use the term modern to designate any science that legitimates itself with reference to a metadiscourse . . . making an explicit appeal to some grand narrative . . .” (Lyotard 72).

“I define postmodern as an incredulity toward metanarratives” (Lyotard 72).

“Thus the society of the future falls less within the province of a Newtonian anthropology (such as structuralism or systems theory) than a pragmatics of language particles. There are many different language games—a heterogeneity of elements. They only give rise to institutions in patches—local determinism.” (Lyotard 72)

Venturi, Robert. “The Duck and the Decorated Shed.” Postmodernism: A Reader. Ed. Thomas Docherty. NY: Columbia UP, 1993.

Crawford Manor vs. Guild House

http://libraries.mit.edu/rvc/kidder/kjpegs/C0752-063~.jpg

Paul Rudolph’s Crawford Manor

http://libraries.mit.edu/rvc/kidder/kjpegs/C0752-064~.jpg

Paul Rudolph’s Crawford Manor

Crawford ManorHigh-rise apartment for the elderly

“heroic and original” (299)

“ordinary and conventional but do not look it” (295)

http://faculty.cva.edu/contemporaryart/imagepg2.html

http://www.arch.mcgill.ca/prof/sijpkes/arch374/winter2001/mwildm/

http://www.arch.mcgill.ca/prof/sijpkes/arch374/winter2001/mwildm/guildhs.html

Guild HouseHigh-rise apartment for the elderly

“ugly and ordinary” (299)

“ordinary and conventional and look it” (295)

Guild House

Denotation Connotation

Heraldic Physiognomic

The sign Guild house Graphics: institutional dignity

Size: commercialism

Position: entering

White-glazed brick

Decoration Floor levels + palace Palacelike scale and monumentality

Double-hung windows

Window Domestic, ordinary

heraldry

The duck vs.

the decorated shed

The Duck

Where the architectural systems of space, structure, and program are submerged and distorted by an overall symbolic form.

http://www.arch.mcgill.ca/prof/sijpkes/arch374/winter2001/mwildm/

The Duck

When a building is subtly formed and interpreted by its overall composure, it is then that we have a duck.

http://www.arch.mcgill.ca/prof/sijpkes/arch374/winter2001/mwildm/

The Duck

'Ducks' . . . connote meaning through expressive features in the visible fabric of the building itself, 'ducks' do not have added ornamentation. http://www.hku.hk/english/courses2000/7006/week6.htm

Venturi, a duck (Learning from Las Vegas, 1972) http://faculty.cva.edu/contemporaryart/imagepg2.html

Pyramids at Giza

http://www.msjc.edu/art/djohnson/art101/101lecture4.html

The Decorated ShedWhere systems of space and structure are directly at the service of program, and ornament is applied independently of them. This we call the decorated shed. http://www.arch.mcgill.ca/prof/sijpkes/arch374/winter2001/mwildm/

The Decorated ShedWhen the sign is literal and spelled out either by letters or by bold ornaments, we end up with a decorated shed. http://www.arch.mcgill.ca/prof/sijpkes/arch374/winter2001/mwildm/

The Decorated ShedDominated by signs which denote meaning (usually function and brand name) and which connote commercialism in their size, the 'decorated shed' is a mismatch of design and function. It is a building which has applied to it the ornaments and signs that indicate its use. http://www.hku.hk/english/courses2000/7006/week6.htm

Venturi, a decorated shed (Learning from Las Vegas) http://faculty.cva.edu/contemporaryart/imagepg2.html

http://www.artnet.com/Magazine/reviews/goldsworthy/Images/goldsworthy1-25-4.jpg

"A roadway could become a city. A building could become a sign. In no place at all, someplace could be created. That is Las Vegas' genius." http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/1997/Jul-06-Sun-1997/photos/architecture-4.jpg

Niels Ole Lund : Venturi Visits Las Vegas, 1976 http://www.toender-gym.dk/Kjelds/Stilbi/Venturi.jpg

SummaryVenturi sought to introduce notions of irony, playfulness, multivalenced lexicons and a celebration of the ordinary into architecture, resisting the austere, monumental and heroic quality of modern architecture; and in so doing, he sought to make architecture bend to the demands of place, more responsive to the immediate historical and cultural environment of its location of buildings. (Woods 97)

Key Features of Postmodernist Architecture

1. A celebration of spectacle2. Radical eclecticism3. Random historicism4. Irrational space5. Parodic metaphor

(Woods 112-113)

Fredric JamesonA critic of postmodern architecture

Jameson argues that postmodern architecture functions aesthetically to undermine democratic urban space, since it merely imitates the cultural logic of late capitalism, which is a consumer-led triumphalism. (Woods 95)

White Noise#1: p. 3, first paragraph;

p.20, “It seemed to me . . . . in the evening.”;

p. 36, “I realized . . . . apprehension.”

#2: pp. 12-13, “Several days later. . . .”

#3: pp. 16-17, “On one such night . . . .”

#4: pp. 22-25, till “in the penitentiary”

#5: pp. 25-26: “It was warm . . .” to the end.

#6: pp. 37-39: “He helped . . . . dry cleaning.’”

References

Woods, Tim. Beginning Postmodernism. Manchester: Manchester UP, 1999.