What Is Art? Where Are We Going?

So I took a class through the Watershed Arts Foundation this last month. We discussed Modernism and Postmodernism and where the future of Art is headed. I am about to expose my ignorance on this subject by saying that I lumped Modernism and Postmodernsim together in a blurry, grey blob in my head. Now I understand that these two movements in the art world are very different. Modern Art is an attempt to reduce things to a pure state or abstraction. Modern Art strives to be new and pure. It implies the idea that the artist is a supreme human that stood up for the ideas of pure originality.

Postmodernism is the opposite. It is complex and decidedly un-new as nothing can be new now. While modernism is ordered and clean, postmodernism is chaotic and disorderly.

I'm trying to sort out my feelings on this subject. While European Postmodernism was considered to express the agony that follows the loss of hope, American Postmodernsim reflects our shallow preoccupations. On the surface this sounds like two different things but I think of shallow, materialistic mindsets as hopeless in their own ways. When you focus on the minor things maybe you are trying not to look at the big things because they seem hopeless. Our own sense of hopelessness.

So where is going now? That is the question. The speaker of this talk said that he thought art was going to be more generative. I looked up "Generative Art". This is what I found:

1. 
   
2. "Generative art refers to art that in whole or in part has been created with the use of an autonomous system. An autonomous system in this context is generally one that is non-human and can independently determine features of an artwork that would otherwise require decisions made directly by the artist."

That definition comes from Wikipedia so its a very general definition at best. There were many other hits on the subject. I could go into more detail about what I think this means and how its represented now. This is an easy "google". But I don't mean for this to be about generative art all by itself. I want to explore where art is now and will be going. That was one opinion. I don't know enough about the art movements and how they transpired to say that I can predict where the art world is going but I do want to say this:  I worry that the art world is moving away from the traditional foundations of art. I feel that there is a skill and craft that should be mastered. Once those skills are mastered then ideas can be realized in a creative way. I hear that the current trend at my local University has left that foundation behind. Skill is lost but ideas are big. I find that very frustrating. I hope that is not true everywhere. 

On a related subject our local University shut down what was a great service to the art community.For years they had been hosting a nude model session for artists on Saturdays mornings at no cost. It wasn't made clear why this decision was made but it is very aggravating. It was handed out in a very backhanded way and the artists of Eugene are not going to take this sitting down. Expect a fight!  A friend of mine wrote an open letter of frustration to address this issue. Read it!