Avant-garde
Avant-garde refers to a progressive movement characterized by the development of innovative and often surprising ideas across various disciplines, including art, literature, politics, and science. The term, derived from the French word for "advance guard," originated during the French Revolution, symbolizing a group of artists dedicated to advancing societal progress. Initially focused on the arts, avant-garde encompassed philosophies that sought to challenge social norms and promote change, with significant influence emerging from France in the nineteenth century. Throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, as artistic movements evolved, the definition of avant-garde began to broaden, encompassing new techniques in diverse fields such as film, music, and technology. By the mid-twentieth century, the movement's emphasis shifted from social critique to the exploration of truth and pure sensation, often in opposition to mass culture and consumerism. In contemporary discourse, the term has evolved to describe any novel or unconventional creative work, sometimes detached from its original socio-political intentions. Despite this shift, the avant-garde remains an important concept in understanding the relationship between art and societal change.
Avant-garde
The term avant-garde refers to a progressive, cutting-edge movement in which new and often surprising ideas in art, literature, and other areas are developed. The modern idea of avant-garde can be applied to many disciplines and is not just limited to the arts. Occupations in politics, cooking, information technology, and even science are considered avant-garde when practitioners utilize innovative ways of thinking. Avant-garde was originally a concept exclusive to the art world, and the term itself was often used to describe the effect this style had on society more so than the physical style of the art itself.
The contemporary understanding of avant-garde was established during the modern art movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, which emphasized the novelty of the physical art form rather than the philosophy behind it. Around this time, the concept of avant-garde found expression in America, where its meaning began to evolve. The idea of avant-garde changed with the times and was soon used to identify innovative techniques in film, music, electronics, and other creative fields. The term was later generalized to describe innovation in any discipline.
Overview
The word avant-garde is derived from the French vanguard, which literally translates to "advance guard." The term vanguard was used in the Middle Ages to describe a group of army soldiers placed before the main body of soldiers to protect them and secure an advance during battle. The political philosophy known as vanguardism also took its name from this French term. This revolutionary concept called for artists to band together for the protection and advancement of society. The concept of avant-garde is founded in the philosophy of vanguardism, and France is regarded as its birthplace.
The French Revolution occurred during the early and middle parts of the nineteenth century. At this time, French citizens used vanguardist philosophies to express their desire to be liberated from the oppression of a royalist government. They established what they called a cultural vanguard, or a group of artists who would lead France into a new era of progress and prosperity. The concept of avant-garde developed along with this philosophy.
At this time, the term avant-garde referred to art and its influence over social matters. The idea was introduced by French socialist Henri de Saint-Simon. His writings from the 1820s describe art as a means of liberation from social constraint. The first known use of the term avant-garde, however, was in Olinde Rodrigues's 1825 essay L'artiste, le savant et l'industriel (“The artist, the scientist and the industrialist”), which argued that art had the power to reform politics, economics, and society in general. In this sense, the avant-garde, or the vanguard, of society was the artist, and it was the artists' responsibility to shape the moral history of mankind.
The avant-garde philosophy of art was prominent in France in the mid nineteenth-century, when artists such as Gustave Courbet critiqued the social order through symbolism in their artwork. France experienced monumental changes around the 1850s following the French Revolution; French art of the time reflected these changes. The avant-garde model also made its way to Russia during its revolutionary period in the late nineteenth century, and Russian artwork of the time was often rife with political symbolism.
Expression of contemporary issues in art persisted for many decades, as artistic form and theory continued to transform. A broad range of artistic movements adopted the avant-garde theory. Regardless of style, the work of the avant-garde movement was dedicated to provoking social change. This idea directly contrasted with a different artistic movement known as l'art pour l'art, or “art for art's sake,” which took hold in Europe in the mid-nineteenth century.
The idea of "art for art's sake" was driven by a group of artists who wished to separate art from politics. The Industrial Revolution provoked many artists to challenge the belief that all progress was good. Postimpressionism artwork and its successors, the Cubist and Dada movements, exemplified this shift in attitude. These modern artists found society distasteful and ridiculous and had no desire to use it as a motivating force in developing artwork. This modernist viewpoint was popular during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and drove the change in understanding that came to define contemporary ideas about avant-garde.
Modern Usage
By World War II, the early sociopolitical focus of avant-garde art was overshadowed by a new emphasis, which concentrated on the search for truth and the expression of pure sensation during an age of capitalism. Avant-garde artists expressed their opposition to mass culture and the influence of industrialism. They were especially opposed to consumerism, which was prevalent in the mid-twentieth century as part of the golden age of advertising. The term kitsch entered the English language at this time; it was used to define people, places, and things that were considered the opposite of avant-garde.
The concept of avant-garde continued to find new meaning as the word entered modern discourse. In the 1960s, the term's definition became distorted by the mainstream culture. The term came to be synonymous with "new" and "different" and was used to describe any type of novelty creative work, from photography to film to music. What started as an artistic philosophy meant to stimulate social and political reform became a simple adjective to describe the unconventional.
Bibliography
Calinescu, Matei. Five Faces of Modernity: Modernism, Avant-garde, Decadence, Kitsch, Postmodernism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1987. Print. 17 July 2014.
Merriam-Webster. "Definition of Avant-garde." Merriam Webster Online. Merriam-Webster, Incorporated. Web. 17 July 2014. <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/avant-garde>
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Fauvism." The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Web. 17 July 2014. <http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/fauv/hd‗fauv.htm>
The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968)." The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Web. 17 July 2014. <http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/duch/hd‗duch.htm>
Wood, Paul. The Challenge of the Avant-garde. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999. Print. 17 July 2014.