Modern art is an obtuse, highly academic field, dominated by intellectuals, critics and other insufferable experts. However, calling modern art “art” is something of a misnomer, because it really isn’t art. After all, art must be beautiful.
I suppose you could call modern “art” conceptual social commentary in physical form or perhaps conceptual aesthetics. Of course this line of reasoning leads to an interesting question. If modern art really isn’t art, then what, if anything, qualifies as real modern art?
You won’t find the answer in any art history book. Art academics, high in their ivory towers, will never admit that they’ve spent their careers pursuing a philosophical unicorn. So that leaves the rest of us to figure it out on our own.
In my opinion, real contemporary art is the style or styles exemplified in the prevailing pop culture. It pervades society, and just as a fish does not understand that it swims in the sea, neither do we recognize the contemporary art that surrounds us every day.
Real art isn’t the domain of the stereotypical Bohemian “artist”, but is instead created by craftsmen, designers, crafters and thousands of other normal people all over the world. Real contemporary art is eminently approachable.
Everyday items that no academic would consider art are the real masterpieces. This includes everything from the iconic simplicity of a Louis Vitton handbag, to the minimalist, industrial design of an iPhone, to the distinctive, rectilinear form of an early 1980s gull-wing DeLorean car.
Let’s examine a specific example: steampunk design. Steampunk originated as a genre of novels that fused science fiction and fantasy elements together against a 19th century, industrial Victorian backdrop. But this subculture did not stay limited to novels for long.
It soon branched out to fashion, art and even movies and music. Within only a couple decades steampunk became a ubiquitous, widely-recognized international art style. You may have never read a steampunk novel, but you can instantly recognize steampunk design – with its unmistakable labyrinth of brass, gears and pistons – if you see it.
And steampunk has proven itself to be widely influential in popular culture, too. Hit movies such as The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Wild Wild West are outstanding examples of steampunk films. But steampunk has hardly been limited to just movies. The wildly successful video game series Bioshock also has strong steampunk elements. The Victorian-derived style is also alive and well in the decorative arts, with everything from steampunk jewelry to steampunk furniture to steampunk accessories readily available.
Steampunk may not be recognized as “art” by academics, art critics and other intelligentsia, but it has had dramatically more impact on popular culture than conceptual art, telematic art or any other formally-recognized modern or postmodern art movement.
Want another example? How about the 1986 graphic novel Batman: The Dark Knight Returns? Before the release of this seminal work, Batman was symbolized in the public mind by Adam West’s corny rendition of the character in the late 1960s live-action Batman television series.
This Batman series was a campy, low-budget affair with a plot that focused on simplistic moral lessons. Even today, many people are familiar with the ridiculous graphical onomatopoeia splashed across the screen during every (poorly choreographed) fight scene. This version of Batman was a low point of the franchise, fatally branding the caped crusader as a zany children’s character.
In 1986, Frank Miller’s graphic novel Batman: The Dark Knight Returns was published by DC Comics. This work instantly and forever changed the world’s perception of Batman and, ultimately, every other superhero too. Frank Miller placed his anti-hero Batman in a dark, ugly and hopelessly corrupt Gotham City. It was a city full of societal rot, overrun with vicious criminals and hamstrung by an incompetent local government.
But the Batman of this Gotham wasn’t a nice guy. No, he was a bastard – a vigilante in the truest sense of the word. In addition to his unsettling mental issues – or perhaps because of them – Batman used brutal methods when dealing with Gotham’s criminal element. This was a Batman of the gritty real world, not some silly “everything’s better after 30 minutes” sitcom.
So why do I bring up Frank Miller’s Batman: The Dark Knight Returns? I do it because the impact on popular culture from this singular work of art has been nothing short of massive.
This lone graphic novel not only single-handedly revitalized the entire Batman franchise, but also gave us the template for how all superheroes are viewed today. Every live-action Batman movie released since the early 1990s has been based – to some degree or another – on that Frank Miller graphic novel.
Not only that, but most successful superhero movies and television shows today incorporate important elements from Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Iron Man and The Avengers, just to name a few, all owe their overwhelming cultural influence and commercial success to Frank Miller’s bleak and anguished 1986 reimagining of Batman. The 1986 graphic novel Batman: The Dark Knight Returns is, quite simply, modern art – real modern art.
Art historians and art critics have built up an ivory tower around the concept of contemporary art. Only those movements that they approve of – like Dadaism, Abstract Expressionism or Performance art – are admitted to the inner sanctum of (post) modern art. All else is unfairly relegated to the disposable bin of “pop culture”.
But the experts have it wrong. Art – real art – doesn’t hang on museum walls or in avant-garde art gallery exhibitions. Instead, it is embodied in everyday objects that average people touch, use and enjoy – objects that ultimately reflect the zeitgeist of the larger society.
