The notion of postmodernism, which developed in the 1970s, suggests a pattern of thinking,
even non-thinking, than a historical epoch. Postmodernism defies the act of analyses,
dismisses logic and cause-and-effect determinism, and replaces them with random
associations, representations, and reflections—reflections that are self-reflections or are homage-paying reflections to past texts and models. Where modernism repudiates the past,
the approach of postmodernism embraces it and quotes and recycles it. The approach of
postmodernism is about itself, a deconstructed self or art to usher in the desired reflections
of that self, being self-referential, deeply imbued with its own critique, its metaphors, similes,
and personifications, as it parodies itself, creates collage and pastiche, sending us back and
forth in amusement, or irritation, upon our thoughts and history (Cohen 1994, 281-285).
Armed with the technique of experimentation, in like manner as our scientists and
media space operators of newer technology, postmodern artists agglomerate fragments
in geographical and historical discontinuity of observable materials, and like the scientists,
celebrate the ‘randomness of arbitrary juxtaposition’ which is intermixed with commercials,
promos, newsbreaks, announcements, station identifications, and old film clips. |