Art, criticism, and ideology in the East European borderland

Collection:
Mokslo publikacijos / Scientific publications
Document Type:
Knygos / Books
Language:
Anglų kalba / English
Title:
Art, criticism, and ideology in the East European borderland
Authors:
Šapoka, Kęstutis
Publication Data:
Vilnius : Lithuanian Culture Research Institute, 2025.
Pages:
199 p
Contents:
Foreword by Ilya Budraitskis — Author’s Preface — 1. LATE 19TH AND EARLY 20TH CENTURIES: THE LEFTIST IDEOLOGY AND AESTHETICS. The Question of Aesthetic Idealism in Post-Marxism — The Questionable Marxism of the Russian Revolutionary Avant-Garde — Proletarian Hegemony, Proletarian Culture, and the Role of Intelligentsia — 2. LATE 20TH CENTURY: NEO-AVANT-GARDE AND THE CONCEPTOF THE “END OF ART. The ‘End of Art’ as a New Start — Counterculture — Postmodernism — The Identity Crisis of Art Criticism — 3. THE LATE 20TH CENTURY CONSERVATISM — 4. ART CRITICISM AND PHILOSOPHY. Ideology and Discourse — A Gap Between a ‘Word’ and a ‘Thing’ — Philosophical Typology of Art Criticism — ‘Applied Art Theory’: Art Criticism that Makes no References — Factology vs Metaphysical Reveries — The Potato Metaphysics — What You See Is What You Get — The Vitality of Kitsch as Professional Habitus — 5. THE COLD WAR AND THE DECADENT WESTERN MODERNITY: THE SOVIET PERSPECTIVE . Outlining Modernism in the Early Brezhnev Era — The ‘Pessimist’ and ‘Optimist’ Marxisms — What is ‘Decadent Modernism’? — The Unconventional Side of the Official Marxism: Idealism and the Ideal — The Latent Conservatism of Lithuania during the Late Soviet Period — The Question of Art Criticism During the Late Soviet Period —6. HERMENEUTIC RIPPLES: LITHUANIAN ART CRITICISM AFTER 1990. The Post-Colonial and Post-Imperialist Contradictions in Eastern Europe and Lithuania — The Terminology of Hyper-Imitation — Lithuanian Postmodernism — Postmodern Conservatism: The Concept of ‘Quiet Modernism’ — The Term ‘Quiet Modernism’ as an Expression of Post-Soviet Ideological Conformity — Multiple Conservatism in Lithuanian Art Criticism in 1990–2009 — 7. LITHUANIAN ART CRITICISM AFTER 2009: THE ‘NEW-OLD’ IDEOLOGICAL ORDER. Art Criticism Versus the Administrative Apparatus — Art Criticism Today: Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea — The Populist MOdernism as/and the New Conservative Paradigm — Conclusions — Bibliography — Index.
Subject Category:
LT
Menai / Arts; Estetika / Aesthetics.
Summary / Abstract:

EN‘Contemporary art’ is usually perceived as art whose main function is to criticize reality. Since existing morals and societal beliefs prevent us from seeing the true imperfection of the world, such art tries to remove the veil of ideology from reality. The prevailing opinion is that ideology and ‘critical art’ are incompatible. Furthermore, they are opposites of each other: ideology tries to mask the contradictions of reality, whereas ‘critical art’ exposes those contradictions and ideology itself. However, in exposing the illusion of everyday life’s normality, the representatives of ‘critical art’ usually do not elaborate on their own critical viewpoint, nor do they reflect on their own plastic language and place in the broader cultural and political sphere. This, as Kęstutis Šapoka notes in his book, is what makes ‘contemporary art’ not only a hostage of ideology but its direct producer. Art affirms the power of the dominant ideology not only through individual works but also primarily through the system of social institutions, such as galleries and art criticism. The viewer who perceives/consumes ‘contemporary art’ is in contact with a pre-standardized notion of modernity, the given. [p. 7].

ISBN:
9786098231892
Subject:
Menotyra / Arts
Permalink:
https://www.lituanistika.lt/content/61320
Updated:
2026-03-31 15:21:31
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