Man in the culture of postmodernism. Postmodern ideas about culture

Question No. 9

Postmodernism was the result of the negation of the negation. At one time, modernism rejected classical, academic art and turned to new artistic forms. However, after many years, he himself became a classic, which led to the denial of the traditions of modernism and the emergence of a new stage of artistic development in the form of postmodernism, which proclaimed a return to pre-modern forms and styles at a new level.

Postmodernism(French postmodernisme - after modernism) is a term denoting structurally similar phenomena in world social life and culture of the second half of the 20th century: it is used to characterize a complex of styles in art.

The birth of postmodernity took place in the 60-70s. twentieth century, it is connected and logically follows from the processes of the modern era as a reaction to the crisis of its ideas, as well as to the so-called death of superfoundations: God (Nietzsche), the author (Barthes), man (humanitarianism).

Postmodernism is more of a mindset, an intellectual style.

Formed in an era of dominance of information and communication technologies, theoretical knowledge, wide choice opportunities for each individual, postmodernism bears the stamp of pluralism and tolerance, which in artistic manifestations result in eclecticism. His characteristic feature was the unification within one work of styles of figurative motifs and techniques borrowed from the arsenal different eras, regions and subcultures. Artists use the allegorical language of classics, baroque, symbols of ancient cultures and primitive civilizations, creating on this basis their own mythology, correlated with the personal memories of the author. The works of postmodernists represent a playing space in which there is a free movement of meanings - their overlay, flow, and associative connection. But having included in its orbit the experience of the world artistic culture, postmodernists did this through jokes, grotesque, parody, widely using the techniques of artistic quotation, collage, and repetition.

Following the path of free borrowing from pre-existing and existing artistic systems, postmodernism, as it were, equalizes them in rights, significance and relevance, creating a single world cultural space, covering the entire history of the spiritual development of mankind.

Postmodernist styles:

· High tech -(English) hi-tech, from high technology - high tech) is a style in architecture and design that originated in the depths of late modernism in the 1970s and found widespread use in the 1980s.

· Deconstructivism - direction to modern architecture, based on the application of the ideas of the French philosopher Jacques Derrida in construction practice. Another source of inspiration for deconstructivists is early Soviet constructivism of the 1920s. Deconstructivist projects are characterized by visual complexity, unexpected broken and deliberately destructive forms, as well as a pointedly aggressive invasion of the urban environment.

· Bionics (bio-tech)- the name of modern “neo-organic” architecture, where the expressiveness of structures is achieved by borrowing natural forms. Often contrasted with high-tech.

Directions of postmodernism:

· Pop Art- a movement in the fine arts of Western Europe and the USA in the late 1950s and 1960s, which arose as a reaction of denial to abstract expressionism. Pop art used images of consumer products as the main subject and image.

· Op art – or " Optical art"an artistic movement of the second half of the 20th century, using various optical illusions based on the peculiarities of perception of flat and spatial figures.

· Conceptualism - the literary and artistic direction of postmodernism, which took shape in the late 60s - early 70s of the twentieth century in America and Europe. In conceptualism, the concept of a work is more important than its physical expression; the purpose of art is to convey an idea. Conceptual objects can exist in the form of phrases, texts, diagrams, graphs, drawings, photographs, audio and video materials. Any object, phenomenon, or process can become an object of art, since conceptual art is a pure artistic gesture.

· Performance - a form of modern art in which the work consists of the actions of the artist or group in certain place and at a certain time. Performance can include any situation that includes four basic elements: time, place, the artist’s body and the relationship between the artist and the viewer. This distinguishes performance from fine art forms such as painting or sculpture, where the work is defined by the object on display.

· Happening - a form of modern art that represents actions, events or situations that occur with the participation of the artist, but are not completely controlled by him. Happenings usually involve improvisation and, unlike performances, do not have a clear script.

· Fluxus - international art movement of the 50s-60s, a significant phenomenon in the art of the second half of the twentieth century. This is the merging in one “stream” of various methods of artistic expression and means of communication of concrete and electronic music, visual poetry, movement, symbolic gestures. The main principle is absolute spontaneity, arbitrariness, refusal of any restrictions, which was achieved through such forms as happenings, decollage, various street actions and performances, and antitheater.

· Bodypainting - one of the forms of avant-garde art, where the main object of creativity is the human body, and the content is revealed through non-verbal language: poses, gestures, facial expressions, markings and “decorations” on the body. The object of Body Art can also be drawings, photos, videos and body models.

· Hyperrealism (photo-realism) - a movement in contemporary art (painting, sculpture and cinematography) of the second half of the 20th – 21st centuries, combining the utmost naturalness of images with the effects of their dramatic alienation.

· Public art- art in an urban environment, aimed at an unprepared viewer and implying communication with the urban space.

· Street art - direction in contemporary fine arts, distinctive feature which has a pronounced urban character. The main part of street art is graffiti (aka spray art), but one cannot assume that street art is graffiti. Street art also includes posters (non-commercial), stencils, various sculptural installations, etc. street art every detail is important, little thing, shadow, color, line

· Land art - an art movement that emerged in the United States in the late 1960s, in which created by the artist the work was inextricably linked with the natural landscape

· Kinetic art - a direction in contemporary art that plays up the effects of real movement of the entire work or its individual components. Kineticism is based on the idea that using light and movement to create a work of art.

· Video art - a direction in media art that uses the capabilities of video technology, computer and television images to express an artistic concept.

· Actionism - a form of modern art that emerged in the 1960s Western Europe. The desire to erase the line between art and reality leads to the search for new ways of artistic expression that add dynamics to the work, involving it in some kind of action (action). Action (or the art of action) becomes general concept for artistic practices in which the emphasis is shifted from the work itself to the process of its creation. In actionism, the artist usually becomes the subject and/or object work of art. Forms close to actionism are happenings, performances, events, the art of action, the art of demonstration and a number of other forms.

· Neo-pop art - a movement that emerged in the 80s of the twentieth century as a reaction to conceptualism and minimalism. Neo-pop is not fundamentally new artistic movement, but rather represents the evolution of pop art with its interest in consumer goods and celebrities of the world of popular culture, only with icons and symbols of new times (Michael Jackson, Madonna, Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, etc.).

· Neorealism- a movement that emerged in the late 50s and early 60s, thanks to a group of European artists, as a reaction to Tachisme and Abstract Expressionism. They proclaimed “new prospects for the approach to reality.” Their works were often created from unusual materials in order to more accurately convey social realities

· Neoconceptualism - a direction that represents the modern stage of development of conceptualism of the 60-70s.

Consideration of postmodernism should begin with its origins and beginnings. Aristotle also expressed the idea that the key to understanding the essence of a thing lies in studying its origin.

One of the theorists of postmodernism, W. Eco, notes that the term itself explains a lot about the nature of this phenomenon. In his opinion, the limit comes when the avant-garde (modernism) has nowhere to go further, since it has developed a metalanguage that describes its own texts. Postmodernism is a response to modernism: since the past cannot be destroyed, because its destruction leads to muteness, it needs to be rethought, but ironically, without naivety. Postmodernists rethought not only modernism, but also the entire previous culture, and this applies to a greater extent to the literary and theoretical works of W. Eco himself, addressed to interpretation medieval culture. There appear to be multiple origins of postmodernism. Thus, the primary impulses of this trend should be sought in romanticism. Indeed, the inherent taste of romanticism for marginality, the periphery of the psychological and social, alogism, and the unconscious is a strong impulse adopted by postmodernism. Romanticism, like postmodernism, is also characterized by an acute confrontation between the individual, inspired by genius, and the mediocre crowd, “cohesive mediocrity*”. Romanticism arises as an active and meaningful confrontation between the extreme existence of a creative personality and the faceless and insipid everyday life. Like romanticism, postmodernism is characterized by oppositionality, critical attitude towards a traditional, "classical" view of things and phenomena. It seems that romanticism and postmodernism are consequences of similar social and mental processes, the cultural folds of which intersect and intertwine. The origins of Russian postmodernism can be found in the intellectual atmosphere of the Russian Silver Age, which created a stable interest in philosophical and artistic thought to the “extinct cultures" of the past. In this sense, the “turning over” of cultural heritage, the compilation of an intercultural mosaic, characteristic of postmodernism, as well as the mythology of Russian symbolism, characteristic of the work of, for example, A. Bely and V. Ivanov, can be considered as direct predecessors of postmodernism. An active interest in the mythological reveals an orientation this phenomenon on archaic forms of thinking and creativity. The philosophy and art of postmodernism are characterized by an appeal to the archaic, myth, i.e. to text in its original meaning, but also to the comprehension of epistemological phenomena and various types mentality. At the same time, as one of the theorists of this direction, M. Foucault, postulates, in the culture of postmodernism, the “cultural unconscious” dominates the consciousness of an individual. This is especially evident in the work of many contemporary artists who carry out the task of deconstructing the epistemological picture of the world and reducing it to a mosaic interweaving of different meanings and values. With the help of myth, postmodern creations realize, in the words of R. Barth, “the possibility of trans-historical existence.” Involvement in myth creates the conditions for entering the spheres of cultural archetypes and historical narratives, which, on the one hand, contradicts the theoretical principles of postmodernism, but on the other hand, it corresponds general processes movements of modern culture. Postmodernism both destroys metanarratives and creates new ones using cultural mythologies.

There is no doubt about the closeness of postmodernism to the “philosophy of life” (Nietzsche, Bergson, Ortega y Gasset). Thus, J. Deleuze analyzed the philosophy of F. Nietzsche from the point of view of postmodern principles and noted the closeness of Nietzsche’s “universal” pluralism philosophical ideas end of XX century Nietzsche sincerely wished to “give irresponsibility its positive meaning.” According to Deleuze, "irresponsibility is Nietzsche's noblest and most beautiful secret." Irresponsibility and amoralism, even some intellectual cynicism, become the basis for a revaluation of traditional values and the development of a new view of reality - “pulling up to reality.”

One of the main tasks of postmodern theorists is to overcome traditional Eurocentrism, which has become an axiom of traditional European science. Thus, in postmodernism there is a search for other cultural traditions, based on the principle of complementarity of cultures developing along their own regional lines. This is especially true of the influence on European culture of the 20th century. classical traditions of the East, enrichment and change of traditional Eurocentric mentality. In cultural interconsciousness, there is an expansion of “vision and horizons” due to the inclusion of other points of view.

To indicate the specifics of postmodernism, a new feature of thinking in the culture of the 20th century, designated as “cyclicality,” should be formulated. This is a special principle for reading the historical process, antagonistic to the Enlightenment principle of progress. According to this principle, in its history, each culture sequentially goes through several stages. By being involved in historical processes, each new culture inevitably forced to repeat the logic of development of cultures approaching the end or already extinct. Therefore, repeating phases can be recorded in the development of each culture. The principle of mosaic and repeatability of cultural development is especially characteristic of the 20th century. In this regard, P. Sorokin noted the unusualness of modern culture, calling it “integral.” The accumulated “cultural material” of humanity is, as it were, mastered anew by thinkers of the 20th century, forming new associative connections and assessments, perhaps to activate subsequent intensive development.

Researchers of the philosophical situation of the second half of the 20th century. rightly note “dialogue” as “the key concept of postmodernism.” The previous eras of avant-garde and modernism can be understood, with reservations, as monological. The pathos of their development lay in the monological impact of scientific concepts reflecting one of the aspects of reality. A deep understanding of postmodernism is possible only in the aspect of cultural interpretation dialogue as a clash of different points of view. Since dialogue by its nature is focused on at least two opinions, it reflects the debatable nature, or rather, the uncertainty of the intellectual atmosphere of a culture. The variability of opinions reflects the variable nature of the movement and development itself. It is no coincidence that the scientific relevance and popularity of M. Bakhtin’s ideas about the dialogical nature of culture date back precisely to the development of postmodernism.

Following M. Foucault, we can postulate that the subject, the personality in the modern sense, emerges only at the turn of the 18th-19th centuries. as a result of the collapse of monologue culture and the emergence of dialogism. The phenomenon of dialogue (polylogue) is based on the polysemy and pluralism of values mastered by postmodernism; it determines the situation of not only two, but many colliding points of view. The principled nature of dialogism presupposes the inevitable emergence of the Other as the bearer of a different point of view, different values and way of life. Another may be a subject - a bearer of a different culture. Awareness of the value of the Other creates the opportunity to understand another culture, a different paradigm, but also a deeper and more comprehensive attitude towards one’s culture. A variant of this search was the appeal of European intellectuals to the cultures of the East.

The theoretical key with the help of which it is possible to understand many problems of postmodernism was synergetics. Synergetics as a methodology for studying such complex modern phenomena as postmodernism offers a range of intellectual recommendations:

The main premises of the synergetic vision of the world are the following theses: a) the almost unattainable strict conditioning and programming of trends in the evolution of complex systems; b) the creative potential of chaos is self-sufficient for the constitution of new organizational forms (any microfluctuations can give rise to macrostructures); c) any complex system is inherently inherent in alternative development scenarios; d) the whole and the sum of its parts are qualitatively different structures; e) instability is interpreted as one of the conditions and prerequisites for stable and dynamic development - only such systems are capable of self-organization; f) the world can be understood as a hierarchy of environments with different linearities.

Investigating physical and chemical processes, one of the theorists of synergetics, I. Prigogine, extended his conclusions to historical and cultural processes. He proposed to consider evolution as a process leading to greater complexity and diversity of biological and social structures through the emergence of new “dissipative” (scattering) formations of a higher order. A new “order arises from random fluctuations” (“order from chaos”). In this process special role is assigned to chance, which is considered as the most important condition for the formation and development of new structures. The combination of chance and necessity creates the opportunity to consider historical and cultural processes in a new aspect, which takes into account the meaning-forming role of chance and expands the boundaries of axiomatic patterns. According to Prigogine,

the laws of strict causation seem to us today to be limited cases applicable to highly idealized situations, almost caricatured descriptions of change... complexity science... leads to a completely different (opposite) point of view.

Subjunctive Mood in Study historical processes turns into the most important scientific discourse, expanding research perspectives. Research into the nonlinear development of systems can be productive when using nonlinear principles, for example, “leaking”. It becomes relevant to study the “leap” - a dialectical leap in the form of which a system, as a result of internal changes, moves to a new level of complexity: “when a system “jumps” to a new level of complexity, it is impossible in principle to predict which of the many forms it will take.”

The more complex level to which the system moves as a result of changes cannot be reduced to a simple set of its components. These processes are amenable to research and scientific prediction only in a new system of coordinates and concepts, provided that accidents, fluctuations, and leaps in development are included, creating a heuristic situation of scientific search aimed at discovering the moving and uncertain phenomena of modern culture. Such an “expanded view” (a term from artistic system Matyushin-Sterligov) makes possible a deeper understanding of the processes and creativity and some particular manifestations of modern artistic culture, such as performances, installations and improvisations. In postmodernism, to characterize these phenomena, the concepts of “rhizome” and “fold” are used, denoting the fundamental “non-structural and non-linear” organization of the object of study, capable of immanent and autochthonous mobility (Deleuze, Guattari). For a productive study of postmodernism, one should use the synergetic method of analogy, which acquires various modifications depending on the specifics of the conceptual field used as starting point analogies. Thus, to study the culture of postmodernism as an open system, the analogy method is modified as a method of analogy with information exchange. Cultural processes are studied as complex systems, and therefore it is possible to use the fractal analogy method. If these processes are studied as nonlinearly developing systems, then the method of analogy with nonlinear development is used. In the processes of cultural research, which set the task of identifying the patterns of order-formation processes, the method of analogy with growth points is used." Various aspects methods of studying by analogy form the general methodological basis for studying the culture of postmodernism.

To characterize postmodernism, we should add the gaming principle, noted by many researchers. The emphatically ironic, playful mode of self-determination, characteristic of the postmodernist worldview, was reflected not only in the artistic practice of this movement, but also in the very style of philosophizing on this topic.

A game There is a way to violate any one-dimensional logic, to go beyond it.

The game is by its nature non-utilitarian, permeated with an aesthetic principle, self-valued and homemade. Indeed, the gaming principle, which has methodological significance for postmodernism, manifests itself in the sphere of existence of a work of art. The metasemantics characteristic of postmodern works is achieved using various connotative means. However, all these means can be described in just one word - game. In the multi-valued semantic space of an artistic performance, the viewer has the right to take risks, choosing his version from among possible interpretations. Then he considers the result of the spectacle as his own find, as the result of his own free choice.

Thanks to the play principle embedded in a postmodern work of art, “the work of releasing the symbolic energy” of the aesthetic object is carried out. J.-F. Lyotard assigns this role to language games. A playful experiment with reality is possible in the field of any textual space, be it artistic creativity or everyday behavior. Due to the implementation of the game principle, the free movement of meanings from text to context and vice versa increases. The game becomes a means of combining and shifting meanings. In a game situation, the “folding” of the semantic field clearly manifests itself - the ease of movement from one semantic plane to another, the conventionality of the boundaries of conceptual and living space. Narrative folds, naturally growing out of the ontological contiguity of postmodern values, create a ribbed, ironic atmosphere of openness.

Structuralism, which became one of the immediate forerunners of postmodernism, was characterized by R. Barth as follows: it “can be defined historically as a transition from symbolic consciousness to paradigmatic consciousness; there is a history of a sign, and this is the history of its “realizations”. Postmodernism is rightly viewed as a step in the interpretation of mental structures.

Dissatisfaction with the historical discourse, which discards individual details and processes and fixes attention on the main development, stimulated a turn to the analysis of structure, to the search for the atypical. This atypicality is reflected in formalism and, consequently, in the structure of the cultural text itself. The process of awareness of the world and man has moved into the sphere of “designation” of objective and subjective realities with the aim of subsequent knowledge of the “signified” and “signifier”, as well as the study of the “designation” process itself. In postmodernism, a person is identified with a text, since the ontology of language and text thickens and crystallizes in the intellectual atmosphere.

One of the prominent representatives of postmodernism, I. Hassan, identified the characteristic features of this phenomenon. The philosopher noted the terminological ambiguity of postmodernism. According to him, the term “contains an objection to itself from within.” Being a product of modern culture, postmodernism, like a palimpsest, "absorbs many features of previous movements. Half-erased signs and texts of past cultures appear on the transparent fabric of modernity, making adjustments to it. Postmodernism combines diachronicity and synchronicity of theoretical thought. Being a theoretical justification for the second half of the 20th century c., postmodernism “has called forth two deities acting in two directions" - the Apollonian vision, general and rational, and the Dionysian feeling, aesthetic at its core. The aestheticization of being inherent in postmodernism makes one wonder whether this movement does not embody an exclusively artistic tendency of vision peace? Indeed, modern Art acts as the most accurate identification of postmodernist quests.

Analyzing the “indeterminism” characteristic of postmodernism, Hassan notes that certain aspects of this concept can be isolated from the following words: openness, heresy, pluralism, eclecticism, random selection, rebellion, deformation. A number of terms characterizing incompleteness give an idea of its other features: anti-creativity, difference, discreteness, disjunction, disappearance, decomposition, dedefinition, demystification, detotalization, delegitimization. Terminological specificity sets the researcher up for the fundamental “incompleteness”, the destruction of integrity, which characterize postmodernism as a living process of modern culture, which is in constant development and, apparently, has not yet reached its apogee. Due to terminological uncertainty, Deleuze argued that postmodernism uses concepts such as “black holes”, “blurred aggregates”, “zones of proximity”, “Riemannian spaces”, “bifurcations”, which can be used by philosophers, scientists and artists. Their apparent metaphorical nature is only visible. In fact, metaphor “captures” processes of reality that do not have stable scientific formulations. The use of metaphors and concepts from parallel activities should lead to unexpected coincidences, semantic similarities and heuristic findings.

A prominent researcher of postmodernism, I. Ilyin, rightly points out the existence of an interconnected complex - “poststructuralist, deconstructivist and postmodernist”, which has a unity of foundations and paradigms. In this unity, poststructuralism appears as a unique aesthetic concept, deconstructivism as a method of analytical procedures of artistic phenomena based on postmodern ideas, and postmodernism as a general mentality of the modern era, existing autonomously, but not without the participation of the other two components of this complex.

Postmodernism is characterized by the use of purely techniques, arising from random “slip-of-the-spots”, gaps in the manuscript, stitches, lengths and voids in the text in a fundamental effort to “not put a full stop”, etc.

Through all these signs passes in a single impulse the will to incompleteness, affectation, body politics, knowledge of the body, eroticism of the body, affectation in everything related to the individual as the main goal of humanistic discourse in the West. Therefore we can call this tendency indeterminism, thus emphasizing its pluralistic character...

Turning to border areas testifies to the postmodern expansion of “mental space”, the desire to expand the “borders of the world”, and natural curiosity.

The plurality of differences in the themes and stylistics of postmodernism is united and converges in three main theses.

First, people do not have access to reality and therefore do not have the means to reach the truth. Secondly, reality is inaccessible because a person is a prisoner of language, which gives form to thoughts before there is an opportunity to think, and therefore there is no way for a person to adequately express what he is thinking about. Third, man creates reality through language, and therefore the nature of reality is determined by those who have the opportunity and power to shape language." These theses emphasize the importance of the means mass media that shape public opinion and influence the image of reality.

I. Hassan notes the most characteristic differences identified in the work of postmodernist thinkers. He points to:

? intertextuality and semiotics (Y. Kristeva);
? hermeneutics of the suspect (P. Ricoeur);
? “critique of beatitude and pedagogy of ignorance” (R. Barth); schizoanalysis by J. Deleuze and F. Guattari;
? humanism of the unreal (M. Foucault);
? grammatology of differences (J. Derrida);
? the policy of delegitimization (J.-F. Lyotard);
? “paracriticism and parabiography” (I. Hassan);
“deformity and mutations (L. Fiedler);
? “doubting imagination” (M. Galineski);
? “superfiction and supergame” (R. Federman);
? a new phase of psychoanalysis of intimacy (N. Holland);
? theater of the impossible (G. Blau).

Thus, all this confirms the diversity of indetermination, or decreativity, or, otherwise, the anonymous impulse of the present moment, leading us back to the middle of the century with its Heisenberg uncertainty principle in physics and Gödel's incompleteness theorem in all logical systems...

Postmodernism is most manifested in modern artistic creativity, and its characteristics are directly related to artistic culture as a whole. The uniqueness of modern humanism is permeated by “ambiguity, indecision, dissipation and deconstruction in art and in its theories,” and “all ambiguity is liberal; it prepares us to accept the multiplicity of creativity and increases our tolerance for differences of all kinds.” The analysis made by I. Hassan and other researchers leads to the conclusion that the artistic culture of postmodernism is fundamentally heterogeneous and multiple in the forms and methods of its manifestations. From this also follows the problem unresolved by the thinker about the boundaries of postmodernism and the limits of its expansion. Indeterminism and uncertainty imply limitlessness, but postmodernism has boundaries. Apparently, the concept of boundaries in relation to a given cultural phenomenon also requires special understanding and definition and implies a diffusion of meanings. Perhaps it is the borderline forms of postmodernism that represent the most eloquent characteristic of this phenomenon.

R. Barth argues that structuralism as a movement in science acts as an “intellectual” objectification of human thinking and creativity. He writes that

There are writers, artists, musicians, in whose eyes the manipulation of structure... represents a special type of human practice; analysts and creators should be united under a common sign, which could be given the name structural man; This person is determined... by the nature of his imagination, or, better to say, the ability to imagine...

A “structural person” is the owner of a special type of thinking; he is able to view reality as a structure. The study and mastery of this structure is possible through the mastery of cultural “texts” and the creation of new structures from them. Thus, the emphasis moves from reality to metareality. In fact, this is what happens in modern culture: cultural environment becomes the main human habitat. The second reality replaces the first. Postmodernism theoretically postulates these priorities.

Difficulties in assessing postmodernism stem from the incompleteness of the process of this phenomenon, from its interweaving into the ongoing processes of modern culture. Reflecting the transitional era, postmodernism is the elimination of the “logocentric cultural paradigm with its monotheism, the presumption of the Ought, the dictates of “legislative reason”. This trend expresses the painful, crisis state of modern philosophy. All postmodern game meanings is carried out in the name of searching for new integrity, new attractors such integrity. However, this search is extremely difficult in the conditions of a consumer society, the values of which are primitive, stable and enshrined in the mass consciousness. Postmodernist discourse reflects the consciousness of the intellectual elite, which does not accept the primitive values of mass consciousness.

There were similar periods of crisis in the history of philosophy, when, for example, ancient sophistry, later medieval scholasticism and even later the Enlightenment turned to the search for truth with the help of linguistic constructive forms.

The significance of postmodernism lies in creating the preconditions for a new formulation of the problem of individual freedom and responsibility. The merit of postmodernism is the demonstration of a multimodal consideration of culture, as well as the self-sufficiency of creativity and creative personality.

The nature and problems of postmodernism lie in its fundamental dialogism, which is manifested in the installation of Western culture on the culture of the East. This orientation gives a chance for dialogic mutual understanding and complementation, as well as overcoming the self-isolation of Western and Eastern cultures.

Today Western society is in critical situation, moving between extreme states - the absolute dominant of the structures of capitalist production and market relations, reflected in social psychology and aesthetics, and the absolute dominant of the social way of labor. The modern historical mission of “post-capitalism” and “post-socialism” is the path of social, cultural, artistic development, contained in the creation of a new type of mentality. This new mentality must unite two polar types with their internal dialectical-dialogical meaning.

Postmodernism, being the overcoming of modernism, which personifies the era of confrontation and mutual negation not only of styles of thinking and types of artistic creativity, but also of social systems, becomes a reflection of the historical and cultural situation of social, scientific and artistic pluralism.

The elements included in the large system of human culture are diverse and disparate both in nature and in origin; they develop according to autonomous laws, but within the general system strict diachrony is observed, ensuring mutual dialogical coexistence. Historical-cultural, social, socio-psychological, aesthetic and artistic dialogue is the dichotomy of elite and mass cultures, the differences between elite and mass consciousness. For the culture of the 20th century. characterized by a split into elite and mass. Such a split

became especially dangerous in the conditions of the maturation of the revolution, when the main striking force of the destruction of the existing social order the mass was made, because its activity is manifested precisely in destruction, and creation is the privilege of the spiritual elite - scientific, artistic, political, religious."

However, for the history of culture, the essence of the problem lies not in its very division into mass and elite, but in their relationship.

Thus, postmodernism “highlights” the problem of elite and mass consciousness and their interaction, conceptually but denoting the existing contradictions. The methodological “amalgam” of the problem is the postmodern concept of “fold”, used, for example, by M. Heidegger, Foucault and Deleuze. Thus, according to Deleuze, the “fold” is a difference, a fold that distinguishes and at the same time can itself be distinguished. The concept of “fold” directly refers to many communities of social life, separated by differences in values, interests, lifestyles, goals, etc. The concept of “fold” implies a variety of semantic modifications that accurately reproduce shades of meaning, speciation and variants of the relationship between elite and mass consciousness , also taken in heterogeneous combinations. Thus, the concepts of “folding”, “gyrus”, “bending”, “bending”, “bending”, “bending” reflect various sides and facets of social, cultural and artistic “spaces”, as well as the nuances of interactions. Also close to the concept of “fold” are the meanings of the phenomena of “doubleness”, “Other”, “reflection”, “interposition”.

Heidegger explored the fold in the aspect of the duality of the fold, which is reproduced along two distinguishable sides, but these sides also correlate with each other. For methodological accuracy, it seems necessary to imagine a cultural space that can be “bent” and consider its various planes, which have qualitative specificity and features. Thus, elitist and mass consciousness, while mating and being in mutual dependence and cultural proximity, are nevertheless of different qualities and opposite in many characteristics; they are located in different planes of the “folded surface.” It is clear that the “fold” is a figurative ideal model of the relationships between different but interrelated cultural phenomena. The figurative idea of “folding”, “overlapping”, “bending-unbending”, “tearing”, “wrapping”, etc. creates the opportunity to analyze the diversity of modes of elite and mass consciousness in modern artistic culture.

Task No. 1

POSTMODERNISM CULTURE

The emergence and development of postmodernism

Main features and characteristics of postmodern culture

Postmodernism in architecture

Postmodernism in painting

Postmodernism in literature

Postmodernism in cinema

Conclusion

List of used literature

1. The emergence and development of postmodernism

Postmodernism is a collective designation of trends in the cultural identity of developed Western countries. Postmodernism (or “postmodern”) literally means that which is after “modernity,” or modernity.

Postmodernism is a relatively recent phenomenon: its age is about a quarter of a century. It is, first of all, the culture of a post-industrial, information society. At the same time, it goes beyond culture and, to one degree or another, manifests itself in all spheres of public life, including economics and politics. Because of this, society turns out to be not only post-industrial and informational, but also postmodern. Postmodernism manifested itself most clearly in art.

The etymology of the term "postmodern" dates back to 1917. It was first used by the German philosopher Rudolf Pannwitz in his work “The Crisis of European Culture.” It was about a new man called to overcome the decline. Postmodernism was seen as a way for European culture to emerge from the deep crisis into which modernism, stricken by the ulcers of nihilism and decadence, had led it. This was just a paraphrase of Nietzsche's idea of the "superman".

The second time this term, independently of Pannwitz, is used by the Spanish critic F. de Onis in his work “Anthology of Spanish and Latin American Poetry” (1934). For him, postmodernity acts as an intermediate period (1905-1914) between the first stage of modernism (1896-1905) and the second, stronger stage - the stage of “ultramodernism” (1914-1932).

The third time this word appears in a one-volume presentation (1947) by the American philosopher D. Somerville of the multi-volume work of the English historian A. Toynbee “A Study of History”. Here "postmodern" means the current, modern period Western culture, which began already in 1875.

However, all three cases mentioned are not directly related to the modern meaning of the term “postmodernism”. The German philosopher W. Welsh, a recognized authority in the interpretation of postmodernity, calls them “premature”. In his opinion, the American literary critic M. Howe was the one who, in 1959, was the first to use the term “postmodern” in its modern meaning, developing a discussion about postmodernity in American literary criticism, which continues today.

To date, postmodernism has gone through all the main stages of its formation. At the end of the 50s. V Italian architecture and in American literary criticism the first signs of it appeared. Then they appeared in the art of others European countries, USA and Japan, and by the end of the 60s. spread to other areas of culture. In the 70s there is a final self-affirmation and recognition of postmodernism as a special phenomenon, and it appears as a kind of sensation. In the 80s postmodernism is spreading throughout the world and becoming an intellectual fashion, a kind of special sign of the times, a kind of pass to the circle of the chosen and initiated. If earlier you had to be a modernist and avant-garde, now it has become difficult not to be a postmodernist. In the early 90s. the excitement around postmodernism subsides, and it enters a period of calmer existence.

The English historian A. Toynbee took 1875 as the starting point of the postmodern era, linking it with the discovery of the second law of thermodynamics. For some, this era began immediately after the Second World War. Most authors place the beginning of postmodernism in the mid-70s, although opinions differ on the more precise date of its birth. In the 80s, postmodernism received the status of a concept, thanks, first of all, to the work of Lyotard, who extended the discussion about postmodernism to the field of philosophy.

Proponents of postmodernism believe that postmodernism is a special spiritual state and frame of mind that can and actually arose in a variety of eras at their final stages. Postmodernism in this sense is a transhistorical phenomenon; it passes through all or many historical eras, and it cannot be singled out in some separate and special era. In particular, this opinion is shared by the Italian postmodernist writer U. Eco. Lyotard is inclined to the same opinion, believing that Aristotle can be considered the first postmodernist. Canadian political scientists A. Croaker and D. Cook call Augustine the Blessed as such.

Others, on the contrary, define postmodernism precisely as a special era that began with the emergence of post-industrial civilization. This opinion is shared by H. Küng and W. Welsh and others. It seems that, despite all the differences, these two approaches can be reconciled. Indeed, postmodernism is primarily a state of mind. However, this state has been going on for quite a long time, which allows us to talk about an era, although this era will apparently become a transitional one.

2. Main features and characteristics of postmodern culture

2.1.Postmodernism in architecture

As a well-defined direction, postmodernism in architecture took shape by the mid-70s. Ch. Jenks in his book “The Language of Postmodern Architecture” (1977) calls the exact date sweep away the avant-garde in architecture: June 15, 1972. On this day, the Pruitt-Igoe neighborhood in St. Louis, Missouri, was bombed, although it was perhaps the most authentic embodiment of the ideas of modern urban planning. The quarter was built in strict accordance with Le Corbusier's three fundamental values: sun, greenery and space. It consisted of comfortable high-rise buildings, had elevated roads for pedestrians, was an example of sterile cleanliness and rationality, and received an award from the American Institute of Architects. However, over time, the quarter gradually fell into complete desolation, increasingly becoming a place of accumulation of antisocial elements, with a source social conflicts and crime, which ultimately led to a sad ending.

Other authors name other dates for the emergence of postmodernism in architecture. Thus, the French architect and researcher J. Belmont connects the death of the avant-garde and the emergence of the postmodern movement with the energy crisis that began in 1973 and then the economic crisis.

Considering the features of postmodernism in architecture, Jencks identifies seven of its main features. The first of them is related to the attitude to history and the past, as well as to the present and future.

The avant-garde, as is known, came out with a decisive denial of previous history and the entire past. Postmodernism takes a completely different position in relation to the past and the future. He completely rehabilitates history and the past, often expressing a feeling of acute nostalgia for the past.

By rediscovering the history and culture of the past, postmodernism responded to the natural and understandable desires of many people to rediscover their own roots and reconnect with their past history, something that modernism and the avant-garde insistently wanted to deprive them of.

The second feature of postmodern architecture continues and specifies the first. Jenks qualifies it as “frank retrospectivism.” It can also be defined as traditionalism. In this sense, post-avant-garde can be defined as a retro style.

Postmodernism not only rehabilitates tradition and old styles, but also widely uses them in its practice, including what is usually referred to as academicism.

The third feature of postmodernism concerns the relationship of architecture with environment. It is also associated with tradition, but in a broader sense - socio-cultural, national, natural-climatic, etc. First of all, we are talking about the attitude towards nature. Postmodernism goes in the opposite direction here too. He abandons the principle of autonomy and insists on taking into account many conditions, attaching great importance to the feeling of a specific place. The architectural structure must organically fit into surrounding landscape. For these purposes, some participants in the postmodern movement even resort to using shades of the color of the ground on which the house is built.

The next - fourth feature - of postmodernism is a direct continuation and development of the previous one. Jencks defines it as contextualism, which includes ad hokism (“ad hok” - in relation to this) and an urban planning approach.

The fifth feature is that postmodernism rejects the principle of autonomy, restoring the principle of baroque coherence and integrity. Instead of isolated buildings in free spaces, he seems to rediscover the urban fabric, and with it the city itself, which unites around its monuments and has some boundaries in space. Ornament becomes a means of new architectural composition. When designing an individual house, a district or an entire city, it is necessary to take into account the traditions, tastes and opinions of residents.

The sixth feature is that in postmodernism the problems of space are most often solved in the spirit of baroque and mannerism. It has deep roots in tradition and is historically colored. It lacks clear demarcation, simplicity and transparency. It appears tortuous and intricate, dense, rich and fulfilling, mysterious and irrational. Postmodernists attach much more importance to space than their immediate predecessors.

Finally, the last important feature of postmodernism in architecture concerns its eclecticism. This feature acts as a kind of result and logical consequence previous ones. It is determined primarily by the desire of the post-avant-garde to practically implement double coding, to combine tastes and values ordinary people with the professional language of an architect. In postmodernism, as Jencks notes, two codes coexist: “firstly, the popular, traditional, slowly changing, like a spoken language, replete with clichés and having roots in everyday life, and secondly, the modern, full of neologisms and responding to fast changes in technology, art and fashion, as well as the avant-garde architecture."

In modern humanitarian knowledge, interest in the phenomenon of postmodern culture has increased significantly: philosophers, cultural scientists, and literary scholars put forward their own versions of the “postmodern type of culture.” However, at present there is no single idea about postmodernism - there are heated discussions regarding its time boundaries, emergence, features of manifestation in culture and in other spheres of human existence. Postmodernism is a manifestation of a certain mentality, a specific way of perceiving the world, a type of culture.

As is known, postmodernism first arose in the field of literary criticism, and subsequently spread far beyond its borders, covering various spheres of human existence - philosophy, politics, religion, etc. Finally, he began to claim the status of a general theory of modern art, the main exponent of the spirit of modernity.

This small section cannot cover the entire variety of theories and concepts that are defined as postmodern. Therefore, we will try to analyze some concepts, in particular J.F. Lyotard, J. Baudrillard, V. Eco, F. Jamieson, who are rightfully considered leading experts in the field of postmodern culture.

Postmodernism: the history of the term. Discussions regarding the time boundaries of postmodernism in modern philosophy and cultural studies

For several decades now on the pages of various scientific works heated discussions are taking place regarding postmodernism - the essence of this phenomenon, the reasons for its occurrence, and the relationship with previous stages of sociocultural development, in particular with modernism, are being determined. On many issues, the participants in the discussions do not have unified views. At the same time, it can be argued that in modern humanitarian knowledge there are already established General characteristics this phenomenon, influential theorists of postmodernism have emerged, and a certain amount of texts have accumulated that analyze the situation of postmodernity.

It should be noted that the concepts of “postmodernism”, “postmodern”, “postmodernist” are multi-valued. They are used to determine a unique direction in modern art, and to characterize certain trends in politics, religion, ethics, lifestyle, worldview, as well as to periodize culture and designate a unique concept that arose as a result of changes in social life and economic structures. In other words, postmodern theories reveal the features of modern modernization and processes in society, the main features of a post-industrial, post-technotronic consumer society. Some researchers believe that postmodernism is genetically connected with these types of societies, is their creation and at the same time should become the universal theory that is the only one capable of comprehending the complex processes taking place in modern society.

Thus, we can talk about postmodernism as a direction in artistic culture, as a situation in society, as an influential theoretical concept that studies the realities of the modern world, as a methodology for determining the basic characteristics of modernity.

The definition of the concepts “postmodernism”, “postmodernity”, according to most theorists and researchers, can be carried out in relation to what is meant by modernism. In a socio-historical context, one can consider “postmodernity” as the development and negation of “modernity” - an era spanning the period from the beginning of modern times to the middle of the 20th century; in an aesthetic context, postmodernism is a counterpart to modernism as a stage in the development of art. It should be noted that the concept of “modernism” defines the period of New Time, which has its own characteristics. In addition, the concept of “modernism” is understood as a set of trends in modern art that began to develop from the end of the 19th century. The terms postmodernism and postmodernism are either synonymous or differentiated into three degrees. In connection with the New Time, they can be perceived as its antithesis, and in connection with modernism - as its logical continuation. Indeed, postmodern art, in comparison with modernism, is a product of modernity; those artistic processes that created modernism have spread to all modern art in the broad sense of the word. Postmodernism, like modernism, is a stage in the development of art, which excludes classical art. Classical art, associated with the cultural attitudes of the New Age, formed its classical principles, determining the development of artistic culture for a long time: this is the convention of art, which always allows us to distinguish between art and non-art; the uniqueness of the work of art, which sees the main thing in the artist’s work as working with material and form; the presence of direction and style that provide tradition and historicism in art.

The avant-garde, being a powerful artistic movement, abandoned everything that classical art was oriented towards. Characteristic features Most avant-garde phenomena are their experimental nature, rather a conscious revolutionary-destructive pathos regarding traditional art and traditional cultural values, a sharp protest of avant-garde figures against everything that seemed to them conservative, philistine, bourgeois, “academic”. In the visual arts and literature, the avant-garde asserted a decisive rejection of the realistic-naturalistic depiction of reality, a constant desire to create something fundamentally new in everything - first of all, in forms and means of artistic representation. From this comes the declarative-manifestative, shocking-scandalous nature of avant-garde works and their creators, the blurring of boundaries between traditional forms of art for new European culture, the tendency towards the synthesis of individual arts, their interpenetration, interchangeability. The avant-garde has broken ties with classics and rationalism in European culture, but at the same time it has a strong connection with pre-rational mythological and other forms of early cultures, the origins of which are concentrated in Africa, America, and other regions.

Limiting the intellect, the avant-garde turned to instinct and emotion, spontaneity and spontaneity. This orientation allowed us to take a fresh look at the purpose of art. The avant-garde gave world art such outstanding figures as V. Kandinsky, K. Malevich, M. Chagall, P. Schcasso, A. Matisse, A. Schoenberg, F. Kafka, S. Further, J. Joyce, M. Proust and others .

If we compare avant-garde and postmodernism, we can see a lot in common: first of all, kinship artistic principles. Postmodernism is a consequence and continuation of the avant-garde. However, avant-garde and postmodernism are quite different phenomena. The difference between them lies in the attitude towards the future and the past. The avant-garde resolutely dissociates itself from tradition, history, and the past. The pathos of avant-garde artists is directed to the future. Avant-garde of the 20th century is marked by a large number of futuristic projects, and one of the influential avant-garde movements calls itself futurism. This train to the future connects the avant-garde with such a distinctive phenomenon as modern European classical culture. The postmodernist attitude to the future is different: it promotes the exhaustion of the future, but suggests turning to the past. This appeal to the past does not mean deference to tradition. On the contrary, the relationship between postmodernism and tradition is quite complex. Postmodernism uses the past in a “library” version, as a collection of texts that can be used to create new ones with the help of allusion.

Thus, avant-garde and postmodernism, for all their kinship, are quite different phenomena. If the beginning of the 20th century. gave birth and need of the avant-garde, then the end of this century is more characteristic of postmodernism. In this regard, a distinction is made between the terms "postmodern" - a revision of the philosophical foundations of the New Age, "postmodernism" - a revision modernist art, “postmodernity” - relativization from ethical principles and the gradual disappearance of heroism in life, the spread of consumer sentiment in society.

As noted, sometimes the concepts of “postmodern” and “postmodernism” are distinguished. In our opinion, these terms still have more in common than different, so they can be used as synonyms. At the same time, one can agree with those authors who consider it appropriate to use the term “postmodernism” when characterizing the complex phenomena of modern philosophy and art. Let's try to determine the main features of postmodernism as a cultural phenomenon.

Postmodernism is mainly understood, first of all, as a cultural-theoretical movement in the philosophy of the second half of the 19th century - beginning of the XXI centuries, which draws attention to the changes that are taking place in modern world: in the sociocultural, intellectual, scientific, artistic, aesthetic and even political spheres. Postmodernism cannot be defined as a consolidated, organized philosophical and artistic movement; it does not pretend to be such a definition. Under the name “postmodernism” various concepts and theories are united; it is this concept that has not yet been sufficiently conceptualized.

It is believed that the term “postmodernism” was officially introduced into scientific circulation by A.J. Toynbee. According to the English historian, this term indicates the modern phase of Western European culture, an important feature of which is the transition from a policy based on thinking in terms of the interests of national states to a policy that takes into account the global nature modern civilization. A. Toynbee believed that this stage began back in 1875. Mid-70s of the XIX century. - a period of rapid development of European states, the formation of modern models of social management, at the same time required the implementation in life of new thinking associated with the emergence of global problems of human civilization. Thus, A. Toynbee, when defining postmodernism, relied on geopolitical factors.

The German philosopher Wolfgang Welsch, who explored the origins of this concept, identifies other cases of its use: in 1917 in the work of Rudolf Pannwitz “The Crisis of European Culture”, which speaks of “postmodern man”; in 1934 by the Spanish literary critic Federico de Onis, where postmodernism is considered as an intermediate phase in the development of literature between modernism and the so-called “ultramodernism” (1905-1914).

According to the outstanding American theorist F. Jameson, the emergence of postmodernism can be dated back to the post-war boom in the United States (at the turn of the 1940s-1950s), and in France - to the formation of the Fifth Republic (1958). American theorist Hug D. Silverman argues that postmodernism has no fatherland, but in Zhe's opinion. Derrida, the most postmodern country is Japan in the sense that its culture organically combines traditional and modern elements.

The founders of postmodernism are considered to be F. Nietzsche, M. Weber, T. Adorno, M. Horkheimer, M. Heidegger, M. Foucault, Zhe. Derrida, J.F., Lyotard, who carried out a radical critique of European culture and history, which would later be called deconstruction. Will not a big exaggeration consider the source of postmodernism to be those crisis phenomena in European culture that made themselves known back in the second half of the 19th century.

One of the clearest characteristics of postmodernism is given by its famous researcher Ihab Hassan. He notes the following signs of this phenomenon:

1) uncertainty, the cult of ambiguities, errors, gaps;

2) fragmentation, installation principle;

3) “decanonization” - the fight against traditional values, the sacred in culture, person, ethnic group, the fight against logos, author’s priority;

4) lack of psychological and symbolic depths;

5) rejection of mimesis and the figurative principle;

c) the dominance of irony, which affirms a pluralistic Universe;

7) mixing high and low genres, stylistic syncretism;

8) theatricality of modern culture, working for the public, mandatory consideration of the audience;

9) immanence, the fusion of consciousness with the means of communication, the ability to adapt to their renewal and reflect on them.

In general, when studying the phenomenon of postmodernism, most scientists insist that postmodernism arises first in the context of artistic culture (literature, architecture), and then spreads to other areas - philosophy, politics, religion, science, becoming a defining phenomenon for an entire stage in development of culture. We can also say that in these areas new problems, trends, and phenomena are emerging that are already generally classified as postmodern. Postmodernism is a rather convenient term for characterizing new, complex, and not yet sufficiently meaningful problems. However, a broad interpretation of this concept causes certain comments from those theorists who are inclined to use the concept of “postmodernism” only in the sphere of artistic culture. Thus, according to British sociologist Anthony Giddens, the concept of “postmodernism” refers mainly to styles or movements in literature, painting, sculpture and architecture. Refuting the legitimacy of the spread of postmodern doctrine to economic, political and social sphere, Giddens, like, by the way, other Western theorists, uses the concepts of “modernity” and “postmodernity” that are similar in sound, but somewhat different in meaning, to define the realities of the era. “Postmodernity” means a set of characteristics of the modern era, among which there are those that assert the impossibility of determining the direction of development modern society.

Another well-known researcher of postmodernism, S. Morawski, sees the essence of this phenomenon in philosophical reflection regarding the processes of development of modern thinking and societies. The scientist comprehensively examines the history of the concept and the views of theorists on the phenomenon of postmodernism and comes to the conclusion that the formulation of the essence of postmodernism is often opposite to each other, and those philosophers who are usually defined as postmodernists (J.F. Lyotard, W. Eco, W. Welsh), they refute the opinion that postmodernism is in opposition only to the culture of the New Age, since postmodernism conflicts with the entire philosophical tradition. Thus, postmodernism, according to Morawski, is, first of all, philosophy in its non-standard manifestation, that is, such reflections that go beyond ordinary philosophizing. Moreover, the researcher views postmodern philosophy as post-philosophy for the reason that postmodernism “attacks Plato as much as Hegel and Husserl, the pre-Socratics as much as Heidegger.” Analyzing the relationship between postmodernism and avant-garde, S. Morawski defines postmodernism as anti-avant-garde. Anti-avant-garde features of postmodernism lie, according to the researcher, in the dominance of metaphilosophical and transphilosophical studios in the postmodern discourse. Polemicizing with J.F. Lyotard, who identifies postmodernism and the avant-garde, S. Morawski considers the sources of postmodernism to be the realities of modern society with its cult of consumerism, tolerance, the presence in each individual of various social roles and cultural transformations.

It is also necessary to pay attention to such a correct, in our opinion, statement by S. Morawski, in which he polemicizes with J. Baudrillard: one should not see in postmodernity the end of history, human development, the negative trends of the modern era will provide strong resistance, which will help correct this negative direction of modern development of society.

Thus, the prospects for the existence of culture also take place in the era of total deconstruction, a rethinking of the very foundations of human existence in the world.

Thus, the very concept of postmodernism, the essence of this phenomenon, has become the subject of numerous discussions in Western and domestic philosophical and cultural thought. The nature of these discussions testifies to the complexity and contradictory nature of the phenomenon of postmodernism and postmodern culture. Well-known theorists of postmodernism in their philosophical work assigned the main role to the study of cultural problems, linking the processes occurring in it with postmodern ideological transformations.

Postmodernism is a cultural movement that manifested itself primarily in developed Western countries, and then, to one degree or another, spread to some other regions. Postmodernism, in essence, means a multidimensional theoretical reflection of the spiritual turn in the self-awareness of Western civilization, especially in the field of art and philosophy, and only later revealed itself in various spheres of human activity.

Main features and characteristics of postmodernism

Many features inherent in postmodern art and expressing the general cultural paradigm of modernity are considered in the classification proposed by the American literary scholar Ihab Hassan:

1. Uncertainty, the cult of ambiguities, errors, omissions.
2. Fragmentation and installation principle.
3. “Decanonization”, the fight against traditional value centers: the sacred in culture, man, ethnicity, logos, author’s priority.
4. “Everything happens on the surface” - without psychological and symbolic depths, “we are left with the play of language, without the Ego.”
5. Silence, refusal of the pictorial principle.
6. Irony, and a positive one, affirming a pluralistic universe.
7. Mixing genres, high and low, stylistic syncretism.
8. Theatricality of modern culture, working for the public, mandatory consideration of the audience.
9. Immanence - the fusion of consciousness with the means of communication, the ability to adapt to their renewal and reflect on them.

One of the main postmodernist ideas is the democratization of culture, the reduction of supreme values, the rejection of the highest ideals, which at one time were attractive to the creators of modernist art. Postmodernism puts forward as the main creative principle the fundamental pluralism of styles and artistic programs, ideological models and cultural languages.

At first, the concept of “postmodernism” was more actively used in the field of artistic culture, and only over time it received a broad interpretation and, in addition to a unique direction in art, it began to be used to characterize certain trends in philosophy, politics, religion, science, ethics, lifestyle, worldview, and in ultimately - for the periodization of culture. It is in these latter senses that it is used in the present text.

The attitude of postmodernism to history has a special character: it does not live from an imaginary negation of everything that preceded, but has in mind the real simultaneity of the non-simultaneous. Moreover, postmodernism has its ancient, medieval, modern and other ancestral forms. Thus, through the understanding of all the problems of postmodernism, the idea of continuity of cultural development necessarily passes through, interpreted as a very complex process, primarily devoid of linearity.

We believe that the most successful and capacious model of postmodern multidimensionality is the unique model of modern culture proposed by J. Deleuze and F. Guatarri, which they talk about in their book “Rhizome”. The authors distinguish between two types of crops that coexist today - a “woody” culture and a “rhizome” culture. The first type of culture gravitates towards classical models and is inspired by the theory of mimesis. Art here imitates nature, reflects the world, is its graphic recording, tracing paper, photograph. The symbol of this art can be a tree, which represents the image of the world. The embodiment of "woody" art world serves as a book. There is no future for the “arboreal” type of culture; it is becoming obsolete, Deleuze and Guattari believe. Modern culture is a “rhizome” culture, and it is aimed at the future. The rhizome book will not be a tracing paper, but a map of the world; the semantic center will disappear in it. What is coming is not the death of the book, but the birth of a new type of creativity and, accordingly, reading. The book-rhizome will implement a fundamentally different type of connections: all its points will be interconnected, but these connections are structureless, multiple, confused, they are unexpectedly interrupted every now and then. This type of nonlinear relationship suggests a different way of reading. For clarity, Deleuze and Guattari introduce the concept of a “buffet”, when everyone takes whatever they want from a book-plate. Such a rhizome can be imagined as a “thousand plates,” which is what the authors call their next book.

This kind of organization literary text, W. Eco also noted, comparing the book with an encyclopedia, in which there is no linearity of narration, and which the reader reads from any place he needs.

Contemporary art consciously rejects many of the rules and restrictions developed by the previous cultural tradition, offers a different attitude of man to the world around him, and demonstrates a special vision. According to Lyotard, the artist or writer is in the situation of a philosopher, since he creates a creation that is not governed by any pre-established rules. These rules are created along with the creation and thus each creation becomes an event. Hence, postmodernity, according to Lyotard’s concept, should be understood as a paradox of the previous future.

In the sphere of artistic culture, the emergence of postmodernism, according to Fr. Jameson, caused by a reaction to the high forms of modernist art. Since there were several modernist forms of high art, various forms of postmodern art accordingly emerged, striving to supplant the previous ones in artistic practice. Jameson considers the erasure of previous categories of genre and discourse, which can be found in the field of so-called modern theory, to be a feature of postmodernism. This phenomenon applies primarily to French texts, but is gradually becoming widespread. For example, how to define the work of M. Foucault, Jameson asks, what is it, philosophy, history, social theory or political science? This kind of “theoretical discourse” is a feature of postmodernism. M. Ryklin believes: Foucault writes with literature, because in his texts there is a lot of uncertainty, unclassifiable tension, that in literature he sees machines of meaning. This kind of theoretical discourse, which has absorbed the features of artistic discourse, is a feature of the postmodern era.

So, postmodern pluralism becomes dominant in culture and this distinguishes postmodernism from modernism as a phenomenon of the late XIX - early XX centuries, where pluralism took place mainly in artistic field. Moreover, it is important that postmodern pluralism is more radical than any previous one. It is so radical that it can now become universal in a consistent manner.

In cultural postmodernity, characteristic of the 20th century is fulfilled. semantic structure of plurality. In all spheres of its manifestation, comprehending the experience of the previous development of mankind, returning to the origins and foundations, seeing in the path traveled not only errors and misconceptions, postmodernism is ready to see through the past and present what should be formed in the future, and thereby involves the search for ways to self-salvation and self-preservation of humanity.

Postmodernity is, of course, a phenomenon of Western culture. What was the attitude towards this phenomenon in our country? Let's take a short historical excursion. We mastered postmodernist issues in two ways; one of them is the publication of translated articles by Western authors; the other is the reflection of domestic authors on this revealed to the world Western phenomenon. Then they began their own experiments in the field of artistic and scientific creativity and retrospective understanding of phenomena national culture, which some authors have found it possible to call “postmodern”.

Perhaps the first information about postmodernism “first-hand”, accessible to a wide circle, was published in the collection “Calling a Spade a Spade”, which contained excerpts from the preface by W. Eco to the novel “The Name of the Rose”, in which compatriots could learn about some the main features inherent in postmodern literature.