If an art piece uses only old/discarded materials, is it still counted as modern art?

Question

Please give reasons for your answer, or at least something that will hold up under debate XD

Answer 1

"Modern" in common parlance means "contemporary", but in art history, it's the cultural style that predominated the west from roughly 1875-1950,

To be "modern" in style, the work should be based on some intellectual theoretical foundation.  It will usually break with tradition in some major ways, but that break is not done for rebellious or novel reasons--it's got to be solidly defensible.  When Arthur Miller wrote "Death of a Salesman", he published essays about why a common man could be the hero of a tragic play.  Paul Klee wrote a book about his theory of painting--it was over 1000 pages.  Artaud's treatise on "Theatre of Cruelty", Sartre's existentialism, Dali's Freudian-basd surrealism, Picasso's cubism (founded on the theories of formalism originally advanced by Cezanne), Gaugin's primitivism--not to mention musical primitivism, atonalism, impressionism--and poetry's symbolism and formalism...  All "isms", all the time.

If you make a piece NOW, it's in the postmodernist period (eventually, someone will come up with a better name for it, after it's over).  The postmodernist is a wildly romanticist, Dionysian time when artists NEVER explain their work (well, some do, but most say "my work speaks for itself").  And every work is supposed to be so earth-shatteringly novel that only freaks can relate to it.

In either case, the choice of material matters not at all.  In the midieval period, much architecture used parts salvaged from Roman times; they're still medieval works, not Roman!

Answer 2

"Modern Art" is a stylistic movement (that, ironically enough, isn't modern anymore).  Just because art is modern doesn't mean it's "Modern Art".  And yes, it can still be modern even if it uses old materials (the core of the Exquisite Corpse).

The materials don't determine whether something is old or new.

Answer 3

paint's been around for centuries, thats pretty old, but its still used to make 'modern' art

xx

Answer 4

"Modern" refers to the school or style not the materials.