pomo art

"If the painter and novelist do not want to be, in their turn, apologists for what exists (and minor ones at that), they must renounce such therapeutic occupations. They must question the rules of the art of painting and narration as learned and received from their predecessors. They soon find that such rules are so many methods of deception, seduction, and reassurance that make it impossible to be "truthful." An unprecedented split occurs in both painting and literature. Those who refuse to reexamine the rules of art will make careers in mass conformism, using "correct rules" to bring the endemic desire for reality into communication with objects and situations capable of satisfying it ... As for artists and writers who agree to question the rules of the plastic and narrative arts and perhaps share their suspicions by distributing their work - they are destined to lack credibility in the eyes of the devoted adherents of reality and identity, to find themselves without a guaranteed audience."

-Jean-François Lyotard