A History of Contemporary Art
2024-2025
Contemporary Art, often ambiguous, multifaceted, and controversial, is characterized by works that challenge traditional models and stereotypes, resist categorization and interpretation, and require “alternative criteria” for understanding and critique.
This seminar will focus primarily on works created from the 1960s to the present, exploring concepts, practices, theories, and critiques that shape the contemporary “art world.” It will examine philosophical perspectives and theoretical formulations by thinkers such as Jean-François Lyotard (The Postmodern Condition), Jean Baudrillard (The Consumer Society, Simulacra and Simulation), Fredric Jameson (Postmodernism or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, The Ancients and the Postmoderns), David Harvey (The Condition of Postmodernity), and others. Parallel to these theoretical viewpoints, the seminar will explore various artistic movements (Pop Art, Conceptual Art, Minimalism, Installations, etc.) and practices (Performance, Land Art, Body Art, Video Art, Bio Art, etc.), culminating in works characterized by concepts such as appropriation, hybridity, interdisciplinarity, intermedial, eclecticism, and other elements of contemporary and postmodern production.
The seminar is aimed at art teachers at all educational levels, cultural sector professionals (galleries, museums, cultural organizations, etc.), journalists and critics of art and cultural events, students and graduates of cultural and artistic fields, artists, and anyone interested in understanding contemporary art within its historical, cultural, and social context.
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Betty – Gerhard Richter 1988
Lectures Include:
- Lecture 1: From Abstract Expressionism to Pop Art and Op Art. Color Field Painting, Structured Sculpture, Primary Structures, Environmental Sculpture, Photorealism, and Minimalism.
- Lecture 2: Conceptual Art, The Void and the Full, Language, Conceptualization, and Description of Art as Art, Fluxus, Joseph Beuys, Happenings, and Arte Povera.
- Lecture 3: Body Art, the Body and its Transformations, Installations, Performances, Environmental Art, and Land Art. The transition from material to immaterial.
- Lecture 4: Large-scale Sculptural Installations in Public Space, Postminimalism, Feminist and Postcolonial Critique.
- Lecture 5: Video Art, Appropriation Art, Recontextualization of Art, Intertextual and Intermedial Interpretation. New Conceptual Art, Irony, Humor, and Institutional Involvement.
- Lecture 6: The Institutional Critique Movement. The definitive transition from object-based art (pre-modern art) and subject-based art (modernism) to content-based art (postmodernism). Major exhibitions, contemporary museums, and the art market.
- Lecture 7: The Concept of the Postmodern in Visual Arts, Architecture, Literature, Philosophy, and Cultural-Political Critique. Visit to a Contemporary Art Exhibition/Museum.
| Duration | 21 hours, 7 sessions of 3 hours each |
| Schedule | Thursday 18:00-21:00 |
| Fee | €200 in 2 installments of €100 |
| Instructor | ΒΙΟΓΡΑΦΙΚΟ ΣΗΜΕΙΩΜΑGiannis Koukoulas – CV |
IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
- Annual membership registration required: €15
- Trial lessons are only available in monthly programs (1 per program) with the corresponding lesson fee.
- Membership fees for all monthly programs are paid in advance on the first day of the respective month.
- Official holidays are included in the fees and are not made up (Official holidays: 26/10, 28/10, 24/12 (half-day), 25/12, 26/12, 31/12 (half-day), 1/1, 6/1, Clean Monday, 25/3, 1/5, Holy Thursday (half-day), Good Friday, Holy Saturday, Easter Sunday, Easter Monday, Holy Spirit Day, and 15/8).
- In case of absence due to the member’s fault, no transfers are allowed.
- In departments with a waiting list, if the membership is not renewed within the first week of each month, the spot will be allocated.
- Tuition fees are non-refundable: if the participant cancels their participation for any reason, if they do not attend the lessons for any reason, or if they choose to discontinue during the lessons. Transfer of participation to a different program of YMCA Thessaloniki for themselves or for a relative within the same financial year is allowed.
- Cost of magnetic card in case of loss: €3
