Contemporary Art

Contemporary art is the art of contemporary times that finds its relevance and inspiration from the day to day events, human emotions and circumstances. Contemporariness in artforms started to emerge soon after the first world war when people started to feel the need to portray life and the sufferings through art. Artists that fall in the contemporary art category often work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a result of a dynamic combination of methods, concepts, materials and subjects that continuously challenge boundaries, thus giving rise to even abstract contemporary art now. Contemporary art is defined by its diversity and eclectic approach and as a whole is distinguished by the very lack of a uniform, organising principle, an ideology. The classification of “contemporary art '' as a special genre of art goes back to the beginnings of modernism in Europe and mostly London.

The contemporary art society, as a private society for purchasing works of art to palaces and museums, was founded in 1910 by the critic roger fry and others. A number of other institutions using the term were founded in the 1930s, such as in 1938 the contemporary art society of Adelaide, Australia, and an increasing number after 1945. Many, like the institute of contemporary art, Boston changed their names from ones using “modern art”  in this period, as modernism came to be defined as a historical art movement, and much “modern'' art ceased to be “contemporary”. One of the consequences of the drastic changes over short periods of time in the world and the behaviour and mannerisms of people has also been seen in contemporary art paintings. It has become thoroughly questioning in nature, introspective. The changes amount to a situation that has come to identify itself as contemporary. Works of art, before they become anything else, are a testimony to the fact that they come into being within their contemporaries. Shifts from modern contemporary art to contemporary art occurred in every cultural milieu throughout the world. However, contemporary art painting is also very often criticised for its stark connection to distinctive realities. Perhaps, the greatest hindrance to a critical knowledge of contemporary art is the common sense belief that the phrase “contemporary art” has no critically meaningful referent, that, it designates to no more than the “radically heterogenous empirical totality of artworks” produced within the time-frame of the notion of the present. The institutions of art have also been criticised for regulating what is designated as famous contemporary art. Outsider art, for example, is also contemporary art, in that it is produced in the present day. One critic has argued it is not considered so because the artists are self-taught and are thus presumed to be working outside of a socio-historical context.

At any one time a particular place or group of artists can have a strong influence on subsequent contemporary art. The ferus gallery, for example, was a commercial gallery in Los Angeles and re-invigorated the Californian contemporary art scene in the late fifties and the sixties. A common concern since the early part of the 20th century has been the penultimate question of what actually constitutes art. In the contemporary period (1950 to now), the concept of avant-garde may come into play in determining what art is noticed by galleries, museums, and collectors. Contemporary art in India has been present since modern art was accepted and propagated through the Bengal school of painting. India contemporary art and abstract art has an immense involvement of gods and goddesses. Indian contemporary art which focuses on deities includes contemporary modern art radhakrishna painting, contemporary durga painting, abstract contemporary durga painting etc