Postmodern art represented a reaction against the prevalent trends in modern and popular art of the period, particularly of anything considered avant-garde. In painting, postmodernism reintroduced conventional techniques and subject matter to art with the use of industrial materials and pop culture imagery. While modern artist provided unity and coherence through art, postmodern artists celebrated the discontinuity and fragmentation of their subjects.

During the late 1940s and early 1950s, artists realized that the process of making art (such as working on the floor, throwing and dropping lines of paint) is just as important as the piece of art itself. With abstract painting in the 1950s and 1960s, hard-edge painting and geometric shapes became popular amongst artists. Performance based works of art emerged later with the combination of sculpture, dance, and music with audience participation. The abstract expressionist style combined the use of manufactured items with traditional art materials, while pop art emerged with the focus on the mass production and the consumer culture. Fluxus artists worked with whatever materials were available, and as minimalism emerged, artists focused on extreme simplicity. Other movements in postmodern art include installation art (art that uses any media to transform a space or an area), multi-media art, and the return of traditional art forms in the 1970s and 1980s through neo-expressionism.

Famous Postmodern Artists

Jackson Pollock
Robert Rauschenberg
Barnett Newman

Untitled Combine, 1963
by Robert Rauschenberg