"Post-modernism is modernism with the optimism taken out"

Robert Hewison's assertion that "Post-modernism is modernism with the optimism gotten" supplies a succinct structure for comprehending the transition from the modernist to the post-modernist ethos in art, architecture, literature, and broader cultural expressions. To translate this quote, it is necessary to think about the core principles of modernism and how post-modernism diverges from them.

Modernism, which grew in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, was identified by a positive optimism and a belief in development, development, and the possibility of developing a better world. It accepted originalities, technologies, and forms, typically rejecting conventional styles and conventions in favor of experimentation and the pursuit of pureness and functionality. Modernist architects like Le Corbusier and authors like James Joyce exhibited this spirit, intending to improve society basically in the image of modernity.

By contrast, post-modernism, emerging in the mid-to-late 20th century, reflects a more hesitant, questioning attitude. This motion was born from a growing disillusionment with the promises of modernism, particularly in the wake of historical events like the 2 World Wars, the Vietnam War, and the Atomic Age, which exposed the failure of innovation and progress to guarantee a better, more ethical world. Instead of sticking to a single story of progress, post-modernism accepted pluralism, paradox, and pastiche. Designers like Robert Venturi and artists like Andy Warhol had fun with historic referrals and accepted complexity and contradiction, moving away from modernism's clearness and simplicity.

Therefore, Hewison's quote highlights how the vibrant self-confidence of modernism paved the way to the realisms and complexities of post-modernism. The optimism that as soon as drove modernist perfects was changed with a more nuanced viewpoint, suspicious of grand stories and available to diverse analyses of truth. Post-modernism, for that reason, is a cultural reflection of an era where certainty is elusive, and reality is typically seen as subjective and fragmented.