The Story of Contemporary Art

An informative overview and historical account of contemporary art from around the world, covering the period from 1960 to the present.

Contemporary art has never been easy to pin down. Breakthroughs aren't straightforward and developments do not follow a line of progress or sequence of artistic movements, and this is what makes it unique in the history of art. Acknowledging this, author Tony Godfrey crafts a narrative from a series of often dramatic creative conflicts and arguments around what art is or should be. From object versus sculpture, painting versus conceptual, to local versus global, and gallery versus wider world, The Story of Contemporary Art traces a history in terms of drastic changes in social and political life over the last sixty years.

What does it all mean?
Can it really be art?
Why is it so expensive?

Although questions like this are always asked about contemporary art, they are not the questions that E. H. Gombrich set out to answer in his seminal book The Story of Art. Contemporary art is very different from what came before. From the 1960s, where Gombrich’s account concludes, artists began to abandon traditional forms of art and started to make work that questioned art’s very definition. This is where Godfrey picks up the story.

When examining the relationship between art and the ever-changing world, Godfrey emphasizes the importance of considering various perspectives, including those of critics, theorists, curators, collectors, audiences, and artists. An important narrative in the book is the story of how the common perception that what was accepted as art by the establishment was made almost exclusively by white - often old - men from North America and Western Europe, has been radically overturned.

This book is both thought-provoking and insightful, without being overly academic, as it explores the development of contemporary art.