Contemporary art is a term used to describe the art of today, generally referring to art produced from the 1970s onwards. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic combination of materials, methods, concepts, and subjects that continue the challenging of boundaries that was already well underway in the 20th century. Diverse and eclectic, contemporary art as a whole is distinguished by the very lack of a uniform, organising principle, ideology, or "-ism". Contemporary art is part of a cultural dialogue that concerns larger contextual frameworks such as personal and cultural identity, family, community, and nationality.
Vito Acconci was an American performance, video and installation artist, whose diverse practice eventually included sculpture, architectural design, and landscape design. His performance and video art was characterized by "existential unease," exhibitionism, discomfort, transgression and provocation, as well as wit and audacity, and often involved crossing boundaries such as public–private, consensual–nonconsensual, and real world–art world. His work is considered to have influenced artists including Laurie Anderson, Karen Finley, Bruce Nauman, and Tracey Emin, among others.
Joseph Kosuth is a Hungarian-American conceptual artist, who lives in New York and Venice, after having resided in various cities in Europe, including London, Ghent and Rome.
Alfred Earl "Al" Hansen was an American artist. He was a member of Fluxus, a movement that originated on an artists' collective around George Maciunas.
Lawrence Charles Weiner was an American conceptual artist. He was one of the central figures in the formation of conceptual art in the 1960s. His work often took the form of typographic texts, a form of word art.
Günter Brus was an Austrian painter, performance artist, graphic artist, experimental filmmaker, and writer.
Roman Opałka was a French-born Polish painter, whose works are mostly associated with conceptual art.
Peter Halley is an American artist and a central figure in the Neo-Conceptualist movement of the 1980s. Known for his Day-Glo geometric paintings, Halley is also a writer, the former publisher of index Magazine, and a teacher; he served as director of graduate studies in painting and printmaking at the Yale University School of Art from 2002 to 2011. Halley lives and works in New York City.
Raphael Montañez Ortiz is an American artist, educator, and founder of El Museo del Barrio, in East Harlem, New York City.
Hamish Fulton is an English walking artist. Since 1972 he has only made works based on the experience of walks. He translates his walks into a variety of media, including photography, illustrations, and wall texts. His work is contained in major museums' collections, such as the Tate Britain and MoMA. Since 1994 he has been creating group walks for the public. Fulton argues that "walking is an artform in its own right" and argues for wider acknowledgement of walking art.
Asia Art Archive (AAA) is a nonprofit organisation based in Hong Kong that documents the recent history of contemporary art in Asia within an international context. AAA incorporates material that members of local art communities find relevant to the field, and provides educational and public programming. AAA is one of the most comprehensive publicly accessible collections of research materials in the field. In activating its collections, AAA initiates public, educational, and residency programmes. AAA also offers research grants and publishes art and cultural criticism on its online platform 'Like a Fever'.
Internet art is a form of new media art distributed via the Internet. This form of art circumvents the traditional dominance of the physical gallery and museum system. In many cases, the viewer is drawn into some kind of interaction with the work of art. Artists working in this manner are sometimes referred to as net artists.
Michael Najjar is a German artist, adventurer and Future Astronaut. He lives and works in Berlin. In his artwork he takes a complex critical look at the technological forces shaping and drastically transforming the early 21st century.
Seo Soo-Kyoung, known by the artist name SEO (세오), is a South Korean contemporary artist who lives and works in Berlin, Germany. Her artist name comes from her family name Seo written in capital letters.
Xing Xin,, is a contemporary Chinese artist based in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, China, involved in installation and performance art. Xing Xin started as a performance artist in 2003, with an academic background in sculpture, and is currently teaching performance art, video art, and installation in Sichuan Fine Arts Institute.
Hans Kotter is a German artist whose art consists of lighting effects and color interacting with the environment.
Johannes Girardoni is an Austrian-American sculptor and installation artist who uses digital and analog technology. His work ranges from small, organic objects to large-scale interactive light installations.
Kathy Rae Huffman is an American curator, writer, producer, researcher, lecturer and expert for video and media art. Since the early 1980s, Huffman is said to have helped establish video and new media art, online and interactive art, installation and performance art in the visual arts world. She has curated, written about, and coordinated events for numerous international art institutes, consulted and juried for festivals and alternative arts organisations. Huffman not only introduced video and digital computer art to museum exhibitions, she also pioneered tirelessly to bring television channels and video artists together, in order to show video artworks on TV. From the early 1990s until 2014, Huffman was based in Europe, and embraced early net art and interactive online environments, a curatorial practice that continues. In 1997, she co-founded the Faces mailing list and online community for women working with art, gender and technology. Till today, Huffman is working in the US, in Canada and in Europe.
Rita Rohlfing is a German painter, photographer and installation artist.
Self-Portrait as a Soldier, or Selbstbildnis als Soldat, is an Expressionist oil-on-canvas painting by the German artist Ernst Ludwig Kirchner. Kirchner created this self-depiction in 1915, following his medical discharge from military service during the First World War. The artwork measures 69 centimetres in height by 61 centimetres in width. The painting was first exhibited in the 'Städtische Galerie' in Germany between 1916 and 1919 and currently resides at the Allen Memorial Art Museum in Ohio USA. Critical interpretations of the painting attribute its stark Expressionist style and myriad of symbolic elements to the socio-political turbulence of Germany during the First World War. Self Portrait as a Soldier may be viewed as testimony to Kirchner's volatile mental and physical health and as a critique of the chaotic instability of Germany during the early 20th century.
