Visual Aids for TED Talk

My paradigm shift essay was on modern conceptual art and how it has evolved from the preceding Dadaist and Pop Art movements of the twentieth century — picking up new stylizations like a deviation from realist techniques and a “democratization” or abstraction of subject matter. I was thinking of using three visual aids that might be representative of each fundamental facet of each movement. For instance, the Dada artist Marchel Duchamp emphasized the possibility of using mass-produced “readymades” like toilets as being art forms, so I would put up a slide like this:

Duchamp also effectively challenged the previously accepted notions of fine-art. Next, I was thinking of using a wordle, or a word cloud, of the word “art” and emphasizes its changing usages throughout recorded history to show how the term and its scope have broadened significantly.

The word choices above were mostly plucked from my essay and the modern definitions of art. The word cloud shows that contemporary outlooks on art now encompass things like “imagination”, “pop culture”, “everyday”, and “meaning maker” — things that were all built up by the Dada and Pop Art movements.

My third visual might be something like this:

^ A picture of a sea of green apples and a bright red apple tucked in between the rows. Contemporary art and the “modern artistic license” really gives the artist a lot of freedom and leniency in his or her works, which reflects this sort of individualist mindset in society today. Art forms nowadays are respected for their expression and captivation of intriguing ideas. Moreover, contemporary, modern art tends to stray away from the elitist works of early centuries; ordinary, everyday subject matters and more abstract ways of portraying imagery hold a popular appeal. Art can be appreciated even if the work doesn’t bear direct realism. This photograph I think shows this theme of “individualism” well.