Grove Art Online - Modernity

        In Terry Smith's Grove Art Online article, "Modernity," he illustrates how the term can be broken down into two parts: the nature of modernity and modernity and the arts. He first defines modernity as a "term applied to the cultural condition in which the seemingly absolute necessity of innovation becomes a primary fact of life, work and thought." The term originated in the mid-19th century and was powerful during the colonization of non-European countries and new cultures formed in Europe. Smith argues that modernity is not just the idea of something being modern, or the gap between deciphering if something is old or new, it's meaning goes much deeper than that.
        One line that struck me while reading this article was "Modernity is living in, and with, perpetual flux." I found this line intriguing because although it is short, it too has a deep, complex meaning. I think a big idea that goes along with modernity is the idea of change, yet its consistency throughout life. I would personally define "perpetual flux" as an act of flowing or constant movement; continuous succession. Modernity can be seen in and directly flows with change, one cannot happen without the other. As Smith states, change is the inevitable result of functioning forces outside of ourselves and many times is unpredictable. Due to this observation of change, modernity can be something that provokes a "preoccupation in us" with significance, occurrence, as well as definition.
          This idea that Smith is offering about modernity and its nature directly relates to The Communist Manifesto of 1848 by Marx and Engels. Smith does include an excerpt of it but the relationship goes beyond just that. The Communist Manifesto argues that development and production is inevitable and also that relationships change due to different factors. In this manifesto, class relationships were defined by an era's means of production. Although these changes had been resisted from the start of the Industrial Revolution, they occurred anyways due to larger forces of change that drowned the public's resistance to an unpredictable world they were unfamiliar with.
            In summation, modernity has been and will continue to be associated with change, as well as cultural and intellectual movements that occurred during different historical time periods, one example being post-industrial life.