The intermediality of the avant-garde or the avant-garde of intermediality? Is the avant-garde intermedial?

Abstract

_{The article is an attempt to answer the question “Is the avant-garde intermedial?” Intermediality is not a new concept in the field of art and media theory; it has a long history, going back to 1965, when Dick Higgins published his essay Intermedia. The artist then tried to put his ideas into words as an intermedial manifesto of the avant-garde. This paper characterizes its assumptions, defines the notion of “intermedium”, and determines the basis of intermedial strategies. In the subsequent section of the paper the author starts a discussion about media theory and mediality in avant-garde art, looking at intermedial relationships in many artworks, and drawing attention to the objectification of art, which has led to the development of intermedial ready-mades and poème-objets. An important aspect of the intermedial activity of the avant-garde artists seems to be also the tension between the opposing poles of “gesture aesthetics” and “discourse strategy”. In the subsequent sections of his discussion of intermedial practices of the avant-garde artists, the author refers to the allegorical strategy described in Peter Bürger’s Theory of the Avant-Garde, whose aim is to work out the notion of a non-organic avant-garde work. It is characterized by montage, which can be compared to the process of integrating heterogeneous elements into a “new” whole, similar to the intermedium, which is a combination of different media. In this context montage may be understood as an intermedial process. The answer to the question “is the avant-garde intermedial?” is not obvious. The intermedial theories presented here seem to be anachronistic or even erroneous, because nobody understands intermediality currently like the avant-garde in the 1960s.}