Chapter 6: Consumer Culture and the Manufacturing of Desire

The main discussion topic of Chapter six is how art plays a major part in countries' economies because they are selling for high prices. Advertizing, television, books, etc. sells artwork. There are several stages of art. Modernism was aroung the twentieth century (1900). Manet was one of the artists of this time period. This is when the anti-art or dada came to be, after World War I. They think that beauty is not an art. In 1922, T.S. Elliot wrote The Wasteland and Hallowmen. The next stage is Postmodernism which occured around the 60's and 70's. It came to be around World War II. It was a rejection of Modernism. "After Aushchwitz how can you write poetry," one very famous poet asked. Also the idea that are can do anything, it could cure cancer. Media came to be a form of art as well. Pop musicians also formed, people like Radiohead and Moby. Bricolage took dominant art forms, reconstructed them and used them in different ways. Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacah came up that human being hunger or desire something and when that is fulfilled they hunger for something else. Lacah says that there is always a gap or lack of desire. The term "the grass is always greener on the other side" is a good way to explain what they mean.