Week 3- 'Postmodernism' at the V&A

We visited the Postmodernism: Style & Subversion show this week and were asked to
'Engage in the show and within context of the module ask yourself which work in the show underlines your idea of what is 'technological' (draw, take notes, sneak photos).'


I chose costumes and clips from Blade Runner

These epitomised the technological for me as the film presents a future in which the line between evolution and technology has been blurred to such an extreme that artificial people can disguise themselves among real humans. I agree with Walter Benjamin's observation that "technology is not the mastery of nature but of the relations between nature and man" and apparently so does the Sci-fi genre with its recurring robotic humans. Any dystopian plot requires forethought with regards to human beings and the way we interact with our environment. This is interesting in the context of David Nye's theory that making or using tools is similar to composing a narrative: you need to imagine a sequence of events with multiple outcomes.  

A key scene/costume from the exhibition which illustrates my ideas of the 'technological' are these in which Zhora, a human replicant, flees from her attacker (Blade Runner) in a clear plastic raincoat. She has been created by humans and now she is destroyed by one, crashing through glass windows and falling to the floor among inanimate mannequins, which is what she becomes in death.

Though Blade Runner questions the relationship between humans and technology, for me it defines technology in the simple terms of tools which are invented to solve problems:


Human replicants solve the problem of boredom and difficult labour: they are made to work and entertain.
The Voight-Kamff machine solves the problem of identifying the replicants and
'Spinners' (flying police vehicles) and weapons solve the problem of 'retiring' (killing) them.

I found the exhibition very useful in understanding Postmodernism as a movement in art, fashion and culture. I would now be able to recognise an object as 'postmodern' in a context outside this museum.

David Nye comments on the unstable use of the word technology in recent years; it became complicated in the 90s as it became synonymous with computers, telephones etc. It is easy to make the mistake of saying the 'New Wave' music video section of the exhibition was the most technological, but technology is older than this. Though I chose a film, I recognise that all of the objects in the show, from teapots to chairs can be considered in terms of 'technology'. Ideas such as 'how can I have something to sit on' or 'how can I brew and pour my tea' would have led to earlier cultures creating useful objects like those in the exhibition. Obviously the ones displayed are not the first of their kind to be invented, they are a postmodern version, expanding on the object's original function to add a decorative statement which brings freedom to design and shatters established ideas about style.