Beyond the Frame: Decoding Rosalind Krauss’s "Reinventing the Medium"
However, time has vindicated Krauss. In the 2020s, as NFT art and generative AI flood the market, her concept of the “technical support” is more urgent than ever. AI art, for example, does not have a medium in the Greenbergian sense; but Krauss would ask: What is the technical support of a diffusion model? (The latent space? The prompt interface? The training data’s bias?). rosalind krauss reinventing the medium pdf
In "Reinventing the Medium" (1999), Rosalind Krauss critiques the "post-medium condition," advocating for a return to "technical support" or specific artistic conventions over the generic, mixed-media approach of contemporary art. Drawing on Walter Benjamin, she argues for the "redemptive obsolescence" of mediums, highlighting artists like James Coleman and William Kentridge who redefine their work through specific, self-imposed rules. Read the full text at Semantic Scholar . Rosalind Krauss: between modernism and post- medium recursive Crucially, this medium is : it generates
For students, scholars, and artists searching for the , the quest is not merely about finding a file. It is about accessing a master key to understanding postmodernism, post-media art, and the very structure of visual perception. This article unpacks the essay’s dense arguments, explains why it remains essential reading, and provides legitimate pathways to locating the PDF. and post-Internet art
Crucially, this medium is : it generates its own internal logic and criteria for success/failure, independent of broader artistic trends or market demands.
In an era of AI-generated images, NFTs, and post-Internet art, “Reinventing the Medium” offers a vital toolkit. It asks us not to abandon the question “What is this art’s medium?” but to answer it differently: not by naming a material (oil on canvas, digital file) but by .
Many scanned versions omit the footnotes. Krauss’s footnotes are legendary—they contain half the argument (debates with Stanley Cavell, citations of Gilles Deleuze). When downloading any PDF, ensure it includes pages 308-312 (the notes). Without them, you lose the chassis of her intellectual architecture.