The concept of the avant-garde is still today an area of contention
since its initial cultural formulation by Saint-Simon in 1825. One of the
most important works to emerge that added to the contemporary debate on the
avant-garde and post-modernism was the classic work by Peter Burger, The
Theory of the Avant- Garde. While this work had a profound impact on art
and literary theory and on discussions about the European avant-garde, it
has in recent years been criticized on a number of levels.
The central argument in Burger's book centers on the meaning and
definition of the term avant-garde and how the concept of the avant-garde
differed from modernism. These are crucial issues for Burger, which he
outlines in this work. Central to The Theory of the Avant-Garde is the
argument that the concept of the term - avant-garde - should be understood
as an awareness of the pitfalls of modernism and a radical attack on the
dominant institutions of art and literature. According to Burger the aim of
avant-garde should be to re-integrate art into life and to do away with
arts adherence to and association with ideologies and established
A cardinal aspect of the entire book, which has created controversy in
both academic and artistic debate, is the insistence that Burger makes
throughout his writing that there is a critical and sharp distinction
between modernism and the avant-garde. The book outlines the deficiencies
in modernism that, in Burger's view, contrast so clearly with the
definition of the avant-garde. He states that modernism is defined in
terms of its consistent and continuous adherence to the concept of
aesthetic autonomy. This refers to the cardinal characteristic of
modernism, which is the assumption that the value of art as "high art" is
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