Abstract

The research article discusses the concept of “the transavantgarde”—a term coined by an Italian art critic, Achille Bonito Oliva, to describe certain phenomena in visual arts (especially painting) which have appeared since the end of 1970s—and attempts to adapt it for a discussion of twentieth-century Polish music. The transavantgarde (Italian la transavanguardia) is an Italian form of expressionism in art (neoexpressionism); it originated as a rejection of modernism, formalism, innovation, originality, and stylistic coherence and began to treat tradition in a new way, intensely referring to 16th century mannerism, ambiguity, stylistic pluralism and polysemy. While on the one hand transavantgarde artists are fully aware of the crisis of the avantgarde experiment, on the other they aim to create content-packed works of deeply expressive and romantic character. The transavantgarde is widely considered an early stage of postmodernism, or simply its synonym. There is a difference, though, between the transavantgarde and the postmodern. Oliva speaks of a journey from America to Europe and back. My article discusses these differences, systematizes the most important stylistic aspects and aesthetic ideas and applies these observations to the study of music—a discipline Oliva did not take into consideration. A key issue in the description of the transavantgarde in Polish music is to analyze trends that precede it, are synchronous with it and follow it in history. It is also important to trace borrowings and differences along this time axis. In order to offer an insight of this sort I first present different concepts of “modernity” and “postmodernity” that have appeared in music (and art) of the twentieth century, and then I juxtapose them with the Italian original idea of la transavanguardia.