Avant BasicA new generation of postmodern design plays into similar 70s pastiche, but without the political teethByElizabeth Goodspeed November 26, 2024Design (Elizabeth Goodspeed)SHAREYou cant step into a millennials apartment today without tripping over a piece of furniture with wiggly lines. From the resurgence of neobaroque furniture to the playful, almost cartoonish typography on product packaging, postmodernism is back, yet again. Once a rebellious movement that sought to undermine the coldness of modernism with irony and eclecticism, postmodernism, or PoMo for short, has mellowed into something a bit more cheerful and accessible, with the focus on visual delight rather than intellectual depth. But theres a reason this trend is sometimes called Avant Basicits avant-garde aesthetics stripped of their edge for the mainstream. Of course, the new millennium has already seen one rehash of postmodernism: the Memphis Groupinspired aesthetics of the Indie Sleaze 2000s. In 2012, mixtapes and graphic tees alike indulged in clashing colors, squiggles, and geometric typefaces like Babyteeth (first made famous in a Bob Dylan poster by Milton Glaser, later resurrected on a 2006 album for the Rapture). But as the word sleaze may suggest, this second pass at Memphis Milano brought much of the same cynicism and cheeky bad taste as its predecessors. While 20th-century postmodernism used irony to question rigidity and dogmatism in modern design, Indie Sleaze PoMo widened its aperture to lambast the prosperity promised by the digital age and consumer-driven culture.Read more on aninteriormag.com. Furniture DesignPostmodernism