WITH NO ACCENT Remake, remix, retread...

For some time it has become a normal thing to apologize when using the word "postmodernism." This term may mean almost everything or virtually nothing, which makes its use rather tempting and simultaneously causes guilt. Actually it is about the effect of postmodernism rather than postmodernism as such, if only the distinction between the cause and effect has not yet become an anachronism.

It is generally recognized that everything ever invented by elite culture will sooner or later be taken over by mass culture. Any creative phenomenon will eventually be absorbed, vulgarized, and circulated by mass culture. Thus the esthetics of the baroque have became an unexcelled pattern for conceited ersatz. Thus the pliable revelations of art nouveau are used in designing consumer goods. Thus the "paranoid critical" method employed by the surrealists is ideal for illustrating literary garbage. Many more examples may be provided. But in this case, only the legacy of postmodernism is discussed. One of the most general features of "classical postmodernism" (such phrases should, at any rate, be considered as oxymoron, but we tend not to notice the absurdity of our nearly exhausted language), anyway, one of the most general features of "classical postmodernism" is citation. Citation is like play, like a demonstration of one's own lack of ideas, like an ironic perception of any attempt to say anything serious. Even so, such ironic play is still playing with beads, an exquisite play, elite play, sophisticated, multilevel and completely appreciated only by those initiated. But, "with the passage of time artists are replaced (and here I cite Minsk artist Vitaly Kalgin) by art historians, while artists turn into curators," and nothing is left from the blessed phenomenon of postmodernism except the word (the use of which should probably require both an apology and cash fine.) and of the method, i.e., the citation we have mentioned. Upon entering the sphere of influence of mass culture, this method, which is based on the art of compilation, certainly undergoes a transformation or, to be more exact, be carried to the point of complete absurdity. It comes to be understood literally, giving birth to such phenomena like remake, remix and the like (note the re- prefix which means reverse or repeated action). Citation is replaced by arbitrary paraphrase, and compilation by casual copying.

Except for the plot, the remake of Goddard's film "To the Last Breath" has nothing in common with the original and, naturally, belongs to standard Hollywood production rather than the famous New Wave. Even if this is play (and if you want you will can elements of play almost anywhere), then it's not a quite clean one: it is a question of money, in the first place.

As reported by the press, a Ukrainian artist is going to recreate Goya's "Capriccios" in Canada. However, this won't be graphics, but installations and objects which are in fashion today. Is it a synthetic art or paraphrase of the set topic at a school lesson?

The majority of pop and rock hits now also have their so-called covers. I don't mean a new performance, but the very remix, which makes it possible, for instance, to listen to one and the same thing in arbitrary arrangement. You can even sing a duet with your famous farther, like Natalie Cole several years ago, despite the fact that the poor man was long dead. And, following Elton John, a song dedicated to a beauty who had been taken before her age can now be rededicated to another one, not a film-star but a princess, bringing in good money. However, this is also an issue of morality, which remake culture has nothing to do with.

All this in our high technological world may, if thinking consistently, eventually bring about global consequences: new works are not created anymore; rather, existing ones (of which we have more than enough) are adapted to the needs of each individual customer. Someone will order Anna Karenina with a happy ending, an inflatable Venus d'Milo and I probably will subscribe to The Day in which I won't have any column to write.