They're talking about the post 50s abstract expressionism and pop art movements.
Just because it says "modern art" doesn't mean it refers to any and all modern art, much less 19th century art or say cubism or dada.
Which is exactly the problem. If you're going to make an argument that depends on analyzing one very specific thing detached from its surrounding context, you have to actually address that context, and justify why you're ignoring it.
The claim that 1950s pop art was deliberately engineered by a CIA conspiracy for geopolitical purposes can't be sustained without explicitly arguing for why it isn't a natural evolution from the existing trends in art and design that were already prevalent at the time.
I think we can all agree that naming anything "modern" or "new" or "nu" (for new) is simply deeply dumbfucktarded.
GP talks about the 1860s: I'm sorry but nothing about the 1860s is "modern" in 2026. Just as nothing from 2026 shall be "modern" in 2160.
It's nearly as if at least one of the two hardest problems in computer science, naming things, applied to other things too.
'Humans are horrible', oh no I meant only that subset of 3 individuals, you should understand my context... thats weak excuse to be polite.
It shouldn't be attached to anything that can age out of this meaning.
> In the context of art history, modernity (Fr. modernité) has a more limited sense, modern art covering the period of c. 1860–1970.
It's more than a century old now.
"Modern art" in the 1950s/60s post-war sense means extreme abstraction with no realism at all.
Ironically abstraction can work in two directions - evocative messes like Pollock, or clean geometry and abstract functionalism in design and architecture.
The CIA liked the former in art because it was bold, challenging, abrasive, and individualistic. And the artists were drunks and addicts who were easy to own.
The other direction became domestic and corporate design.
And probably also due to it being a counterpoint to the constructivist styles that were being actively promoted by Soviet authorities at the time.
Clinton was just ahead of the curve.
But I was trying to reach the person who left the parent comment.
And hitting them with a phrasing that is directly poststructuralist seemed to be the wrong approach since they appear to operate in a structuralist framing.
What it is not is obvious to derive from first principles ("says modern, so much mean current") or stuck to a single definition ("but historians call any art after the middle ages Modern").
But it is still trivial to pick the context in either use, and trivial for someone to read at least 1 paragraph about the "CIA psy-op" claim, whether it's true or not, and figure what it means by modern art there (it doesn't mean Van Gogh or Monet). People just want to comment without bothering.
However, when you tie the word "new" or in this case "modern" to a time period that was over a hundred years ago you are just setting yourself up for failure and have to make do with calling things "after new" or in this case "post modern". But then where will this end?
What was wrong with calling periods proper names like Renaissance, Baroque and Romantic?
Eras only get these proper names long after they're over. To people living during those eras, they were just "now".
Or as Aristotle would say, start with definitions.
I really do not get arguing about semantics. It is all arbitrary. You need to agree on what is meant to even intend on having a conversation.
There is a language comprehension issue in this thread. At no point does the title imply its invention, it does however imply it is about the CIA and it's a huge tell identifying the injection of personal bias into meaning through either lazy reading, internal personal grievances, or a lost in translation misunderstanding.
"modern art" is of larger scope than CIA; thus "CIA" is the stronger relevant subject matter which narrows the secondary subject and should be understood/read as "modern art in the CIA era" or " CIA era modern art". The "era" is derived by applying "CIA" to "modern art".
This is probably where the mis-read/mis-translation happened. Since "era" is not explicit, modern art narrowed to all things within CIA scope could imply the CIA had a department full of alternative lifestyle bohemian spys creating and spreading modern art (not far off though, they commissioned works and funded related entities). A basic knowing of the CIA would dismiss this as absurd.
However, a translation error happening here can turn "modern art created by the CIA" into "modern art invented by the CIA".