Postmodernism assumes that there is no longer a center. Every form of expression becomes one of many possible versions of reality, and truth is fragmented into context, perspective, and irony. In this world, language ceases to describe the world and becomes a tool for its constant deconstruction. What was meant to convey meaning transforms into a game, a quotation, a mask, or a reference to another statement. The artist does not create a work in the traditional sense but a structure of references—reconfiguring rather than building. This raises the question: is it possible to create a language that not only “comments” but genuinely “communicates”?
Conscious Abstraction emerged as a response, and in a sense as a resistance, to this fragmentation. Instead of irony, it emphasizes relationality; instead of deconstruction, it establishes a linguistic system. Its aim is not to build a narrative but to convey structures of meaning that can be recognized both intuitively and through analysis of the relationships between forms. The image ceases to be merely a quotation or gesture—it becomes a conceptual communication.
The first point of tension between these approaches is hierarchy. Postmodernism denies its existence, rejecting the idea of universal meaning. Conscious Abstraction, on the other hand, requires at least a logical order among the elements of the language, attempting to reconstruct meaning not through figuration or ideology, but through the process of conscious interpretation. Meaning is no longer given from above—it is developed in the interaction between the work and the viewer.
The second point of tension is the role of the viewer. In postmodernist art, the spectator often remains alone, lost in a thicket of references, quotations, and irony, and meaning can be subversive, mischievous, or even absent. Conscious Abstraction places the viewer in the role of an active decoder: they must engage with the structure of the work, recognize repetitions, shifts, tensions, and arrangements in order to extract its meaning. This is not “interpretation” in the classical sense but a logical and conscious understanding constructed from the relationships between elements of the work.
The third conflict concerns the nature of language itself. Postmodernism demystifies language, treating it as a tool of manipulation, domination, and destabilization. Conscious Abstraction, in contrast, treats language as the foundation for possible understanding, based not on figuration but on conceptual relations. Instead of deconstruction, it offers an alternative construction: it does not replicate old forms but operates in a symbolic space where meaning arises from tensions between abstract qualities.
Postmodernism opened a necessary wound, questioning meaning, form, the subject, and even truth, yet it remained at the level of disintegration. Conscious Abstraction does not reject this deconstruction but offers a way forward—a project for a new language. It is not a return to classical forms nor an attempt to restore lost meaning. It is a language that need not be pictorial but remains readable in its structure. The conflict with postmodernism is therefore not merely aesthetic or philosophical: it is a fundamental difference in belief that communication is still possible. Where some see ruins, others perceive a network of references ready to be transformed into the language of a new generation.