Introduction In her landmark 1999 essay “Reinventing the Medium,” Rosalind Krauss responds to a crisis in contemporary art: the idea that we live in a “post-medium condition,” where artists can use any material or technology freely. While this sounds liberating, Krauss argues it leads to a loss of critical rigor. She offers a powerful defense of the medium—not as a traditional category (like oil painting or bronze sculpture), but as a set of technical conventions and recursive rules that generate meaning.
Key Arguments
Against the “Post-Medium Condition” Krauss directly challenges the influence of critic Clement Greenberg. Greenberg believed modernism meant each medium purifying itself (painting becoming flatness). Krauss argues that after minimalism and conceptual art, the medium didn’t disappear. Instead, it was reinvented as a technical support—a prosthesis for the artist.
The Medium as a Technical Support For Krauss, a medium is not a material (e.g., “video”) but a set of conventions derived from a technical apparatus. She famously analyzes James Coleman’s slide projections and William Kentridge’s animated drawings. These artists don’t just use film or drawing—they build a new medium by establishing recursive rules (e.g., Kentridge’s erasure-and-redrawing process).
Recursiveness and Difference A true medium, in Krauss’s sense, generates meaning through internal difference and repetition. It’s not about expressing an idea through any means available, but about constraining yourself to a set of operations that become the content itself. This is what separates “art” from mere illustration or spectacle.
Why This Matters Today Krauss’s essay is essential reading for anyone working with digital media, installation, or post-internet art. It warns us that without a medium (a structure of repetition and difference), art collapses into “the narcissistic, the formless, or the purely informational.” For example, an Instagram slideshow or a VR experience becomes art only when the artist invents or repurposes a technical logic that structures the viewer’s experience over time.
Discussion Questions
Further Reading (No PDF, but check your library or JSTOR)
Tip for finding the essay legally: If you are a student, check your university library’s online database (JSTOR, Project MUSE, or MIT Press Direct). Many public libraries also offer free access to academic journals through interlibrary loan or digital archives.
Rosalind Krauss’s 1999 essay "Reinventing the Medium" defines the "post-medium condition" by arguing that artists must replace traditional material-based mediums with technical supports derived from obsolete technologies. The text highlights artists like James Coleman and William Kentridge who use these constraints to create a "differential specificity" in their work. The full text is available for download at Critical Inquiry.
Rosalind Krauss’s "Reinventing the Medium" argues against the exhaustion of traditional art forms, proposing a "post-medium condition" where artists define new, internal rules for their work rather than adhering to traditional materials. Key to this theory is the concept of "technical support" and the reinvention of mediums, illustrated through artists like Marcel Broodthaers and James Coleman. rosalind krauss reinventing the medium pdf
Reinventing the Medium" (1999) Rosalind Krauss explores how photography shifted from an aesthetic object to a theoretical one, eventually leading to a "post-medium condition" where artists must invent their own specific "technical supports"
Below is a structured paper summary based on Krauss’s arguments. You can view the original text or related academic discussions on platforms like Semantic Scholar ResearchGate Paper: Rosalind Krauss and the Reinvention of the Medium I. The Obsolescence of Photography
Krauss begins by looking back at the 1960s, a period when photography converged with traditional art forms. Paradoxically, she argues that photography’s triumph as an art form occurred just as it was becoming commercially and technically obsolete due to the rise of digital technology. Theoretical Object:
Rather than being judged for its beauty, photography became a site for exploring concepts like the simulacrum (Baudrillard) and (Barthes). The End of Aura:
Drawing on Walter Benjamin, Krauss notes that mechanical reproduction destroyed traditional notions of artistic unity and authorship. II. From "Medium" to "Technical Support"
To move beyond the "outmoded" and "positivist" definition of a medium (which usually refers only to physical materials like canvas or oil paint), Krauss proposes the term "technical support" Definition:
A technical support is a specific set of rules or conventions an artist adopts to create meaning.
In cinema, the "technical support" might be the synchronized sound or the physical celluloid, which artists like Vertov or Marclay manipulate to reveal the nature of the art itself. III. The Post-Medium Condition
Krauss, Reinventing The Medium (Critical Inquiry 1999) - Scribd
Introduction
Rosalind Krauss is a prominent art critic and theorist known for her influential writings on modern and contemporary art. In her essay "Reinventing the Medium," Krauss explores the changing nature of artistic media and the ways in which artists continually redefine and expand the possibilities of art.
The Essay's Main Argument
Published in 1999, "Reinventing the Medium" is a thought-provoking essay that challenges traditional notions of artistic media and the creative process. Krauss argues that the medium of art is not a fixed or stable entity, but rather a dynamic and constantly evolving concept that is subject to reinvention by artists. She contends that the medium is not simply a technical or material support, but a complex system of conventions, norms, and expectations that shape the way artists work and the way we understand art.
Key Points
Impact and Influence
"Reinventing the Medium" has had a significant impact on contemporary art discourse, influencing artists, critics, and curators to think more critically about the nature of artistic media. The essay has also contributed to a broader rethinking of art history, encouraging scholars to consider the complex and multifaceted ways in which art has evolved over time.
Conclusion
Rosalind Krauss's essay "Reinventing the Medium" offers a provocative and insightful exploration of the changing nature of artistic media. By challenging traditional notions of the medium and highlighting the dynamic and creative ways in which artists work, Krauss encourages us to think more critically about the possibilities of art and the role of the artist in shaping those possibilities.
References: Krauss, R. (1999). Reinventing the Medium. In R. Krauss, The Optical Unconscious (pp. 277-295). MIT Press.
Once you locate the PDF, do not read it linearly. Krauss writes in a dense, crystalline style—every sentence carries weight. Follow this method: The Medium as a Technical Support For Krauss,
“Reinventing the Medium” became foundational for:
Critics have noted that Krauss’s model works best for artists who produce a coherent body of work around a single support (e.g., Nauman, Coleman, William Kentridge). It is less applicable to eclectic or purely discursive practices.
As mentioned, Coleman’s work uses a single slide projected over time with layered audio. Krauss argues that this medium creates a “suspended” temporality. Unlike cinema (24 frames per second), the slide projector allows for duration without narrative flow. The viewer is trapped in a perpetual present, which Coleman uses to explore political trauma (e.g., The Boy Who Saw the Iceberg).
In her essay, Krauss uses various examples, but one of the most powerful ways to understand her theory is through the lens of "monochrome" painting (artists like Malevich, Rauschenberg, or Ryman).
When an artist paints a canvas pure white, are they destroying painting? Krauss argues they are revealing the medium.
By removing the image (the picture of a landscape or a person), the artist forces the viewer to look at the support—the physical fabric, the texture of the paint, the wall behind it. They take the "automatic" part of painting (the canvas) and turn it into the subject itself.
This is the crux of "Reinventing the Medium." It is not about working within the rules of a medium; it is about dismantling the medium to find its hidden, structural truths.
Krauss borrows the term “post-medium condition” from philosopher Stanley Cavell. However, she clarifies that this condition does not mean the end of media. Rather, it signals the breakdown of traditional, a priori media (e.g., painting, sculpture) and opens the possibility for artists to invent new, specific media on a case-by-case basis.
“The post-medium condition does not imply the negation of the medium. On the contrary, it opens the way for the medium’s reinvention.”
Let’s be honest: Krauss is difficult. Her sentences are labyrinthine, and her references assume you have read Lacan, Freud, and Greenberg. If you have secured the PDF, do not simply read it from start to finish in one sitting. Krauss uses various examples
Here is a reading strategy: