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Another reason why an avant-garde may be harder to locate today centres on the issue of kitsch.
Clement Greenberg describes kitsch as an art form that takes the effect of the avant-garde without taking into consideration the intent behind its original production.
Say a filmmaker in the 1920s rejects the idea of rational comprehension, because he feels that a belief in rationalism led directly to the outrages of WW1. A young ambitious director today can watch the resulting film, but simply say to himself, wow, that looks cool. He then copies the effect (but not the underlying idea) in a video he makes for an indie band, and then gets it played on MTV2. This, unlike the original film, is not avant-garde, but rather an example of kitsch.
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