Discussing widespread ahistoricism in internationalist, or what I would term "academicist," Postmodernism, Elkins writes:
"(The list of periods might look like this):
Art History
(No subdivisions)
The Present
Psychologically, such a radically collapsed sense of history is a great relief for people burdened by a nagging sense of the importance of history. Suddenly, all art is possible, and nothing needs to be studied. ... Some art historians who work exclusively on contemporary art feel the same exhilaration: they can apply any theories they want, interpret in any fashion they choose, and cite or ignore precedents at will. But as Milan Kundera might say, sooner or later the apparent lightness of art history reveals itself as an "unbearable lightness," and finally as an unbearable burden."
Stories of Art, James Elkins, NY: Routledge, 2002, p. 26.
link.
I enjoyed "Master Narratives and Their Discontents" and haven't yet read "Stories..." I appreciate history being taken apart by someone who knows it. It has to be good for artists to carry a light sense of history, an easy camaraderie with past artists, and no one can know what the history of our own time will say. But you have to believe in progress, and you need good historians to know whether progress is being made, or if it's really possible after all.