How does one understand something like Art? Below are some notes that other people have made:

Conceptual Art
emphasizes content at the expense of form: what matters is not the specific object produced by the artist, but the processes by which it was produced. The concept behind a work of art is what matters; the materials used are unimportant and are often ephemeral (body-painting, junk, etc.).
See What I Mean? / Morgan & Welton / Arnold, 1992 (p. 92)

Postmodernism
Unlike modernism, Postmodernism starts from the assumption that grand utopias are impossible. It accepts that reality is fragmented and that personal identity is an unstable quantity transmitted by a variety of cultural factors. Postmodernism advocates an irreverent, playful treatment of one's own identity, and a liberal society.
Art Now / Taschen, 2002 (p. 562)

Cognitive Dissonance
is the theory that people feel uncomfortable when faced with contradictory information or viewpoints and therefore tend to seek out messages which confirm [for them] choices or verdicts which they have reached.
See What I Mean? / Morgan & Welton / Arnold, 1992 (p. 62)

I have selected these quotes for a specific reason. In America in the 1970s there were quite a few Conceptual Artists creating works of some notoriety (I will make reference to which ones later). I was born in the 1970s and feel that historically this might be a good place to start looking at art.

The term Postmodernism is bandied about in the university where I teach. Some say it is the era that we are currently in, others say we have gone though it and are now somewhere else and there are those who don't think it is at all relevant. Simply asking where we are now, in terms of art history, is an important question - contextualising our very own footsteps.

Cognitive Dissonance is much bigger than the above quote, but it is helpful in reminding me that we sometimes see what we want to see rather than the truth. Trying to find ways of having critical distance is essential to this little body of work.