Modernism in art had four main elements: reducing works to essential properties, moving towards abstraction, intensifying personal expression, and recognizing intrinsic value in art. The document discusses two forms of Modernism - as a tradition and as an evolutionary condition - and how Dadaism and Marcel Duchamp challenged conventions by exhibiting a urinal as an artwork, arguing that if paint tubes are ready-made, then all paintings are technically "readymades aided".