avant-garde

plural avant-gardes · alternative avantgarde

1. obsoleteThe vanguard of an army or other force.

   Antonyms: arrière-garde

2. Any group of people who invent or promote new techniques or concepts, especially in the arts.

   Synonyms: remnant, vanguard · Antonyms: arrière-garde

comparative more avant-garde · superlative most avant-garde · alternative avantgarde

1. Innovative and pioneering, especially when extremely or obviously so.

   It was a very avant-garde production.

   3 more examples

   While the work of the contemporary artists in the show is avant-garde, it does not overwhelm the colorful faience made by the Faucon family, seven generations of ceramicists who operated a factory in Apt, a town in the Luberon Valley, from 1890 until 2002.

   2009 January 30, Wendy Moonan, “An Old-School Collector With Ideas on Beauty”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 26 Nov 2022

   I fear she will pay a heavy price for the avant garde ideas she has been sold.

   2014 November 24, James Dobson, Modesty and Self-Esteem, archived from the original on 24 Mar 2025

   There’s a moment, for instance, in the competition show Beast Games that struck me as something close to avant garde. Donaldson lays out a million dollars in cash in a big pile, and instructs each of the 10 remaining contestants to come out of their little houses one by one, and to choose how much money they want to take from the pile.

   2025 June 3, Mark O’Connell, “‘The Mozart of the attention economy’: why MrBeast is the world’s biggest YouTube star”, in The Guardian, archived from the original on 07 Jun 2025

   Synonyms: underground