Medium specificity is a consideration in
aesthetics and
art criticism. It is most closely associated with
modernism, but it predates it. According to
Clement Greenberg, who helped popularize the term, medium specificity holds that "the unique and proper area of competence" for a form of art corresponds with the ability of an artist to manipulate those features that are "unique to the nature" of a particular medium. For example, in painting, literal flatness and
abstraction are emphasised rather than illusionism and
figuration.