Abstract art=not a bowl of fruit...or is it?
January 14, 2008
I know it's hard at first, but you too can learn to enjoy abstract art just as much as the unabstracted after reading a few of these handy tips! Read through, ponder a moment, and try out your newfound skills at the gallery or museum of your choice. Forewarning: Don't go on an empty stomach.
My eyes are hungry to find meaning in these blobs of paint!
What you’re look at is non-representational art, that is, a work of art not based on anything recognizable in the real world. How can art have no subject matter? The same way ingredients to a recipe can exist without the final food product. You can think of the abstract as looking at all the ingredients that exist without seeing what the recipe is going to create.
What are these "ingredients" that artists work with?
Some of the most important ones that are easy to find when you first see a painting are color, shape, and texture. Of course, the painter needs only one ingredient to start with, but s/he can use as many and as much of each as s/he likes.
How can I enjoy my food without seeing what I'm eating?
Here's the fun part--the artist has left the ingredients all laid out for you to create your OWN recipe. This is an exercise of your imagination. If you want a salad, make a salad. If you want a chocolate cake, make a chocolate cake. Mr. Artist has assembled his own unique plate of food for himself, but also wants you to enjoy it in your own way. Or perhaps not...
This canvas looks like nothing was painted on it. Why would anyone want to look at that?
A cup of water is pretty boring, but it’s still sustenance, and important at that. Whether you’re looking at brussell sprouts or a wedding cake, it's up to the viewer to find taste or distaste in what they’re seeing. There might be more to it the closer you examine. This is another critical thinking moment where you are free to think whatever you like of the artist and his work. Maybe he did it JUST to annoy you, because really, that’s what some people are out to do. Art is a way of communicating thoughts, emotions, ideas. It doesn’t mean they’re trying to please you and make you happy.
Stop talking about food!
Okay, an unfood analogy: Movies are an art form just about everyone can relate to. You’ve seen films about war, love, pain, happiness...they can have horrible characters and events in them, but you enjoy them nonetheless.
Think of that boring white canvas as the same thing that happens at the end of the movie when a critical plot point is about to reveal itself, and instead the screen just goes blank. WTF I wanted to know what happens! The ending is there, but you’re never going to see it. You’re left craving more, and perhaps after the annoyance subsides, you have gained an appreciation of what you had seen. The white screen and canvas may be a symbol of purity, the unknown, the beyond. Who knows? You might! Remember, no one is wrong as long as they try.
Enjoy your meal! 
Call a friend, go out and cook up some ingredients take in some art! I highly recommend checking out the current exhibit of Stephen Knapp in the Beecher Center at the Butler Institute of American Art. (it's only up unti February 10!) He works wonders with color and shape by using light as his medium. I’d say they results are pretty yummy. But I really like Skittles, so maybe that’s just me.
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Your first painting is a Jackson Pollock if I am not mistaken. He was great because he was the first. An innovator during a time period where everyone else was doing very similar abstract expressionist work. However, I must say, that personally I feel that anyone who does this today and passes it of as innovative or as "fine art" is some what cheap.
The ingredients you have mentioned are part of the thirteen elements and principles of design. The principle behind them being the more of them that are in line with the concept or message trying to be conveyed the more obvious and deliberate your visual message will be. I think fine artist do this, for the most part, on a subconscious level, whereas graphic designers, or at least the good ones :), are aware of these a use them to their fullest advantage.
Nice article. Now I want skittles!
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Correct, the first image is a Pollock. The middle is Robert Rauschenberg, and the last is Stephen Knapp. If the elements of design are the ingredients, then the principles of design are the directions for cooking. All very vital to the overall outcome, in art and design. =)
And I agree with your statement about art today. Some people cop an attitude about themselves that's probably not deserved. I think it can be compared to (not again with the analogies aRhhhGG) a cover band vs. an indie rock band. Sure, they're both making music with instruments and have great technical skill and control. But only one is being innovative with the content.
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Unfortunately these days, in order to pay the rent, playing covers will provide that (8 0ut of 10 times). I had to quit the covers game. I told myself if I have to play Jessy's Girl one more time I was going to shoot myself. Ha! :)
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i've actually walked by people in the butler who were looking at non-representational art and saying "well, i could've done THAT!" that day i learned there are appropriate times for calling security.
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Having just spent time with an art major in the Carnegie Museum, I've decided to put some thought in this. See, we split out time up about equally looking at killing machines (dinosaurs) in the Natural History museum and contemporary art.
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I know being a photo minor gives me no qualifications to judge art, but then, most people in the world don't have art degrees, right?
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My friend kept explaining how mind-numbing it is to create abstract, non-representational art. We get into this debate a lot. I usually win by grabbing a sheet of computer paper and his art supplies, making something non-representational, then pouring black paint/drawing all over it with a Sharpie and handing it to him. He usually then gets really high and starts the debate all over.
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I generally don't claim to be an artist, so maybe I'm totally wrong. I just feel like there's at least two categories of abstract artists: 1) People like my friend Rich who care about expressing themselves and defeating the art world through non-representational art, AND 2) People like me, who make it just to prove it can be made.
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I agree, put even then those people who make abstract art can't deny the fact that art, falls into the visual language and it is communicating those things associated with it. For example, lets take lines. Horizontal, Vertical and Diagonal and ask well what do they imply? In terms of energy it can be said that horizontal lines have the least energy and diagonals have the most. Each element conveys a message in the visual language. So even if they are attempting to convey say the concept happy, they may fail to do so if they use a larger % of elements that contradict the concept. Concept is king!
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The Light exhibit(the last pic) is probably the greatest meal ever.
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That's right Dr Goo! If anything can convince art-phobic people to go to a museum, I think that's it.
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