AN ARGUMENT FOR ABSTRACT
With reference to artwork the term “abstract” was in the early 1900’s beautifully defined as “a smaller quantity containing the virtue and power of the greater.” ( (Johnson)
I have never liked what I think we all think of as abstract art. You know those child like paintings of a one eyed, three breasted nude atop a green two headed bull with sun flowers falling out of big puffy clouds and always with an esoteric name like “Blue Freedom”
What I am finding, however, is that the more I mature in my art … the more I want to abstract or according to one definition of abstract “be selective”. My comfort zone has always been and will probably always be in realism and detail. Because I CAN be realistic in any or most media and because I am finding that I NO LONGER NEED TO PROVE IT
I am gradually choosing and loving the simpler line and a more basic shape. The beautifully clean lines of an accurate gesture is saying so much more to me lately even though I will forever be a drop-jawed fan of realism and detail.
At first I thought I was “losing it” but then I quickly realized that I am making the statement I want with much less detail. If I were to make this point with verbiage it would go something like this.
#1 — “I saw a robust hulk of a man jogging towards me. His heavily muscled barrel chest heaved as he passed. Even the air around him rushed out of his way as his massive weight passed by me.”
#2 — “I saw a robust hulk of a man jogging towards me. His heavily muscled barrel chest heaved as he passed.”
#3 — “I saw a robust hulk of a man jogging ”
The first description is like this awesome sculpture by Richard Weaver that is loaded with the details that Richard wants you to see and he takes no chance that the viewer will miss a thing as he perfectly and carefully sculpted this piece.
The second description is like a sculpture containing basic shapes with suggestions of some details here and there. The artist is hoping the viewer will knit together the basics clearly shown along with the implied details.
The third description is like my abstraction of what was probably a similar image that inspired Richard Weaver. Where Richard probably had a model posing in his Virginia based studio I was merely sitting in a mall. I was just people watching when this immense fellow passed by. The energy and power that I felt as he passed was inspiring to me. When doing my ROBUSTIOUS sculpture I was only interested in providing the most basic of shapes with the hopes that the viewer would simply appreciate the mass and the motion and the further hope that “a smaller quantity containing the virtue and power of the greater.” … would be the result.
