By Matthew Simpson
I am a Yarraville-based artist often painting abstract compositions of lines. I am often asked what it means. My response is usually that it is open to you to interpret. I thought here I would expand on that answer.
Abstract art doesn’t mean any one thing. There are many different approaches that result in abstract art. Many works you don’t even need to understand, you need to feel. Abstract art can be appraised by how well it conveys the stated ideas of the artist. If the ideas of the artist are unknown, then is it visually interesting and does it make you think or feel something? Many people feel the intersection between abstraction and figuration is the most exciting and interesting area of art. Contrasting with modern abstract art is contemporary art.
Art does not mean any one thing. In life nothing has inherent meaning. Everything derives its meaning from context.
Figurative, or representational, art does not mean only one thing. A picture of a vase of flowers does not often result in a response of what does it mean, yet it is just as valid to ask in both cases. When admiring a picture of flowers, it can be that the attraction is for the quality of colour, the interplay of shapes, the way the artist has or has not exactly followed reality, botanical study, diverted from natural colour or made the creative process evident, and so on. A picture of flowers is not actually flowers after all. It is not common to ask what flowers mean.
Rather than mimic reality, there is also a multitude of impulses that result in abstract art. Examples are decoration, geometry, play, investigation and expressionism. Expressionist art often explores themes of spirituality and psychological states.
Joan Miró (1893 – 1983) was a Spanish artist. His art reflected his interest in the unconscious or the subconscious mind. He often employed childlike motifs suspended in an ambiguous plane. These works should be felt rather than understood.
When looking at an abstract art piece it can be assessed by how well it conveys the ideas of the artist. Jackson Pollock (1912 – 1956) expressed his inner world and emotions through his paintings, emphasizing a state of being. Obviously, it would be unfair to assess an abstract artwork like Pollock’s by its lack of subject matter. Pollock said painting is self-discovery and that every good artist paints what he is. When looking at a Pollock, I look at the energy and immediacy of the paint and how well it conveys his being.
When looking at an artwork where I don’t know the ideas of the artist, my way to assess it is whether I find it visually interesting and does it make me feel or think. My definition of visual art is that it is everything that is visually interesting. If it is not interesting or fails to excite an emotional response or intrigue me intellectually, then I say move on. Works that pass this test are worthy of further consideration and can be judged along formal lines. Formalism considers the way art is made and its purely visual aspects, rather than its narrative content or its relationship to the visible world.
The Western transcendental modernist trajectory of abstract art is that art progressed over time from realistic depictions of reality to increasingly non-representational forms. It culminated historically with Abstract Expressionism in the 1950s according to a theorist like Clement Greenberg. An artist like the Swedish artist and mystic Hilma af Klint (1862 – 1944) interrupts this narrative. Purists dictate that art should be wholly abstract, like af Klint, or entirely representational. To many, the most fertile ground lies in the overlap.
Contrasting with modern abstract art is contemporary art. An example of contemporary art is the banana that was taped to a gallery wall. Contemporary art describes art from the 1970s onwards that often engages with current issues and explores new forms of expression. My own taste in art suggests that art made to question “what is art?” is a consideration that was long since determined and is hence a redundant investigation. Art is everything.
