Abstract Painting

Why am I an abstract painter? It is not for acceptance or money. Abstract painting is as difficult to sell as nudes and harder to create. The vast majority of the population doesn’t relate to it on a meaningful level. If you have the ability to paint in almost any style (which I believe I can), why choose abstract?

Let’s first explore why abstraction exists in the first place. Artists never contemplated such a form of painting until recently. And, painting as we know it started as far back as 39,000 BC! What brought this new art form into existence and why do I connect with it? To answer the first part of this question we need to explore history and the forces that shape it. I believe the world changed in unimaginable ways in the mid-19^th century. The world’s equilibrium had been upset and a process of the planet’s transformation initiated. Art like any other aspect of civilization is an element of that transformation. What were some of the forces that lead to new art? Two realities that may have had a profound influence on the “new” was the end of patronage and the beginning of a new state of mind about art and the phenomenal world, especially in the West.

Patronage was the engine of art since before the Pharaohs. Patronage was the exclusive realm of the powerful – royalty, religious leaders, aristocrats and the wealthy. It served to establish their status in society, promote political aims, communicate ideology or theology, and incidentally support artists, not to mention make their artistic careers. When we think about patronage in art most of us recall the Renaissance and the Medici family or Pope Julius II. However, patronage during the Counter-Reformation demonstrates the control of art’s subject matter in a more interesting way. The Reformation and the Counter-Reformation had different expressions depending on where you were in Europe. (I know this is veering off subject, hang in there) Two of the great artists of this period were Caravaggio in the South and Rubens in the North. Both were effected by the Council of Trent in 1563 – the Catholic Church needed to strategize responses to those pesky Protestants. It now concluded that sex was bad, and intimated appropriate standards for art. For example, Michelangelo was told by the Pope to put clothes on his subjects, he ignored him. “The Denial of Peter,” one of Caravaggio last works, which now hangs in the Metropolitan in NYC is worth contemplating.

Caravaggio, The Denial of Peter

This subject was rarely seen before the commission from Cardinal Paolo. Why? Because it was a visual reaction to the Protestant attack on the sacrament of Penance and Confession. Caravaggio had no choice in what to paint just how to paint it. And, his painting style was a breakthrough innovation. In the North, Rubens was making a fortune painting in a very different style. This was due to the patronage of the wealthy Protestant privileged class (they liked those giant canvases of big nudes and landscapes hanging in their estates).

Rubens, Pythagoras Advocating Vegetarianism. 

Frans Snyders was contracted to paint the still life section.

When Catholic Spain took over the south of Belgium and exiled the Protestants to the North, they found that the occupied churches needed the new Catholic art (more crucifixions). And, Rubens was the guy they picked to do it. Unlike Caravaggio, everyone loved Rubens. He had friends everywhere, even in Spanish court and besides his wife was Spanish! No wonder he need to created a “workshop!” He leveraged patronage into big business, employing many apprentices and students. He even hired sub-contractors that specialized in painting animals, etc. Unfortunately, much of Rubens religious work was destroyed during the bombing of Europe. When it came to subject matter money still called the tune. Generally speaking, this reality would not change until the 19^th and opening of the 20^th centuries. This is not to say that artists wouldn't paint unless they were paid. Rembrandt painted over 90 portraits of himself from 1620 -1669. However, I don't imagine he created them believing that there was a pent-up demand for his likeness among the wealthy.

Rubens, The Raising of the Cross

What happened that ended the patronage system? One factor was the seismic shift in power and the growth of the middle class. The powerful in Europe (many related to one another) ignoring the disparities in the distribution wealth and self satisfied within their royal estates could not detect the winds of change blowing – a unforeseen storm that would topple them all. Monarchies vanished almost overnight in Europe. Beginning with Napoleon III in 1870 in France and ending with Germany 1918, almost all the royals of Europe were dethroned. And, their pattern of supporting the arts disappeared with them. No longer were artists told what to paint, nor did they need to pander to the powerful or to the fashions of the times. In France, the Salon and Couture ended with the loss of sponsorship of the monarchy. The age old practice of patronage was supplanted by the marketplace. The wealthy were still significant players as they always were but now more as consumers than clients. Artists no longer were held captive to a patron’s dictates. The chains slackened and they were freer to express themselves in ways never imagined before. In France, the new painting of the Impressionists marked one of the first signs of power being transferred to the people.

Let’s take a closer look at the effects of these “winds of change” during the period of the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries. Artists could not help be influenced by the tempests battering both the social, scientific and religious foundations of thought. The former Newtonian view of the world (as a clockwork) is assailed by the implications of quantum mechanics and theories of relativity. The birth of psychology and the exploration of the unconscious mind will have a profound impact on the art to come. The seeds of Individualism are germinated. Long held beliefs are being questioned. Inherited religious orthodoxies are being replaced by a virulent form of secularism calling into doubt the nature of spiritual realities and the authority of moral values.

The false confidence produced by the longest period of peace in Europe (1871-1914) suddenly turns into horrifying despair with the outbreak of WWI. The social/political environment of the times will give rise to an extreme revolution in artistic expression and philosophy. Namely, Dada and Surrealism (one of the parents of abstract art). The devaluation of rational thought (believed to have caused the war) and the belief in the supremacy of the emotional/unconscious world sets the foundation for an anti-establishment movement centered in Paris. This group of artists no longer responds to the outward beauty of nature but turns inwardly to a mysterious invisible reality seeking new truth. Freud’s theories of free association, dream analysis, and automatism resonate in the Surrealist’s Manifesto. In 1921, Carl Jung defines abstraction as four elements: Sensation (Aesthetic), Intuition (Symbolic), Feeling, and Thinking. The conceptual framework for viewing reality was being rebuilt in ways that challenged traditional structures.

The definition of art is not only challenged, it’s assassinated. In 1917, Marcel Duchamp proves that art can be anything. Under the name of R. Mutt, he submits a readymade urinal to the Society of Independent Artists exhibit calling it “Fountain” (they reject it, insisting it is not art. In 2004, it is deemed the most influential artwork of the 20^th century).

Marcel Duchamp, Fountain, 1917

Wassily Kandinsky (another parent of abstract art) makes a significant contribution by counter balancing the negativity of the Surrealist philosophy. In 1910, Kandinsky returns home at sunset from a day of plein air painting. He is struck as he enters his studio by an “indescribably beautiful painting, all irradiated by an interior light.” He recalls, only to be able to distinguish “forms and colors and no meaning.” To his amazement he realizes that it is one of his own painting, turned on its side! New insights and dynamics of art were born at that moment. Kandinsky responds to his age of horrific war, the “unconscious mind” and “scientific relativity” not my embracing absurdity, rejecting society’s institutions, and dismissing rational thought. Instead, he translates the invisible world of the unconscious into a spiritual reality that is attracted to beauty and the sacred. In 1912, Kandinsky writes The Art of Spiritual Harmony, where he expresses, “The salvation of art and of man is a spiritual one. One does not have to paint Madonnas to be a religious painter.”

Wassily Kandinsky, Composition 7, 1913

Abstraction is now associated with mirroring higher values through the instrumentality of the artist’s soul. Misunderstood as a rejection of the beauty of nature and devoid of thought. This view of abstraction couldn't be further from the truth. It is one of the highest expressions and intuitive aspirations that an artist can aspire to. Abstraction has the ability to rise above the recognizable into a higher realm of the undefinable, like a prayer beseeching spiritual confirmation from above. Kandinsky’s view of art is, “something that appeals less to the eye and more to the soul.”

To accomplish this vision for the viewer, I believe the veil of “literalism” (not to be confused with realism) must be lifted so the heart can respond “metaphorically” to all the symbols of the created world. Color, form, line, texture of abstract art can then be perceived as gateways to the heart, if they are configured properly. From the creative side of the equation, this is a process that involves both the outer and inner powers of the individual artist and the mysterious forces that surround him. If art is the reflection of the artist’s soul, then it should not be a mirror of soiled a heart. Rather to achieve art’s highest purpose it must thrill the emotional receptors of one’s soul enabling it to recognize the signs of its Creator that shine out resplendent through artistic endeavor. Painting should be a creation that both stirs the emotions and illuminates the rational mind.

This is why I chose to paint abstractly. I do not wish to elevate one form of art over another but rather share my thoughts and trace the pathways that may have led to abstract painting.

Please refer to my previous January post “The Irascibles and Creative Principle” for the conclusion to the historical timeline of abstract art, as it found expression in America after WW2.

One of the invisible forces propelling the “winds of change” is the dawn of the Baha’i Revelation in 1844. It foretold the end of the monarchies of the world when they were at the height of their powers and predicted both world wars. I need to acknowledge Century of Light written by the Universal House of Justice for insights into the social and spiritual conditions of the period covered in this post.