Abstraction

Abstract is a term often used in art to describe artworks that may appear to be without a recognisable subject. It can refer to artworks that use forms that have no source at all in external reality. Or to forms that are ‘abstracted’ from the real world – based on subject matter found in reality but reduced in shape, line and colour to their simplest forms. It uses a visual language of shape, form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world.

As it does not try to represent the material world, abstract art has often been seen as carrying a moral dimension, embodying such virtues as order, purity, simplicity and spirituality. Pioneers of abstract painting in the early twentieth century include Kandinsky, Malevich and Mondrian, while Naum Gabo was an early pioneer of abstract sculpture. Since then abstract art has been indistinguishable from what we now know as modern art.

Abstract Artists:

Wassily Kandinsky

Wassily Kandinsky is one of the pioneers of abstract art. His practice spans through different abstract art techniques and styles that would later be used by generations of abstract painters. Kandinsky first began to use expressive color masses separating them from forms and lines. Soon after that, he started to merge geometry with abstraction, thus participating in creation of geometric abstract art. Although geometric forms were not something Kandinsky was particularly interested in, in his art we see the first encounters of geometry and abstraction. Finally, his work at the Bauhas cannot be ignored. Here, Kandinsky theoretically examined the use of colors, and under the influence of Gestalt psychology, he began to focus on straight lines, which led to the contrasting tones of curved and angled lines on final compositions.

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Painting was, above all, deeply spiritual for Kandinsky. He sought to convey profound spirituality and the depth of human emotion through a universal visual language of abstract forms and colors that transcended cultural and physical boundaries.

Kandinsky viewed non-objective, abstract art as the ideal visual mode to express the “inner necessity” of the artist and to convey universal human emotions and ideas. He viewed himself as a prophet whose mission was to share this ideal with the world for the betterment of society.

Kazimir Malevich

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Malevich is also one of the pioneers of abstract painting, but he was also the creator of one of the most radical abstract art movements ever – Suprematism, a term which expressed the notion that colour, line, and shape should reign supreme over subject matter or narrative in art.  The main interest of Malevich (and his fellow Suprematist artists) was to search for the so-called zero degree of painting, the point beyond which the medium could not go without ceasing to be art. As a consequence, they used extremely simple motifs, subjects and forms.

The whole composition is focused on basic geometric forms, such as circles, squares, lines, and rectangles, painted in a limited range of colors. Because of his contacts in the West, Malevich was able to transmit his ideas about painting to his fellow artists in Europe and the United States, thus profoundly influencing the evolution of modern art.

More radical than the Cubists or Futurists, at the same time that his Suprematist compositions proclaimed that paintings were composed of flat, abstract areas of paint, they also served up powerful and multi-layered symbols and mystical feelings of time and space

 

Yves Klein

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Yves Klein was the most influential, prominent, and controversial French artist to emerge in the 1950s. He is remembered above all for his use of a single color, the rich shade of ultramarine that he made his own: International Klein Blue. For many, Yves Klein has been associated with minimalism and performance art. However, his legacy within the realm of contemporary abstract art is indisputable. As Klein said himself: Blue…is beyond dimensions, whereas the other colors are not. All colors arouse specific ideas, while blue suggests at most the sea and the sky; and they, after all, are in actual, visible nature what is most abstract.

“Never using the line, one has been able to create in painting a fourth, fifth, or whatever other dimension – only color can attempt to succeed in this exploit. The monochrome is the only physical way of painting – permitting us to attain the spiritual absolute.”

http://www.yvesklein.com/files/filter_file_91.mp4

The abstract painting that dominated French art in the 1950s was invariably premised on the notion that an artist could communicate with the viewer through the power of abstract form. But skeptics of modern, abstract art have always alleged that the viewers, like the faithful devotees of a false god, do more of the work than the artist, investing the forms with their own feelings rather than discovering the artist’s. Viewed in this light, Klein’s monochrome blue paintings might be read as a satire on abstract art, for not only do the pictures carry no motif, but Klein insisted there was nothing there at all, only “the void.”

“… I thus seek to individualize color, for I have reached the conclusion that each color expresses a living world and I express these worlds in my painting. My paintings affirm the idea of absolute unity in the context of perfect serenity, an abstract concept represented in an abstract manner (…).”

Abstract Photographers

Ola Kolehmainen

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Ola Kolehmainen is a Finnish photographer whose exceptional work could easily fit into the abstract genre as we previously defined. He uses architecture as both a starting point and as his main source of inspiration. Instead of portraying architecture in a direct form, he reveals it as an examination of space, light and color, all of which reflect and question our typical, human way of looking at things.

It is intriguing to follow how Ola’s representation of buildings evolved from a direct approach into an artistic vision thanks to his closer examination of structures. Because of his unique perspective, Ola developed a more abstract and independent language that allowed him to distance himself from architecture as it is.

Recently Kolehmainen has shifted away from his traditional minimalism, and expanded into a complex approach dealing with space, light, and colour in his first exhibition centered around historical architecture. Kolehmainen photographed religious buildings in Istanbul for half a year. In addition to their historical dimension, the artist probes the buildings’ architectural volumes and light ratios: the buildings’ interiors and structural details reveal the changing light of days and seasons.

Andrew S. Gray

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From intricate and nearly impossible points of view to elegant camera shakes, abstract can be done in a variety of ways from simple to complex, all of which produce elegant results. Inspired by the paintings of the old English masters of pictorialism, Andrew S. Gray creates beautiful abstract landscapes with a unique style using intentional camera movement as well as well-planned color palettes.

He personally prints his work, which speaks volumes about his workflow mastery. In fact, Gray is so generous that he even helps people around the globe with one-on-one sessions and video tutorials in addition to offering online help for anyone trying to create landscapes (or other imagery) with a similar style of abstraction.

” Inspired by the paintings of the old English masters with a mix of camera techniques and post processing I have developed these painterly impressionist images of both recognisable and abstract scenes into a style that goes beyond what many consider photography.

The looseness and ability to play without being tied by the light or weather affecting the scene you’d normally be shooting is the style’s appeal to me, also the chance of creating a scene that was not necessarily there. Using a tool of which its sole function is to capture exactly what is in front of it and then making it almost become a brush with which we “paint” is a joy. The results I have achieved since first experimenting with intentional camera movement (icm) have been more satisfying than any photograph I’ve made previously. “

Maija Savolainen

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The artist, Maija Savolainen is a recognized photographer from the Helsinki School. For this specific topic, we will focus on her project called paperworks in which she created abstract and minimalist representations of landscapes using a colorful palette. Much like watching a pastel ode to Hiroshi Sugimoto, Savolainen demonstrates through her work that the simplest resources can lead to the most beautiful simplifications and abstractions.

The series, Paperworks is a study on the colors of sunlight and the photographic way of seeing. The images are made with a folded, white A4 sheet placed in direct sunlight at different times of the day and year. When looking at the picture at a distance, one might see a horizon line. When taking a closer look, it becomes clear that there is something strange about the view. The horizon appears to be a fold on a sheet of paper, the colors are reflections of sunlight on the white surface; a little bit of information makes the eye see something else than before.

In her series ‘Works on Light’  uses recurrent materials, paper, thread, sand and reflecting surfaces in her photographs to showcase the different properties of light and the illusory possibilities of photography. “They are the elements from which other things can be formed through a photographic gesture. When the light hits a round glass plate on my hand from a certain angle it might resemble the full moon in an astounding way.”

“To illustrate this feature, the Helsinki-based photographer Maija Savolainen has created still-life imagery that responds, on an abstract level, to the themes raised by Rail Baltica and the Talsinki tunnel. The sets which are built from paper and yarn, evoke notions of social and economic networks, overlapping and incompatible structures, parallel and twinned cities, and liminality.”  – Crystal Bennes