The post-impressionists´ (such as Van Gogh and Gauguin) primary goal was to express their inner world and Gauguin would begin to paint from his imagination rather than to use nature as a model. Georges Braques had pioneered the technique of faceting an image, in order to capture the essence of an object, rather than the appearance, which would lead to cubism. While not able to reproduce the figurative function of Branques' technique of faceting, Picasso's way of faceting would become a stylistic means that led to almost pure abstraction, a process which would be completed by Mondrian and the Russian abstract artists. From there on the world of abstract art could be roughly divided into two directions: - Painterly automatism The first refers to a style that consists of the depiction of geometric objects: squares, rectangles, triangles, disks, etc. continued below .... |
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Abstract portrait No 6, 2007 abstract oil painting on composite surface |
abstract oil painting on wood |
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abstract oil painting on paper |
"Abstract portrait No 5", 2006 abstract oil painting on paper |
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2009 oils & acrylics on canvas |
2003 - 2008 oils & acrylics on composite surface |
open series screen print | ||
updated 2019 oils & acrylics on canvas |
abstract oil painting on composite surface |
2008 oils & acrylics on linen |
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new abstract paintings
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Abstract artists gallery | Pablo Picasso cubism history | Pablo Picasso blue period | Amedeo Modigliani | how to paint abstract artPiet Mondrian biography | figurative paintings | famous paintings | site map | LoveGaiaFreedom of abstract artHow free can abstract art be, that is the question. As abstract expressionists felt limited by the abstract-geometric and cubistic bounds, abstract paintings began to gain expression and at the same time "lose shape". Abstract paintings by Jackson Pollock demonstrate how abstract expressionism moved towards the production of paintings without conscious control. How effective is abstract art when the emphasis on form is reduced, or absent? Is there a trade-off between expression and form? These are interesting questions about paintings which should transcend the "its all just a matter of taste" platitudes.The creation of abstract expressionism in America had been preceded in the mid 40's by Europeans like Wolfgang Schulze (aka "Wols"). "Wolfgang Schulze was the spiritual father of 'Tachism' (after the French tache = stain, scratch) and in a broader sense of art informel, the style of wild gestures" and 'action painting', a rebellion against the formalism of abstract codes, that reintroduced 'feeling' in art, by freely applying the paint, dripping and splashing" (after "Kunst van de 20e eeuw" - Ruhrberg, Schneckenburg, Fricke, Honnef - Taschen Verlag GmbH). Contemporary paintings no longer reflect a contraposition between abstract art and figurative art, but these styles either come together in paintings by contemporary artists, or exist side by side in pure figurative paintings or pure abstract art paintings. |