Abstract painting explained – Part 4

Art in general is representational or abstract, representational pictures are pictures which you can know what it means from a look at like a picture in your kid’s story an abstract painting is the one where you can’t know what it means instantly.

If we want to define Abstract Art we can say it’s abstracting everything that surrounds from its real form to a new form using colours, shapes & your imagination to describe it.

Abstract art is a high level painting technique which depends on artist’s deep thinking and deepest feelings and also depends on the viewer’s understanding to what the painting say.

“We have to accustom the eye to listen to the painting” Paul Kelly.

There were abstract movements established like: Cubism, Futurism, Vorticism, Neoplasticism, Dadaism, Surrealism..etc. then in the 20th century art Abstract Expressionism was established , and this one was interested in not only the paint but how it’s painted , the material that was used in the painting from colours, papers, toolsetc. which means the overall painting process. Jackson Pollock (American, 1912-1956), Arshile Gorky (Armenian-American, 1904-1948), Franz Kline (American, 1910-1962), Mark Rothko (Russian-American, 1903-1970) are names that must be mentioned when talking about abstract art of this move.

A very well known example nowadays for abstract art are patterns created by graphic designers, most of the patterns are collection of colours and shapes forming a beautiful piece of art that can be repeated to create a prettier background for cloth, wall, …etc.

How to paint it?

The truth is that you have no rules to follow for painting such art, Which is the good thing about it yet a bad thing, it’s good to have no rules bounding you from doing what you want but the bad thing is that you have nothing to follow but your mind, creativity and imagination. Those are the only tools that will guide you, A one piece of advice you can take is reading more about this art and seeing other painters work and what their pictures means that will help you a lot in your path to being professional abstract art painter. So you can just get a piece of paper and brush and start to output everything you have. But always remember is as easy as it may seems as hard as it is, As abstract art is considered one of the most difficult arts as it requires a lot of concentration and a high sense of colours& shapes mixing to get to your point.