Understanding abstract art – Part 6

Abstract art, like any art, should not be “explained” as a how-to. Appreciating art is as far from a skill or craft as you can get. Each person has the ability to understand a work of art- even if their only understanding is whether they like to look at it or not.

People I have met who have not studied art at all often tell me they don’t know when I ask them what they think of an artwork. I tell them that it’s okay to not like it, even if they don’t know why. Visual imagery is a very powerful tool in our moods and our daily lives. Even simple colors effect how we feel without our knowing it. Think of advertising, where fast music and bright colors make you feel energetic. Dark images and slow music lend to mystery or solemn memories. Images and colors are understood on a basic instinctual level. An abstract level, you might say.

I am an artist, and I generally paint abstract paintings. I also enjoy some combination between abstract and figurative- basically people/ figures, and shapes and colors all mixed in together. I think abstract art is powerful because it can convey thoughts and feelings, ideas, evoke emotions. Anyone who has ever seen a picture of something and done a double-take, or stopped, or gone back and stood in front of it for even a few seconds, has appreciated art. If an image is powerful enough to get and hold your attention, it has done its job. The reason that Abstract Art can have a little more power is that it is not an attempt to “feed” you an idea through a recognizable common image. Abstract art gives you, the viewer, control over what you make of it.

When I paint using many bright colors and shapes and movement, I am painting my feelings at that time. I am painting the way I am seeing the world at that moment. When you walk over and look at that painting, you automatically project your current emotion, thought, feeling onto mine. You will react based on your own personal perspective. If you show twenty people a picture of a horse, they’ll all “see” a horse. If you put an abstract image up, you will likely get twenty different responses according to what they drew form the image. I refer you to the Rorschach Inkblot tests. It’s all relative.

I think that, essentially, is the main draw, for me at least, of abstract art. Each and every person will get a different experience out of each image. That is how art should be, a personal experience that can also be shared.