Proto-abstraction
This began in the 18th century.
The beginning of abstraction could be seen in 'Constable' (outdoor oil) in them times they were seen as sketches not art. If you have a closer look, quickly an artist named 'Turner' used brush effects producing it into a painting. Turners earlier work was representational.
19th century was very modern, photography changed things as it is fantastic for representational
Romanticism painting started in the 18th century.
Impressionism
Camille Pissaro - it is radical because he creates a signal for impressionism (can see every brush mark) the landscape is made up of all of these brush marks.
Monet created a piece called 'impression sunrise', leading to the term impressionism. This piece is good because you can see the feeling in the painting, not what you can do with photography. It was romantic expressionism. He also created a piece called 'Waterloo Bridge', a painting of London, it is representational but that's only part of it, the other part of the story is the expressionistic effect.
Abstract is not representational!
They use abstract because they don't have to show a detailed painting.
Georges Seurat 'A Sunday afternoon on the island of La Grande Jatte' the difference between him and Monet is that you cannot see his brush strokes. He started to use primary colors which was an advance in science. He painted with tiny little dots of red yellow and blue which creates a painting, it was more about using what science has discovered. It was a different kind of abstractness, it was a scientific vision.
Japan sealed itself up from the west, this was until the late 19th century. When they started trading they wrapped up their goods in japanese prints. The pictures were extremely graphic and was in some way abstract. It was about shape and line rather than it being representational.
Manet produced a piece called 'Emile Zola' where he painted a japanese print in the background.
Seurat was very geometric, as if it was created by a machine. For an artist to behave like a machine was something new in art.
An artist called Matice, created pieces that was in between representational and abstract.
Daran also produced the same kind of work, worked alongside Matice
Abstraction (no representation at all)
Many artists tried to achieve that effect of music.
When they moved away from expressionism they looked more at geometry (extremely modern).
Mondrian created a sequence of the tree, Started off a bit like matice but when he sees cubism in 1910 then it becomes more analytical. the tree becomes lost.
Mondrian 'De Stijl' going back to primary colours started to create full abstraction using squares
In this time art is referring to itself, not representational at all!
What about now?
Sarah Crowner, looks back at artists like Josef Albers to create oil and gouache on sewn canvas with cloth and linnen. Now we could use this history, or we could abuse it but the right thing to do is transform. It is like music, music doesn't represent anything, it is a system but everyone is devoted to it, abstraction is a genre that has meaning in itself, its a game that you play.
Sarah Crowner took the game of abstraction to a piece of installation art.
The game of painting is changed, you can do anything with it, paint on clothes paint on walls etc.!
Process
You can use all different things to put paint on an object, you don't have to just use a brush, you could use a spray gun, a broom or maybe even the tub of paint itself!
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