The Wandering Skeptic
Monday, September 06, 2004
Why is chaos so seductive to abstract art?
Perhaps it is not the limitlessness of chaos that is so fascinating, but rather the exploration of the confines of the human ability to innovate beyond the chains of conventional human aesthetics; beyond symmetry, beyond balance, polygons, preset ideas of color matching.
It is borne out of a frustration with the lie that our imaginations are boundless; this lie that has been indoctrinated in us throughout our lives. Man is chained to experience, and experience, in turn, is chained to our senses. Abstract art seeks not to prove the infinte stretches of human creativity, but to touch its edges. It is as much an attempt to understand the nature of humanity as psychology, biology, or anthropology.
And, as with all aesthetics, some abstract art is better in doing this than others. How do we judge this? There is no measurement for how far out from the center of conventionalty any one piece of art has striven. It is merely that subjective tugging at our figurative souls that we feel upon viewing. It is in this very subjectivity that the power of such art lies... and also its greatest weakness.
For the uncritical viewer will not comprehend this exploration of humanty, and so the art will not fulfill that yearning for originality the true artist invested perforce. And yet the paradox: who is best to judge? The community of abstract art critics is an excercise in futility: subjectivity of the quality of art, combined with the subjectivity of the quality of art critics, gives rise to an uninterpretable gradation in reviews.
One ought not to interpret the quality of such art for others, but rather expound on what the purpose of the art is: a manifestation of the common human urge to define ourselves... and by knowing our limits, to evolve beyond them. ¶ 1:04 AM
Perhaps it is not the limitlessness of chaos that is so fascinating, but rather the exploration of the confines of the human ability to innovate beyond the chains of conventional human aesthetics; beyond symmetry, beyond balance, polygons, preset ideas of color matching.
It is borne out of a frustration with the lie that our imaginations are boundless; this lie that has been indoctrinated in us throughout our lives. Man is chained to experience, and experience, in turn, is chained to our senses. Abstract art seeks not to prove the infinte stretches of human creativity, but to touch its edges. It is as much an attempt to understand the nature of humanity as psychology, biology, or anthropology.
And, as with all aesthetics, some abstract art is better in doing this than others. How do we judge this? There is no measurement for how far out from the center of conventionalty any one piece of art has striven. It is merely that subjective tugging at our figurative souls that we feel upon viewing. It is in this very subjectivity that the power of such art lies... and also its greatest weakness.
For the uncritical viewer will not comprehend this exploration of humanty, and so the art will not fulfill that yearning for originality the true artist invested perforce. And yet the paradox: who is best to judge? The community of abstract art critics is an excercise in futility: subjectivity of the quality of art, combined with the subjectivity of the quality of art critics, gives rise to an uninterpretable gradation in reviews.
One ought not to interpret the quality of such art for others, but rather expound on what the purpose of the art is: a manifestation of the common human urge to define ourselves... and by knowing our limits, to evolve beyond them. ¶ 1:04 AM
