| | I defend Abstract Expressionism as an objective artform, one which represents honest Human expression, sometimes in symbolic form, and which could be understood timelessly by human culture. Music is an artform that embodies not representational idealism, but ideal emotions(good music anyway). It is not enough for a "musician" to sit down with out a thorough knowledge of musical concepts and play any crap he chooses to call emotional whims. One must have a firm grounding, whether organized by theory or not, of what music is and how to communicate with it. This is not to say, however, that spontaneity in music is always bad(Sonic Youth- rock band- praises individuated song form- experiments in improvisation. If an artist who believes firmly in life improvises, then it is reasonable that the feelings expressed by that unbridled stream of consciousness should speak of his sense of life. Being a musician, and a person who loves the feeling of pure directed focus, musical improvisation provides me with the experience of un-cut invention. and since the feelings of achievement present themselves in me with each note I play, the satisfaction grows, the emotion becomes more focused and directed. In doing this I feel less in control in away, as though a somnambulist. But this is only a feeling. I am in control, because it is my consciousness, my emotions, and my talent that allows me to materialize feeling with sound and bring an improvisation to life.
This stuff about music is not the focus of this essay, i just wanted to make clear my stance on improvisation for the sake of another point I'll make on the subject of Abstract Expressionism. And, also i am not primarily a musician. It is just something i enjoy. i was in a band once, but i quit because in coming to age my band mates had become a Marxist square, an Existentialist drug-addict, and an ideologicically-vacant drug-addict(acid). I am actually a painter, and my work in Abstract Expressionism has revealed to me its potential.
Like music it is a nonrepresentational artform that is created by a process of concious arrangement of parts. Whether color or sound, these parts are both vibrations, visual and audible vibrations percieved by the brain. And since these arrangements of perceptual data are built by Human(rational or, and often, irrational) concepts of structure they are, in a sense of a likeness to human thought and emotion. Everything in the universe is vibration of energy, and since it is from this energy that a conciousness is grown, vibratory sensations lies at a very deep level in our humanity, our sense of enjoyment, and art epitomizes this Human constant and makes it into a directed activity that engages the viewer or listener in a conscious process of (in the case of music)-non-representational introspection and emotional response.
I don't understand why music should be different from visual art in the sense of not being representational. A Human's reality is created as much(perhaps) by sound as it is by visualization. Why is it that this singular sensual activity should be regarded exempt from the philisophical necessities of other media described by Ayn Rand.
By asking this, my intention is to simply raise the idea. I know what the answer is. Music is beautiful. Period. It makes Human's feel good. But to deny that this logic does not apply to color is strange to me. It is the one idea I can't agree on with Ayn Rand. Color arrangement can have the force, dynamism, and rational continuum, of any song. True, it must be explored further than it has, and it was the subectivity of emotion-driven -isms of modern art that brought it to a point within the scope of human ingenuity. But even these forms of art, Impressionism, Post Impressionism, German Expressionism, Futurism carry along within the dust of their collective clouds instances of genius. For instance, Edvard Munch, an original pioneer of expression through color organization, often expressed humans in an austere and beautiful sense. Duchamp, although a believer in nihilism and anti-art(Dada) concepts, his abstraction and symbolic representation of motion in "Nude Descending a Staircase" is fascinating, and represents positive human values in that it stands for thought, reexamination, and the power of an individual to create a symbol devoid of cultural imaging and brought to existence in the image of a single mind, but understandable by Mankind.
Abstract Expressionism takes this function to its highest form, in visual art any way.
It creates parallels with human consciousness through, like music, not re-creation but rather volitional action. Like music, the style in which the tone is applied is essential to expression in that it gives depth to the sound or color used. Expressive mark making gives the space a Human Integrity(as opposed to non-being fantasy) . I believe that mark carries integrity and stands for the integrity of its maker. This is a concept lacking in such preceding movements as Fauvism, Cubism, and Futurism. These artforms, if one can call them that, embark on interesting concepts of arrangement, abstraction and motion, but are lacking in human integrity, for they were, although stepping forward in thought, inhibited by barriors that began where their philosophies ended. Abstract Expressionism is the embodyment of everything modern in art, and is perhaps the exaltant point which the "pioneers" of modern art sought to avoid, by shackeling their peices with barred aesthetic.
Those who say that the form is not art because it lacks the necessity of faculty, are belligerent fools. It is ignorant to say that all Pollock did was hurl paint a canvas based on whims. Pollock's understanding of dynamism and his incredible control of line form are of the highest artistic genius. Krasner is a master of direction emphasis and depth, and has one of the most striking faculties to create consistent mark forms. I feel the same way about much of de Kooning's work.
Please, give me arguments. I do feel strange questioning the aesthetic philosophy of a woman with such incredible artistic strength, but I feel that even if at the bottom of this inquiry I change my view of Abstract Expressionism, I feel it will have been worthwhile to question, consistently and objectively to question, for one must always question ideas, so to find their faults and improve general theory, and if not for anything else, to know what one is rejecting so to understand the nature of what they embrace.
And if you haven't viewed much or simply don't like Abstract Expressionism, try viewing a peice now, after considering this essay.
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