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Category Archives: American Modernism
Perennially New
An article of 1989 by Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe, called “The Current State of Nonrepresentation,” proves that certain ideas might seem fresh, but are hardly new: “…the task of nonrepresentation [is], typically, one which involves seeing a thing which is, for once, … Continue reading
Edges Early and Late
I was reading the catalog for the show Frank Stella 1958, and one of the writers, Megan Luke, explains Stella’s thinking about edges, which led to the early Black Paintings. He noticed that many of the second generation abstract expressionists … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction, Uncategorized
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, form, Frank Stella, illusion, shaped canvas
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Shaped Canvas 8
This piece by Martin Barré is very similar to another by François Morellet shown on this blog over a year ago. The continuation of the line across several discrete panels makes their edges more vivid—the panels punch holes in the … Continue reading
In Memoriam
The series Polar Coordinates for Ronnie Peterson was another tough one for me to learn to like, but now I love them. Somehow, the two layer structure, combined with the busyness of the “ground” layer, has some relevance to the … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction, Uncategorized
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, backstory, feeling, form, Frank Stella, prints, subjectivity, time, titles
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Swan Engravings
I did not like the Swan Engravings at first—critics talk about rich blacks, but I just saw a dull all-over gray, because I really don’t like that wiped-plate look so much appreciated by intaglio printers. But…having taken a longer and … Continue reading
The Price of Greatness
Readers of this blog will know that I am a great admirer of the work of Frank Stella. It seems I’m in a minority. I was talking to a friend who calls him the Leroy Neiman of contemporary art, and … Continue reading
Stella’s Prints
I’ve been enjoying Stella’s prints, and discovering one series after another. Usually each new one is a challenge. I have the catalogue raisonné of the prints up to 1982, and look at it with pleasure every day. And the prints … Continue reading
The Visitor
Kitaj quotes the following, from a letter of Arthur Miller to Saul Bellow: “From time to time there will be a visitor who is very dear to me, but who is unfortunately recognized by approximately a hundred million people, give … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Ethics of Abstraction, Uncategorized
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, literature, sex, subjectivity
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Improvisation
Recently came across a 1991 interview with Stella. His comments on pieces made with poured metal confirm everything I said in an earlier post: “For the most part yes: they are improvised…They are worked over but the process of working … Continue reading
Polly Apfelbaum
I will soon add an interview with Polly Apfelbaum to the Publications page—actually a conversation between her and artist Kelly Jazvac. I very much admire this piece for its negative areas, the way that they flow together and make chains … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, drawing, emptiness, form, grids, Polly Apfelbaum, space
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Preparation
Following Kitaj I’ve been dipping into Hasidism. Parallels between mysticism and art are too easy, and without much practical use, but insights can always help—if one is ready for them. Here is a hopeful observation from Rabbi Mendel of Kotzk: … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Ethics of Abstraction, Principles of Abstraction
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, AJHeschel, feeling, Frank Stella, labor, RBKitaj, society, time, value
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New again
Emerson has something to say about the appreciation of pictures: “So with pictures; each will bear an emphasis of attention once, which it cannot retain, though we fain would continue to be pleased in that manner. How strongly I have … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction, Uncategorized
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, Emerson, emptiness, feeling, form, meaning, Morris Louis, self-reflection, time
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Pulses
Been reading Emerson. He confirms something mentioned more than once on this blog: “Nature hates calculators; her methods are saltatory and impulsive. Man lives by pulses; our organic movements are such; and the chemical and ethereal agents are undulatory and … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Conceptualism and Painting, Principles of Abstraction, Uncategorized
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, Emerson, feeling, Jackson Pollock, meaning, nature, series, sex, time, value
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Taste
One may or may not like Clement Greenberg, but to my ears the following remark contains a lot of sense: “…most of the genuinely original painting of the last century and a half has struck standard good taste, on first … Continue reading
Love Letters
I’ve been enjoying a group of small works in Stella’s Kleist series named after some of the writer’s love letters. Each one has a nice formal gesture; this piece, for example, has parts that swing up and down in opposite … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, cubism, Frank Stella, Pablo Picasso, painted reliefs, sculpture, sex, titles
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Bornowsky’s Spheres
I’ve written a review of Vancouver artist Eli Bornowsky’s recent show in Toronto, soon to appear in the on-line edition of Canadian Art. His small works had wooden spheres, some drawn over with lines, attached to shaped supports. There are … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, Eli Bornowsky, illusion, painted reliefs, shaped canvas, space, volume
3 Comments
Is Painting Dead? Or Sculpture?
The preceding post weighed in with a few tons of metal—maybe too much of Stella’s sculpture all at once. But the ideas are not new to this blog. I’ve already mentioned Stephen Melville’s argument that sculpture has been liquidated between … Continue reading
Moving Out and Staying Back
I’m still getting great enjoyment out of Frank Stella’s Moby Dick series, which seems to be a kind of culmination. With the next series, built around the writings of Kleist, he gives up the method of constructing in superimposed planes … Continue reading
A Flat Bird
In the catalog of the Stella retrospective in Wolfsburg I find a surprising member of the Exotic Birds series. At eight feet wide it is hardly a sketch, but it looks exactly like the preliminary drawings for that series. Most … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, cubism, drawing, feeling, Frank Stella, illusion, painted reliefs
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Lightness
Lightness is an aspect of abstraction that I particularly value. It is allied to the comic, which has been an important strand in art since the Baroque, and became dominant in the west in the early 19th. century. In its … Continue reading
Posted in Abstraction and Society, American Modernism, Ethics of Abstraction, Uncategorized
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, feeling, form, humor, illusion
4 Comments
Questionable or Not
On the British web site abstract critical there is more debate about Frank Stella. I’m on his side but most aren’t. Much of the criticism seems to be based on a perception that the work does not hold together formally—the … Continue reading
Slightly Overwhelming
I’m pretty familiar with the illustrations in Robert Wallace’s book on the Moby Dick series, but when I see the actual pieces don’t usually recognize them. There’s something about the size and detail and rawness of the works that stuns … Continue reading
The Facts
This blog has given a fair amount of time to Frank Stella, and my attention was moving to other things—there are a few posts coming up on the topic of time. However, my interest in Stella has just been revived … Continue reading
Reading Abstraction
In the Kleist series, imagery related to the story, in this case a novella about the famous slave revolt in the West Indies, can’t be ruled out. Robert Wallace, in his discussion of the Moby-Dick works, did very well in … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, Frank Stella, Kleist, literature, meaning, titles
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Unremarkable
I have a catalog from the Albright-Knox called American Painting of the Seventies. As it happens few of the included are what we would call 70s artists, they are mostly good artists who happened to be alive and working during … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, cubism, Frank Stella, painted reliefs, time, value
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Juam
One of the prints from the Imaginary Places series, “Juam,” offers a perspective on Stella’s overcrowded compositions. A first state—much lighter, less labored—was also released, described in a pamphlet dedicated to the piece. As usual the final state is over … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction, Uncategorized
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, composition, cubism, Frank Stella, illusion, place, space
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The Series
In my view, Richter’s important contributions to abstraction have been the color charts and something that I call “the edition of unique works.” The latter might be the most important, and I have talked about it on this blog. But … Continue reading
Figures coming through
Ruminating on the later work of Frank Stella has led me to a some new thoughts about what abstraction really is. Most important is to keep a sense of what Richard Shiff described in our recent conversation as the strangeness … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Principles of Abstraction, Uncategorized
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, demons, figuration, form, Frank Stella, illusion, meaning, subjectivity, the inhuman, titles
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Painting Off
Today one often hears painters whine about the supposed marginal status of their favorite medium in the art world. In 1991 Stella offered the following words of comfort: “Because we accept so readily the idea of the manageable whole or … Continue reading
Abstraction as Child of History
Any working definition of abstraction that I am likely to come up with will be a description of my own paintings—that can hardly be avoided. Recent intense looking at Frank Stella has provoked some ideas, but his work is not … Continue reading
Posted in American Modernism, Italian Art, Principles of Abstraction
Tagged abstract art, abstraction, aesthetics, emergence, Frank Stella, illusion, knowledge, Linsley, nature, the inhuman, value
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