Generalism in Art

Conrad Botha Generalism

Conrad Botha Generalism
Conrad Botha Generalism
Conrad Botha Generalism
Conrad Botha Generalism

These are recomendations of Falon Shusaku Arakawa - a contemporary artist - Here’s on of his paintings, "Is As It: Blind Intentions VIII", 1982 Georges Seurat’s painting, "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte." 1884 - 1886. That’s right, he worked on this magnificant painting for two years - it’s a masterpiece by any definition! And then there’s Picasso - how could I not covet works by Picasso? Consider this work, "Crucifixion." 1930 (I happen to really love Picasso - my avatar, as a matter of fact, is "The Rower." 1910. You can see The Rower in the Houston Museum of Fine Art). OK, I could just go on, naming artists and pasting images all day long, but in the spirit of the question, I’m going to make a choice - if I could only have ONE piece of art, it would be. . . Well, at this exact moment it would probably be "The Kerosene Lamp." 1924, by Joan Miro - below. Why? In a lot of ways, Miro is one of the most important artists of his day, and he has had a profound influence on art and artists in the 20th century. He touches the child in all of us with images, and at the same time, the same images speak to larger truths and issues. He’s not particularly political, but his works capture some of the angst of the politics of his time, and ours. And I can spend hours lost in his work!

Manifesto for Generalism

Manifesto for Generalism

1. Generalism, is art, for the sake of art.

2. All art is Generalism, unless it is narrower defined in another art movement.

3. Whenever art cannot be explained, or defined by the artist or by somebody else, it will be regarded as Generalism.

4. Therefore Generalism unites all art.

5. The onus, therefore rest on the creator, or observer, to explain, or to prove that a particular piece of art should not be regarded as Generalism.

6. Generalism comes down to the fact, that even if an artist has nothing to say, he/she must say it in order to prevent their work to be classified as Generalism.

Jackson Pollocks influence on Generalism

Timeline: Abstract Expressionism

On the floor I am more at ease, I feel nearer, more a part of the painting, since this way I can walk around in it, work from the four sides and be literally `in' the painting.
-- Jackson Pollock, 1947.

Pollock, Jackson (1912-56). American painter, the commanding figure of the Abstract Expressionist movement.

He began to study painting in 1929 at the Art Students' League, New York, under the Regionalist painter Thomas Hart Benton. During the 1930s he worked in the manner of the Regionalists, being influenced also by the Mexican muralist painters (Orozco, Rivera, Siqueiros) and by certain aspects ofSurrealism. From 1938 to 1942 he worked for the Federal Art Project. By the mid 1940s he was painting in a completely abstract manner, and the `drip and splash' style for which he is best known emerged with some abruptness in 1947. Instead of using the traditional easel he affixed his canvas to the floor or the wall and poured and dripped his paint from a can; instead of using brushes he manipulated it with `sticks, trowels or knives' (to use his own words), sometimes obtaining a heavy impasto by an admixture of `sand, broken glass or other foreign matter'. This manner of Action painting had in common with Surrealist theories of automatism that it was supposed by artists and critics alike to result in a direct expression or revelation of the unconscious moods of the artist.

Pollock's name is also associated with the introduction of the All-over style of painting which avoids any points of emphasis or identifiable parts within the whole canvas and therefore abandons the traditional idea of composition in terms of relations among parts. The design of his painting had no relation to the shape or size of the canvas -- indeed in the finished work the canvas was sometimes docked or trimmed to suit the image. All these characteristics were important for the new American painting which matured in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

Male and Female
1942 (240 Kb); Oil on canvas, 73 1/4 x 49 in; Philadelphia Museum of Art

The Moon-Woman
1942 (170 Kb); Oil on canvas, 69 x 43 in; Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice

Stenographic Figure
1942 (180 Kb); Oil on canvas, 40 x 56 in; The Museum of Modern Art, New York

Blue (Moby Dick)
c. 1943 (150 Kb); Gouache and ink on composition board, 18 3/4 x 23 7/8 in; Ohara Museum of Art, Kurashiki

The She-Wolf
1943 (230 Kb); Oil, gouache, and plaster on canvas, 41 7/8 x 67 in; The Museum of Modern Art, New York

Eyes in the Heat
1946 (320 Kb); Oil on canvas, 54 x 43 in; Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice

The Key
1946 (270 Kb); Oil on canvas, 59 x 84 in; The Art Institute of Chicago

The Tea Cup
1946 (230 Kb); Oil on canvas, 40 x 28 in; Collection Frieder Burda, Baden-Baden

Shimmering Substance
1946 (280 Kb); Oil on canvas, 30 1/8 x 24 1/4 in; The Museum of Modern Art, New York

Full Fathom Five

Number 8, 1949 (detail)
1949 (280 Kb); Oil, enamel, and aluminum paint on canvas; Neuberger Museum, State University of New York

Lavender Mist: Number 1, 1950

Easter and the Totem
1953 (150 Kb); Oil on canvas, 84 1/4 x 58 in; The Museum of Modern Art, New York

During the 1950s Pollock continued to produce figurative or quasi-figurative black and white works and delicately modulated paintings in rich impasto as well as the paintings in the new all-over style. He was strongly supported by advanced critics, but was also subject to much abuse and sarcasm as the leader of a still little comprehended style; in 1956 Time magazine called him `Jack the Dripper'.

By the 1960s, however, he was generally recognized as the most important figure in the most important movement of this century in American painting, but a movement from which artists were already in reaction (Post-Painterly Abstraction). His unhappy personal life (he was an alcoholic) and his premature death in a car crash contributed to his legendary status. In 1944 Pollock married Lee Krasner (1911-84), who was an Abstract Expressionist painter of some distinction, although it was only after her husband's death that she received serious critical recognition.

Breaking the ice

It was Jackson Pollock who blazed an astonishing trail for other Abstract Expressionist painters to follow. De Kooning said, ``He broke the ice'', an enigmatic phrase suggesting that Pollock showed what art could become with his 1947 drip paintings.

It has been suggested that Pollock was influenced by Native American sand paintings, made by trickling thin lines of colored sand onto a horizontal surface. It was not until 1947 that Pollock began his ``action'' paintings, influenced by Surrealist ideas of ``psychic automatism'' (direct expression of the unconscious). Pollock would fix his canvas to the floor and drip paint from a can using a variety of objects to manipulate the paint.

The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle (1943; 109.5 x 104 cm (43 x 41 in)) is an early Pollock, but it shows the passionate intensity with which he pursued his personal vision. This painting is based on a North American Indian myth. It connects the moon with the feminine and shows the creative, slashing power of the female psyche. It is not easy to say what we are actually looking at: a face rises before us, vibrant with power, though perhaps the image does not benefit from labored explanations. If we can respond to this art at a fairly primitive level, then we can also respond to a great abstract work such as Lavender Mist. If we cannot, at least we can appreciate the fusion of colors and the Expressionist feeling of urgency that is communicated. Moon-Woman may be a feathered harridan or a great abstract pattern; the point is that it works on both levels.

Conrad Botha, Bits and Pieces

Paul Klee

Paul Klee - "Photograph" (?) -
- Image Copyright © (cf.www.dhm.de/lemo/)

Paul Klee - "1914" - (1914)
- Image Copyright ©
(cf. SHB ArtWeb Gallery)

Paul Klee - "On a Motif from Hamamet" - (1914)
Tempera on board - Kunstmuseum Basel, Basel,
Switzerland - Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Hermitage" - (1918) - Watercolor on
chalk ground - Paul Klee Foundation, Kunstmuseum,
Bern, Switzerland - Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Once Emerged from the Gray- of Night" -
(1918) - Watercolor on paper mounted on
cardboard - Paul Klee Foundation, Kunstmuseum,
Bern, Switzerland - Image Copyright ©
(cf. cgfa.sunsite.dk/klee/p-klee6.htm)

Paul Klee - "Station L 112" - (1918)
Watercolor on paper mounted on
cardboard - Paul Klee Foundation, Kunstmuseum,
Bern, Switzerland - Image Copyright ©
(cf. cgfa.sunsite.dk/klee/p-klee6.htm)

Paul Klee - "Cosmic composition" - (1919)
- Image Copyright ©
(cf. www.arts-studio.com)

Paul Klee - "Nocturnal Festivity" - (1921)
Oil on board - The Solomon R. Guggebheim
Museum, New York, NY, USA - Image
Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "A Young Lady's Adventure" - (1921)
Watercolor - Tate Gallery, London, UK
Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Crystal Gradation" - (1921)
Watercolor - Kunstmuseum Basel, Basel, Switzerland
Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Revolving House" - (1921)
Oil on cotton cloth - Thyssen-Bornemisza
Collection, Madrid, Spain
Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Red Ballon" - (1922)
Oil on muslin primed with chalk -
The Solomon R. Guggebheim
Museum, New York, NY, USA - Image
Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Senecio" - (1922) - Oil on gauze
- Kunstmuseum Basel, Basel, Switzerland
Image Copyright © (cf. SHB ArtWeb Gallery:
www.sackville.ednet.ns.ca/art/)

Paul Klee - "Tale à la Hoffmann" - (1921)
Watercolor on paper mounted on cardboard
Metropolotan Museum of Art, New York, USA
Image Copyright © (cf. cgfa.sunsite.dk/klee/)

Paul Klee - "Mural from the Temple of Longing" -
(1922) - Watercolor, printer's ink and
plastered canvas mounted on cardboard
Metropolotan Museum of Art, New York, USA
Image Copyright © (cf. cgfa.sunsite.dk/klee/)

Paul Klee - "Puppet Theater" - (1923)
Watercolor on chalk ground
Paul Klee Foundation, Kunstmuseum,
Bern, Switzerland - Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery: www.abcgallery.com/K/klee/)

Paul Klee - "Chinese Porcelain" - (1923)
Watercolor on plaster slab
Collection Mr. and Mrs. Werner Moser,
Zürich, Switzerland - Image Copyright © (cf. SHS ArtWeb Gallery - Exhibit Abstraction)

Paul Klee - "17 Astray" - (1923)
Watercolor and India Ink on paper
mounted on cardboard - Kunstmuseum
öffentliche Kunstsammlung, Basel,
Switzerland - Image Copyright © (cf. cgfa.sunsite.dk/klee/)

Paul Klee - "Carnival in the Mountains" - (1924)
Watercolor on paper on board
Paul Klee Foundation, Kunstmuseum,
Bern, Switzerland - Image Copyright ©
(cf. Olga's Gallery: www.abcgallery.com/K/klee/)

Paul Klee - "Botanical Theater" - (1924-34)
Oil and watercolor on board
Private collection - Image Copyright ©
(cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Fish Magic" - (1925)
Oil and watercolor varnished
The Philadelphia Museum of Art,
Philadelphia, PA, USA
Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "The Golden Fish" - (1925)
Oil and watercolor on paper, mounted on
cardboard - Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany
Image Copyright © (cf. SHS ArtWeb Gallery
Abstraction and Formalism: Paul Klee)

Paul Klee - "The Mask with the Little Flag" - (1925)
Watercolor on paper mounted on
cardboard - Staatsgalerie, Munich, Germany
Image Copyright © (cf. CGFA: cgfa.sunsite.dk/klee/)

Paul Klee - "Gate in the Garden" - (1926)
Oil on panel - Huggler Foundation
Kunstmuseum, Bern, Switzerland - Image
Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Reconstruction" - (1926)
Oil on muslin - Kunstsammlung
Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf, Germany
Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Around the Fish" - (1926)
Tempera and oil - The Museum of Modern
Arts, New York, NY, USA - Image
Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Attrapen (Omega 5)" - (1927)
Oil and watercolor on cardboard -
Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection, Madrid,
Spain - Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Flora on Sand" - (1927)
Watercolor on paper - Collection Felix Klee, Bern,
Switzerland - Image Copyright © (cf. SHS ArtWeb Gallery)

Paul Klee - "Little Jester in a Trance" - (1929)
Oil and watercolor on hessian - Museum Ludwig,
Cologne, Germany - Image Copyright © (cf. Olga's Gallery)