Inventing Abstraction at Moma

After visiting In the MoMA, I think abstract art is very good to express invisible things such as sound, speed, movement and emotion. And most painters concern composition in their works. They usually try to minimize their thought of the subject into simplified world by using variety their own character such as diverse colors or symbolization. I chose 3 different art works which I was impressed.

The first one is 'Dynamism of soccer player' which is made by Umberto Boccioni. It looks like quite big collection of colorful masses. Painter used diverse color and lighting spot in his work. Almost all stroke brush on sides of figures is painted of dot style. Also the whole shape of the feature looks like a quite big collection such as a big flower or a combination of geometric solids, and they are randomly bended. It looks having active character like a living creature. I think the painter concerned that the soccer is one of kind of arts as if a drama has no scenario. Athlete’s passion and playing are expressed by various colors, and the complicating lines and form represent their active moving.

 The Second one is 'The Spring', the artist is Francis Picabia. This work is also very huge, and some repetition of geometric shape composed in the painting. There are used only less than 5 original colors, and entire atmosphere looks dark and heavy. It is composed of dividing strict geometric shape, so it also gives some activate feeling because various objects are arranged freely and complicatedly. I think I was not able to feel of the spring of nature, I just got some inspiration about human’s spring like a festival. And dark circumstance represents some negative feeling. However, according to the wall text of this work, he painted it after a long traveling; on the way of his home, he talked about the possibilities of nonfigurative art with his friends. Also the wall text said that “his work is crude paint handling erotic undertones, along with its defiant breach of the figurative refinement; also suggest a parody of cubism’s refinement”. Through this description, he had negative thought about figurative art, so he tried to define nonfigurative art, doubting from figurative art. In the description, it shows his work has some erotic meaning like my expectation because painter used skin colors as representative colors so it depicts some naked people around together in the paint. I think the spring means people’s spring like a festival in the spring, not a nature’s one; they might celebrate for pleasure of coming spring after passing the harsh winter.

Third one is “Vortograph” by Alvin Langdon Coburn.

According to the description of MoMA website, his arrangement of crystalline shapes is generated through the using of a kaleidoscopic devise by him. He refuted the idea of photography which is contrasted to abstraction. He made up his camera lens three mirrors, attached together in a triangle. Through his equipment, he could photograph a variety of surfaces. And in the wall text, “the work represents the poet through an arrangement of geometric forms, and his desire to create an art form at once modern and transhistorical”(=universal) It is one of the kinds of photography abstract art. It might be made by close-up photography technique. The shape looks like a snow crystal, and there is some mirrored form which is expanding rage of shape from central one. I think it expresses some sharp and dreamlike feeling by using monotone and geometrical features.