Peter Van Ael
Belgian (1965 - ) lives in Montgomery, Illinois
Untitled from the Minnesota Symphony, 1995
woodcut
Arkansas Arts Center Foundation Collection:
Gift of the artist, East Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Selections from the Arkansas Arts Center Foundation Collection
Webster's New World Dictionary defines the word "abstract" as - thought of apart from any particular instances or material objects; not concrete. In the field of visual arts Abstract Art refers to a work that is independent of the natural world, it has no distinguishable subject matter. The twenty five works in Abstract Prints from the Arkansas Arts Center Foundation Collection fit this definition with some works being more "purely abstract" than others. The works are all from a particular time period - mid to late 20th century. This exhibition represents two characteristics in the art world of that period; one is that non-representational or "abstract" art had come of age and was a prominent style of the time. The second thing is that many artists in the second half of the century had access to printing facilities and were creating prints in addition to drawings and paintings. Since Guttenberg invented the printing press in 1440, printing has been an affordable and accessible option for the dispersal or commerce of human expression - both literature and visual arts. This accessibility appealed to artists of the '60s and '70s, and art printers flourished during this period.
This exhibition is a wide and varied sampling of the abstract work being produced in the United States at this time. The works of Albers, Kemp and Stanzcak may be seen to be "pure abstraction" - with an interest in color, geometic forms or patterns. Bontecou and Lipton create works related to their abstract sculpture. Quest and Appel on the other hand have started with an object and made it a more abstract image. Liberman, Motherwell and Gottlieb are well known artists associated with the Abstract Expressionists of the New York School. This group of artists were known for their paintings in which emotional expression was confined to form and color alone. This collection of similar works from a rather small time period offers a wide and varied range of image and mark handling.
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