Regularity
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In Europe at the same time, a massive number of artists were working with grid systems and they were often doing so with more explicit focus and rigor. This energy was frequently channeled into groups that formed in different cities. For example, there was GRAV (François Morellet, Julio Le Parc et al) in Paris, ZERO (Heinz Mack, Otto Piene, et al) based in Dusseldorf and extending a wide net across Europe, and The Systems Group (Jeffrey Steele, Peter Lowe et al) in London and the Allianz in Zurich (Max Bill, Richard Paul Lohse et al.). The most iconic artist to work with grids might be the French optical artist Victor Vasarely. His work was so systemized that he invented a notation system to enable a team of assistants to assemble his works using instructions and modular, prefabricated colored pieces. Although it's difficult to discern in looking at the work, there was tension between the artists who worked toward the primacy of mathematical form and those who maintained a desire to imbue subjectivity and emotion in their geometric compositions. In critique of the former category of art, Ferreira Gullar, a Brazilian poet and essayist, wrote the 1959 “Neo-Concrete Manifesto” declaring that it was dangerous for art to be concerned only with, “objective problems of composition, of chromatic reactions, of the development of serial rhythms, of lines or surfaces.” (Beyond Geometry, p. 57) | In Europe at the same time, a massive number of artists were working with grid systems and they were often doing so with more explicit focus and rigor. This energy was frequently channeled into groups that formed in different cities. For example, there was GRAV (François Morellet, Julio Le Parc et al) in Paris, ZERO (Heinz Mack, Otto Piene, et al) based in Dusseldorf and extending a wide net across Europe, and The Systems Group (Jeffrey Steele, Peter Lowe et al) in London and the Allianz in Zurich (Max Bill, Richard Paul Lohse et al.). The most iconic artist to work with grids might be the French optical artist Victor Vasarely. His work was so systemized that he invented a notation system to enable a team of assistants to assemble his works using instructions and modular, prefabricated colored pieces. Although it's difficult to discern in looking at the work, there was tension between the artists who worked toward the primacy of mathematical form and those who maintained a desire to imbue subjectivity and emotion in their geometric compositions. In critique of the former category of art, Ferreira Gullar, a Brazilian poet and essayist, wrote the 1959 “Neo-Concrete Manifesto” declaring that it was dangerous for art to be concerned only with, “objective problems of composition, of chromatic reactions, of the development of serial rhythms, of lines or surfaces.” (Beyond Geometry, p. 57) | ||
| − | These late-century visual works arose from earlier lines of visual exploration. Within the specific context of the grid, pioneers Piet Mondrian, Theo Van Doesburg and other artists affiliated with De Stijl abandoned representation entirely. They moved away from the abstract visual language opened by Wassily Kandinsky, Kasimir Malevich, and Alexander Rodchenko. Van Doesburg et al. coined the term “concrete art” to categorize works that are conceived without reference to nature and symbolism. The manifesto “The Basis of Concrete Painting”, published in April 1930 stated, “The work of art should be fully conceived and spiritually formed before it is produced. It should not contain any natural form, sensuality, or sentimentality. We wish to exclude lyricism, dramaticism, symbolism and so forth. ” (Constructing a New World, p. 187). Van Doesburg continued in “Elementarism (The Elements of the New Painting)” from 1932: “One must not hesitate to surrender our personality. The universal transcends it... The approach to universal form is based on calculation of measure and number” (Constructing a New World, p. 187). Representative works like Mondrian's Composition with Red, Blue, Black, Yellow, and Gray, 1921 (1921) and Van Doesburg's Counter-Composition VI (1925) were composed exclusively with orthogonal lines to form a grid. Works from this time also experiment with rotating the grid 45 degrees to create a more dynamic composition, which is utilized well with 10 PRINT. | + | These late-century visual works arose from earlier lines of visual exploration. Within the specific context of the grid, pioneers Piet Mondrian, Theo Van Doesburg and other artists affiliated with De Stijl abandoned representation entirely. They moved away from the abstract visual language opened by Wassily Kandinsky, Kasimir Malevich, and Alexander Rodchenko. Van Doesburg et al. coined the term “concrete art” to categorize works that are conceived without reference to nature and symbolism. The manifesto “The Basis of Concrete Painting”, published in April 1930 stated, “The work of art should be fully conceived and spiritually formed before it is produced. It should not contain any natural form, sensuality, or sentimentality. We wish to exclude lyricism, dramaticism, symbolism and so forth. ” (Constructing a New World, p. 187). Van Doesburg continued in “Elementarism (The Elements of the New Painting)” from 1932: “One must not hesitate to surrender our personality. The universal transcends it... The approach to universal form is based on calculation of measure and number” (Constructing a New World, p. 187). Representative works like Mondrian's Composition with Red, Blue, Black, Yellow, and Gray, 1921 (1921) and Van Doesburg's Counter-Composition VI (1925) were composed exclusively with orthogonal lines to form a grid. Works from this time also experiment with rotating the grid 45 degrees to create a more dynamic composition. This formal technique is utilized well with 10 PRINT. |
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