But what does it mean?

As I continue to add new items to the shop, I’ve taken to including in the item description a brief explanation of the title. In connection with the ‘Lockdown Series’ of monotypes this is sometimes difficult. Naming a piece of abstract art is never easy and may well end up saying more about the artist than the art! Humans appear to have strong pattern matching instincts. We see shapes and can’t help trying to make sense of them. There is even a scientific term for it – pareidolia. It isn’t surprising then that abstract paintings and prints fall victim to the same tendency. Any meaning in abstract art has to be put there – usually by the viewer, not the artist.

Several things spring to mind from this.

First, just because you see something in an abstract image, that doesn’t mean it is the result of deliberate intent.

Second, just because you see something in an abstract image that doesn’t mean others will also see it. Equally, if you can’t see anything, it doesn’t mean others cannot.

Third, just because an artist gives an abstract image a title suggestive of something in the real world, that doesn’t mean it is actually in the picture.

For example take one of my favourite artists, Gillian Ayres. Many of her paintings only got a title after she finished it. Sometimes she even asked friends to suggest titles. These titles almost never describe what the painting is about. Instead, they seem to reflect how the artwork made her feel and what that reminded her of. Gillian Ayres said you don’t need to understand her art to like it. She just wanted you to look at it. I found many similar quotes from Mark Rothko.

There is a wider point here. There is no meaning in abstract art. It does not require understanding. It just is. A Renaissance painting, with its richly symbolic visual language has much more intrinsic meaning than say a painting by Jackson Pollock. If an artist attaches personal meanings to the shapes and colours of an abstract painting, they must either share those meanings or accept that others will attach their own and, going back to our starting point, see different things.

For other posts see here and here