18.5.08

Meaning and Abstract Painting

From a painter's point of view, it's funny that a critic's assertion that abstract painting is vital because it is an inherent vehicle for meaning is presented as a sort of "eureka". Building a painting is a qualitatively different experience from illustrating an idea, and for the viewer, discerning meaning in a painting is not the same as reading a narrative. To regard a painting simply as a text is to ignore the extreme complexity and the mystery of non-sequential interactions that take place in the inclusive realm of aesthetic experience.