Abstraction is real, probably more real than nature.
Interpretation
Abstraction encompasses ideas and concepts that can represent reality in more profound ways than literal interpretations of nature.
Josef Albers suggests that abstraction, which focuses on shapes, colors, and forms devoid of direct representation, holds a deeper truth than the physical world around us. This perspective values the emotional and intellectual connections that abstract art can evoke, suggesting that these elements can reveal more about human experience and perception than mere natural forms.
In practice
In a lecture about modern art, one might use this quote to emphasize the significance of conceptual approaches in artistic expression.
Simultaneous contrast is not just a curious optical phenomenon β it is the very heart of painting. Repeated experiments with adjacent colors will show that any ground subtracts its own hue from the colors which it carries and therefore influences.
Instead of art I have taught philosophy. Though technique for me is a big word, I never have taught how to paint. All my doing was to make people to see.
When we are honest - that's my saying - if we are honest then we will reveal ourselves. But we do not have to make an effort to be individualistic, different from others.
Ah, the creative process is the same secret in science as it is in art. They are all the same absolutely.
Traditionally art is to create and not to revive. To revive: leave that to the historians, who are looking backward.
In order to use color effectively it is necessary to recognize that color deceives continually.
I take six or seven years to write really small books. There is a kind of aesthetic of leanness, of brevity.
Invention presupposes imagination but should not be confused with it.
Well, the way I play, I try not to be a 'repeater pencil', ya dig? Originality's the thing. You can have tone and technique and a lot of other things but without originality you ain't really nowhere. Gotta be original.
Dancing is, in itself, a very trifling and silly thing: but it is one of those established follies to which people of sense are sometimes obliged to conform; and then they should be able to do it well. And though I would not have you a dancer, yet, when you do dance, I would have you dance well, as I would have you do everything you do well.
Early on, I played a Chinese delivery person, and even that, which was very innocuous, felt like I was somehow betraying myself. I felt very self-conscious on set doing that role, with a crew that was almost entirely white.
When you start with a portrait and try to find pure form by abstracting more and more, you must end up with an egg.
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