Pop Goes the Artist!

So-called “modern art” gets such a bad rap all the time, as if every abstract artist has personally dedicated his or her life to purging the world of order and beauty.  While in some circles, professing a passion for all things avant-garde is practically a requirement for admission, in other circles, it’s just expected that you will hate modern art and all it stands for.  (As if modern artists painted the same things for the same reasons, anyway.)

This wholesale dismissal of all things abstract (or conversely, all things representative) has always irked me, because it’s such a limiting perspective.  So here’s my small piece of advice for all the haters out there: Next time you’re about to blow through the East Building of the National Gallery, which houses most of its modern collection, slow down just a little and really look.  Don’t try to figure out “what it’s supposed to be,” or worse, “what it means.”  Just look at what’s there.  Lines, shapes, and especially colors can all be beautiful in their own right, without necessarily contributing to a representative whole.

Put aside your preconceptions and just see what’s there.  You don’t have to like all of it.  (I certainly don’t.)  Some of it’s beautiful, some is ugly, some is baffling, and some of it pushes the boundaries of what is actually art.  But the diversity is what makes it fun.

Just stop and look.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 8th, 2007 at 8:18 pm and is filed under Miscellany. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.