Art Appreciation

Recently a friend asked me how he should look at a painting; and what could he do, to understand what the artist is trying to say. We are, of course, speaking of abstract or what in common parlance is termed ‘modern art’. I gave him my standard reply, “Just look at it and see what it evokes in you.” What the artist wants to say is not quite so important as what is actually being said to you, in other words, whatever it is that you are receiving from the painting.

Yet, he persisted, so I gave him an introductory book on ‘Understanding Art’. It delineates the basic movements in art history – Early Renaissance, High Renaissance, Baroque, High Baroque, Rococo, Neo-Classicism, Romanticism, Realism, Impressionism, Expressionism, Symbolism, Cubism, Futurism, Dada, Surrealism, Abstraction and so on. It also speaks of how certain artists innovated on the methods of artistic expression and changed the course of art history.

However, I still maintain my earlier position that a work of art speaks to the viewer in the moment of its perception. The artwork carries within it the feelings and thoughts that the artist had as s/he created the painting. When we perceive the painting without any preconceptions or even any desire to understand / interpret it, we directly apprehend, perhaps at a subliminal level, those thoughts and feelings. And even if we don’t ‘get it’, we are richer for the experience.