Johnson 1
Miah Nate Johnson
November 1, 2013
AIB/MFA
Sunanda Sunyal
Forced into New Relationships
“The meaning of these objects, or in their isolation which comes to the same thing, for what we feel most about an isolated object is that it has been deprived of relationship.”
(Lyons 97)
This paper will look into two visions of abstract expressionist artists, those of Aaron Siskind and Franz Kline. The works of these two artists vary in concept and texture, but both artists created abstract works that feature simple designs of form, shape and isolated movement.
Aaron Siskind worked in a style he called the “formal ground” (Jain 113) which describes the uniformity of how he saw his subjects. Siskind’s photographs, usually in black and white, are rich in tonality and define a singular subject that is uncertain. In photographing objects on the street, mixing the relationships of hard surfaces against a soft, and contrasting lights and darks, Siskind was able to ensure that the solitary objects do not become isolated. Due to his use of complicated design of layers of peeled paint or torn paper the viewer has the proclivity to look through the subject not at the subject. This disassociation of the subject is established by means of its being taken out of context. In each of Siskind’s two dimensional works, the subject becomes three dimensional or a sculptural because of the contrasts from light to dark. This opens a suggestion of narrative of form and design and forces new relationships as the use of the camera frames confinement. “Forms play their little part against a backdrop of strict rectangular space - a flat unyielding space. They cannot escape the back into the depth of perspective”(Lyons 97). By using the rectangle as a structure to hold the subject, Siskind is able to make the viewer seize the drama of the intensity of the subject at hand by forcing the subject into the unknown. This gestural movement of freedom of the subject grows frozen by the static nature of the flat plane of photographic print, playing on the emotions of viewer. In some sense the works seem like reproductions of paintings or art works. Many of the photographs play with the rigidity and formality of peeling paint on a wall, broken frames of glass or abstract tar lines. This awareness of the recurrence of “decomposition, melting's, congealing’s and pushing.” (Holmes) present in his work is a mix of textures within a subjective content. Whether Aaron Siskind worked from the unconscious mind of expression, or a preplanned structure of the scene at hand, his photographs are powerful inspriartions of form and design.
Franz Kline was one of the masters of American abstract painting and was at the forefront of American art in the 1950s. Kline developed a freedom on the canvas that was void of defined subjects, but nevertheless gave the viewer a sense of a seamless narrative. Kline’s vision or interpretation of his surroundings evokes a sense of a graphic raw wildness. With massive swipes of the brush that swallow the canvas, Kline creates an ambiguity of layering from light to dark and, brings a depth to the composition that gives the paintings a modular sense, resembling a city scape, chair backs, “calligraphy” (Bakargiev 66), or some lost unknown script. Though Kline denied the suggestion of calligraphy he played with the idea of a fluid motion of intensity, which defined a depth that inspired a transition or collision of textures that engages the audience by means of movement. With a confused simpleness of heaviness or subjective balance through the use of layering and finite movements of stunning sporadic brush strokes, the work fabricates a depiction of a musical score. The movement in Kline’s work resonates on the canvas and could be interpreted as loud or silent in the sense that Kline unequivocally allows the canvas to speak on its own. This process of interaction painting frees the viewer from looking at the pastiche that might result from working with a preconceived idea or a subjective manner to one of the abstract. By playing with the relationships of visual elements, Kline brings an intrinsic meaning of visual “tactilism”(Nagy 134) to the canvas set forth by the interpretation of space and form.
Both Siskind and Kline explore the vision of seeing the world with a different perspectives through their chosen mediums. Their representational designs and textural compositions of movement and form are heightened by their use of gestural design and personal freedom. Their spacial articulation forms a illusionistic story with the use of unifying visual elements that still offers the freedom of isolation.This contemporary approach of emphasizing the sensuous tactile effects opens a narrative to the viewer.
I have moved to a new way of looking at the street; I have always stopped and photographed abstract elements, but never felt drawn to show my work because I thought it had no intrinsic or momentary value. While walking the streets and photographing people, I saw a truck laying tar on the road and it remind me of the crowds I see on the street bustling off to their desired destination. I soon began to build a series of form and design of unseen relationships of color, lights, darks that all reside inside of the rectangle. I discovered a freedom for myself that expressed both an inner thought of composition and the social reality of the street.
Works Cited: Bibliography
Lyons, Nathan Photographers on Photography, New Jersey: Foundation of Modern Photography Series, Siskind Aaron, 1966 Prentice-Hall. Inc Print
Kelly, Jain Darkroom II, Aaron Siskind, New York: Lustrum Press Inc 1978, Print
Lyons, Nathan, Photographers on Photography, New Jersey: Foundation of Modern Photography Series, 1966 Prentice-Hall. Inc Print
Smith, Henry Holmes New York: Robert Mann Gallery Guide 1965 Print
Christov-Bakargiev, Carolyn Milano, Fran Kline 1910-1962, Italy: Skira Editore 2004 Print
Moholy Nagy, Laszlo New Vision of Design, Chicago: Insitute of Design 1947 Print
( 134)
©Aaron Siskind above
©Franz Kline above
©MIAH 2013 6 above
