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Non-Descriptive Painting: an Artist's Point of View

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Non-Descriptive Painting: an Artist's Point of View Copyright by Karl Frederick Richards 1956 NON-DESCRIPTIVE PAINTING: AN ARTIST'S POINT OF VIEW DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By KARL FREDERICK RICHARDS, B. S., M. A. «*«« The Ohio State University 1956 Approved by: Adviser School of Fine and Applied Arts Bureau of Educational Research ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS It would be impossible to acknowledge all the sources of my ideas or to recognize here all those who have influenced my thinking, but I should es­ pecially like to thank the members of my committee for their friendship, understanding, and help — Dr. James W. Grimes, Dr. Ross L. Mooney, Mr. Robert M. Gatrell, Dr. John R. Kinzer, and Mr. Hoyt L. Sher­ man. I should also like to thank Dr. Virgil Hinshaw for his criticisms on portions of this manuscript. I am particularly indebted to my advisers, Dr. Mooney and Dr. Grimes, not only for the time with which they have been so generous but also for the significant influence they have had on my creative development. I am deeply indebted to Dean N. Paul Hudson and the members of the Graduate Faculty who have made this work financially possible. iii CONTENTS Frontispiece........ ii Acknowledgements ................................. iii Introduction: Statement of Purpose ............. 1 Position: Contrast and Conflict ................ 8 Purpose: Descriptive and Non-descriptive ....... 22 Motivation: Self and Environment............... 33 Structure: Aesthetic andExpressive ............ , 44- Craftsmanship: Aesthetic and Technical ......... 50 Meaning: Cognitive and Aesthetic ............... 56 Conclusion ................................ 84 Paintings by the A u t h o r......................... 85 Appendix: Kinds of Mean i n g............... 101 Bibliography..................................... 105 iv INTRODUCTION: STATEMENT OF PURPOSE1 To an artist it seems relatively useless to verbal­ ize about the visual arts. The visual arts are con­ structed with physical materials having certain sensuous qualities which must be directly perceived for adequate comprehension.2 Sensuous qualities are immediately com­ prehensible to those familiar with them, but words can­ not communicate the quality of sound to the deaf ear nor the quality of sight to the blind eye. Moreover, mem­ ories of sensuous qualities would seem to lack both the precision and intensity of sensuous qualities perceptual­ ly apprehended. Words are wholly inadequate to the task -'-Many of the ideas expressed herein are obviously derived from external sources, but the interest in them is proportionate to their usefulness rather than to their sources. The ideas are integrated into a personal, at- titudinal position as a basis for action rather than eru­ dition. Should the reader care to interrupt his reading to examine the footnotes, he will find evidence of in­ debtedness to the ideas and researches of other men, and he is invited to evaluate for himself the relationships between the manuscript and the references. The manu­ script itself represents a pause or tentative position in the personal creative development of the author. "And I've never quite cottoned to the acrobatic kind of scholarship involved in forcing a reader to pop his eyes up and down the page, like a man trying to watch a tennis match while lying on his side." Fred Rodell, "Ah, Scholarship," The Progressive. April, 1956, p. 12. "... how hard it is to translate into intelligible language what is perceived within." C. G. Jung, Psy­ chological Types. (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Com­ pany, 1923), p. 512. 1 ; ^cff qpmmunicatLng the precise sensuous properties of even # ‘.''‘i5j^[email protected] perceptual phenomena.3 ■ o * J-'' I • * > • .*l«rT <> . $by, .then, should an artist choose to write about . v» O qualities which, admittedly, cannot be verbally ated with any significant‘degree* of precision? .*.. • . * * • * . , ., J P f ■^gj&wer is pimple. The non-descriptive.sartist, in * • -■ h f f c S t t f r is continuously sumeora^ttd?questions con- , meaning of his .arti^' ^s^heVm’edting his so-. nBg^TTF • «. * . •• - f : K . ^^""Mp^^tifsibility -if he merely. work in . -•1 JZmL'y'fr.-' g||gp jfetb such questions? Perjiaps|;he|^g.:‘ Questions con- St&j-uzvi-'-'.'..: * • 3" • • ft ® • if ^ }. *•—■.■. ■ 3^.' meaning of non-descripM-ve“'art- are, after all, ""!« * ’ ’•••v priate as questions conce^nin^;..the meaning of m m ■ •' *-v' . Cleaning of a tree, or the -mepgiinjg of any other fcs*a&8«^ qjiality or perceived ®b^ect‘|‘l>-Ney^rtheless, 5, f|*pectations in regard;-tcel?af>tvfafe sheh that, ^SSF&’SSbI^^-8 O'Keefe says, «1 f^ridi'ith^t I could say colors, and shapes, t h ^ I couldn' t say in any things I had no wqpds Jor.11 Daniel Cotton fv ^ CT^ ifglfeeSom of the Brush.11 ^t^^i^c^onthly, v. 181, ^ ^ ^ llbruary, 194-8), p. 4 8 . + ^ 4 o o ^ o !• ° % * i'Cpn't answer your quest’ipn^;abOut the 'abrupt and _ tt?Q; A^cooV _2*gharacter of the non^e^ripj^Jve; emergence in the our century,1 esj^MaiiaySas: mpst of the men ig|i^'pnrt. in it are now d#^^;'4Mojwiyer:,the extra- renascence of this impTiTse^a^ng; iiving painters ^TO^feingthat perhaps Vou*c^ui‘d»_eMwpr.::as an able i s f A ^■Jbitoner. *1 would- welcome Alfred H. t ^ ~ ‘in a letter to the aut.hdl?;^;,^,h-.: ^ Jung says, nPerhapsf arVi-,;.^fs£like nature, .1,1 ^ ut v , * r pimply is,, without intention >tp ' signify Jolande ^ ♦ M r t o r , Psychological "Reflections (New York: Softs. 1953)» p. 174. 3 today, the artist is expected to explain, so to speak, the inexplainable.6 The teaching artist, particularly, is called upon to speak and write about the meaning of art, and his ex­ aminers feel cheated if he "dodges'1 their questions by merely pointing to the object or objects in question. For professional if not for personal reasons, he is faced with the problem of verbally formulating his par­ ticular creative and educational objectives. This neces­ sity, unfortunately, places the artist at a distinct dis­ advantage. Ordinarily the artist is neither specifically trained nor particularly inclined to operate from a ver­ bal frame of reference.? Even should he find himself possessed of linguistic skills, that about which he is 6 As Andrew Cecil Bradley put it, "What Beethoven meant by his symphony, or Turner by his picture, was not something you can name, but the picture and the symphony. Meaning they have, but what meaning can be said in no language but their own: and we know this, though some strange delusion makes us think the meaning has less worth because we cannot put it into words." Melvin Rader, Editor, A Modern Book of Esthetics (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1952), p. 354-. ^Georges Braque said, "The painter thinks in terms of form and color." Robert Goldwater and Mario Treves, Editors, Artists on Art (New York: Pantheon Books, 1945), p • 442. "I can't give you any particular dope on painting — it's too complicated, and meaningless in short snatches, and quite often in longer ones." James Brooks in a letter to the author. "You asked in your letter why I paint as I do. I think you can turn that around and ask yourself the same question." Louis Schanker in a letter to the author. able to speak or write differs considerably from that towards which he normally directs his attention. At best, he can speak only of peripheral problems related to his major area of activity; at worst, he finds him­ self involved in a verbal discipline which, for him at least, is wholly inadequate to the task it is expected to perform. Can the artist ignore social pressures towards verbal formulation, or must he risk the dangers and difficulties attending entry into this verbal environ­ ment where he is relatively inexperienced? In either instance he may expect criticism. The final choice of a course of action may therefore rest on the personal needs of the artist. The teaching artist is faced with the need for verbal communication, and to some degree, he must risk the attempt at linguistic expression. The writing of a manuscript therefore offers such a person the opportunity to examine his personal beliefs in re­ lation to his social environment and to present a more complete and precise statement of faith than might other­ wise be possible.® ® "... it is important that one challenge oneself from time to time to a statement of the beliefs on which he is acting." Ross L. Mooney, "Groundwork for Creative Research," The American Psychologist, v. 9, no. 9 (Sep­ tember, 1954), p. 544. C. G. Jung says, "Upon one’s own philosophy, con­ scious or unconscious, depends one's ultimate interpre- 5 The self-examination necessary to conceptual inte­ gration has, in this instance, altered considerably the original intentions in regard to this manuscript. The initial effort to identify and explain non-descriptive objectives has been significantly affected by the effort to express deeply personal, emotional and conceptual re­ sponses to a particular kind of creative activity in re­ lation to its complex and sometimes unsympathetic social environment.9 Ways had to be found to explicate the tation of facts. Therefore it is wise to be as clear as possible about one's subjective principles. As the man is, so will be his ultimate truth." Jacobi, op. cit.. pp. 112-113. ' Although contemporary society tends to look with suspicion upon that which is not objective, factual, and dispassionately impartial, this manuscript is nevertheless intended to reveal the importance of subjective and emo­ tional factors in the development of a conceptual position. It is a recognition of the inescapable interdependence of conceptual and emotional attitudes. Understandably then, the footnoted quotations have been primarily chosen as evidence for the significance of personal beliefs, and they are not expected to serve as proof or authority for the validity of the beliefs here presented.
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