Rethinking Abstraction: Inventing Abstraction at MoMA

Rumor has it that the Inventing Abstraction, 1910-1925 exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art will be talked about for decades to come. Its topic and its content will be at the forefront of textbooks, classroom discussions and art historical writing. Without a doubt, this rumor is reality. The exhibition explores the infamous transformation of artistic practice into the valleys of non-figurative forms, fragmented planes and

An artistic genius used to be measured by his precision in naturalistic forms. The forefathers of art (and art history) praised the life-likeness of history paintings, portraits and landscapes. Art needed to become Nature’s greatest comrade in order to depict her so truthfully that you could emerge into the depths of each canvas. This illusory experience for the viewer was heightened when perspective was invented and utilized. Then, with oil paints, pictures became glistening with meticulous detail; textures became magical because they truly emerged from the canvas with their palpability. Soon, this would all change. And, it would change quite drastically.

As the exhibition notes, in 1912, Vasily Kandinsky, Frantisek Kupka, Francis Picabia, and Robert Delaunay—presented the first abstract pictures to the public. “Inventing Abstraction, 1910–1925 celebrates the centennial of this bold new type of artwork, tracing the development of abstraction as it moved through a network of modern artists, from Marsden Hartley and Marcel Duchamp to Piet Mondrian and Kazimir Malevich, sweeping across nations and across media.” Once abstraction began it would infiltrate into every artist’s mind (it still does today). The artists, from a wide range of countries and artistic training surely connected and conversed with each other in order to change the art world forever. The exhibition’s curator surely displays the interpersonal relationships between the artists and between their originating countries. The introductory wall text on the sixth floor of the museum, displayed in what looks like an abstract canvas, rather than on a wall; the title is printed on large geometric shapes and the hues of orange, black and white surely command your attention to the abstraction that has become an accepted aesthetic. Next to the text, there is a map; it is so comprehensive (each person is connected to another, like a modern version of a family tree) that it will make you dizzy. Even after learning about abstraction for three years, I had not realized the immense connections between the modern artists of the time. Also, the rooms within the galleries are split into different countries, so the viewer can understand, and interpret, each country’s key figures and the interconnections and contributions to the invention of abstraction.

After viewing more than 350 works, – including paintings, drawings, prints, books, sculptures, films, photographs, recordings, and dance pieces – the viewer will appreciate the exhibition’s thoroughness and key premise. Abstraction is not just another style of the visual arts. Instead it is about “establishing a new modern language for the arts.” Although the exhibition could have turned into a fun guessing game for art history students who have seen many exhibited works on the projector screens in classes, it proved its point most clearly when I had a visceral reaction to one of the works. It is difficult to observe abstraction with a period eye, since today to be modern is to be mainstream. However, when I turned around the first piece of art on display (a Picasso, of course), I was confronted with František Kupka’s Mme Kupka among Verticals, 1910-1911. This glorious work of art both challenged my perception and my understanding of a flat support covered with paint. At first, the brilliant sensation of colored verticals on the canvas come along and create an engaging flatness. And just when the color attracts the mind’s eye, the woman behind the uneven vertical shapes is spotted. Her colored skin gradually changes from a deep plum to pastel periwinkle to lime green. A portrait of his Kupka’s wife becomes a anything but a portrait. The museum suggests that the way the shapes envelope the subject is “suggesting a literal assault on figuration.” Furthermore, the paintings success lies not just in its innovation and bold color, but in its ability to still provoke its observer (like me in the twenty-first century) to see something avant-garde.

The exhibition is not to be missed. It will shape the way you think about abstraction, but it will also shape the way you think about space everyday. After all, abstract art is not about moving from point A to point B. Abstract art is about rethinking your destination, and moving from point AI to point AII. In order to understand abstraction, the viewer must rethink the institution’s conventions and processes altogether. Breaking from academic and societal expectations, the abstract artists invented a new future.