Event
Point and Line to Plane VII
Abstraction
does not deal with objects or with effects or with images, it is purely
expressive art, one that excludes all the styles of the past and is a plastic
art with only one purpose; to inspire human nature towards beauty.
"The
creative force and the expressiveness of paintings reside materially in the
colour and texture of pigment, in the possibilities of form invention and
organization, and in the flat plane on which these elements are brought to
play.
The
artist is concerned solely with linking these absolute qualities directly to
his wit, imagination and experience, without the go-between of a 'subject'.
Working on a single plane as the instantaneously visualizing factor, he
realizes his mind, motives, and physical sensations in a permanent and
universal language of colour, texture and form organization. He covers the pure
plane of expression that has so long been hidden by the glazings of nature
imitation, anecdote, and the other popular subjects.
Accordingly,
the artist's work is to be measured by the vitality, the invention, and the
definiteness and conviction of purpose within its own medium."
Man
Ray 1916, The Forum Exhibition of Modern American Painters.