THE ABSTRACT ARTIST

Michael Edwards

 

THE ABSTRACT ARTIST

 

Inchoate thinking

echoing light in spaces

emerging ideas.

 

On canvases primed

no place for opacity

colours are merging.

 

Interpretation

unenlightened conceptions

the artist reviled.

 

Receptive children

abstraction appreciative

perceptions unstained.

 

 

 

  • Author: Michael Edwards (Offline Offline)
  • Published: September 14th, 2017 00:37
  • Comment from author about the poem: I still fail to understand why so many folk fail to 'get' abstract painting - this little poem reflects that - the painting was done by pour method and is off to gallery on Monday . Yes I am late in posting this morning (UK) but was late last night at a concert.
  • Category: Unclassified
  • Views: 80
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Comments13

  • Goldfinch60

    It took me a long time to come to understand abstract art, what I found was I need to LOOK at a painting not just see it. It is the same with music to appreciate it properly you need to LISTEN to it and not just hear it.
    As you know Michael I have appreciated your abstract works that you have put on this site and this one is no different.
    I can always find something within the abstract that calls to me or makes me think.
    Good write and that last stanza is so true, children do not have stains in their minds.

    • Michael Edwards

      I've heard it said that out of six adults five will say 'I don't understand it; out of six children six will say it's lovely'. If only adults had the open minds of children.

      • Goldfinch60

        It is the same with music, when Joshua Bell busked in a subway in 2007 of the over 1,000 people that passed him only 27 put any money in his case and the person that stopped to listen the longest was a child.

      • FredPeyer

        Michael, an incredible poem and a beautiful painting. Being married to a Chinese woman, the first thing I saw in your painting was abstract chinese character brush painting.The next thought was to be open to whatever comes our way.
        And finally, your last stanza is right on! I find it unfortunate that children's minds are being limited by us adults. WE should be more like children!

        • Michael Edwards

          Spot on Fred and, like you, having a wife from Burma, I can see the Burmese hieroglyphics in the piece.

        • Frank Prem

          Not for me, Michael. I need a picture to be a picture, I'm afraid.

          Good luck to all abstracters, though. There's a place - just not my place.

          • Michael Edwards

            You don't know what you're missing Frank but as you say: each to his own. I'm afraid after years of painting and selling representational art I've grown weary of its predictability and love the freedom of abstract work which is taking over my output.

            • Frank Prem

              Yep, I get that completely. And, of course, I have particular likes in art, but mostly what I like is what my wife or I produce ourselves. It seems more special, more real, somehow.

            • orchidee

              I'm not against abstract paintings, though I don't like too many dark colours. That abstract of yours may sell for about £5 million! Ohh, wishful thinking - or no?!
              A fine write and pic Michael.

              • Michael Edwards

                If only - it's about 18 ins frame size and will be quite expensive once the gallery add their 35% plus VAT - but they must think it will sell or they wouldn't accept it. It's one of four that will be going on display plus some of my little coastal sculptures. All I've got to do now is get them all ready.

                • orchidee

                  Who might buy my 'hymn-book'?! it's on a file online, on this site.

                  • Michael Edwards

                    You might have more luck with a 'her-book'

                  • Fay Slimm.

                    Children often show the way Michael and imagination is their forté - - love the abstract image and enjoyed the depth reached by your words.

                    • Michael Edwards

                      I very much appreciate your kind comments Fay - thanks so much

                    • BRIAN & ANGELA

                      Thanks MICHAEL ~ Like the Impressionists and Surrealists I feel PHOTOGRAPHY has made "Chocolate Box Art" obsolete ! Therefore all my Art is either Abstract or Science Fiction ~ both genres are postcameric. I am surprized you sent us the wrong orientation of Yellow on Blue 36. If you orientate it clockwise thru 90 you will see it is the rear view of the new cover of LADY IN A VAN ! The splashes are detritus ! Your elegant Poem is about as close as you can get to defining L'ARTE D'ABSTRACTE Thanks for sharing also for adding a Poem to our Places FUSION ~ Yours BRIAN

                      • Michael Edwards

                        One turn anti clockwise and it's a dog having a poo !! that's what great about abstract art - interpretation lies in the eyes of the beholder. thanks Brian

                      • WL Schuett

                        Love this Michael I have an artist friend who writes an occasional poem but he only writes art poems , poem about color or one about creativity and the like ... I like the abstract thinking and abstract art it creates

                      • Tony36

                        Well written and expressed

                      • Confused kid

                        Like the concept of the poem

                      • myself and me

                        How come when you pour, it is an art, while I pour, it is a big mess. Do you really need to understand an abstract art? I like this one for its color and the way the color appear on the background.
                        Congratulations. M.E.

                        • Michael Edwards

                          No of course you don't . at the risk of relaying a story already told when I was organising exhibitions a while back the CEO's secretary said she didn't understand or like abstract art. Later as we were walking round the exhibition I said I did like her dress which had an abstract pattern. She replied that it was one of her favourites at which I asked her: 'Are you saying that if you put a frame round it you wouldn't like it any more?' A while later she admitted that, having taken my comment to heart, she had changed her views.

                          • myself and me

                            I guess she never consider the abstract pattern on her dress as an art, but your question to her is really a nerve touch.

                          • malubotelho

                          • malubotelho

                            I like art very much and I love to make art in various form. I like abstracts and can stay for a long period of time just reading its infinite message. I'm learning a lot with my three years old granddaughter. She has so much concentration that if she watchs a cartun movie once it is finished she knows the names of all caracters in an easy way. Plus she immediately begin to use what she learned with the movie. She has her little mind really there, in one piece. Amazing. Your painting to me is like the spectrum of someone running. It has a lot of moviment.

                            • Michael Edwards

                              Thank you malu - as Picasso said - it took me a lifetime learning to draw like a child. your granddaughter sounds like a super little girl - I am picking up our grandson later today - he is 5 and now becoming a real schoolboy but still has that children's innocence - todays activity will be laminating fallen leaves for a school project.

                              • malubotelho

                                Wow! How nice

                              • MendedFences27

                                Fresh ideas come in new forms, when all the older forms have been used up. It happens in every art form, language, paint, music, sculpting...all. Your poem expresses how some cannot cope with the change, while children and their vastly open minds accept everything at face value. No preconceived ideas of acceptability.
                                Your artwork, said to me, a light of hope over a blue environment. Sadness being swept away by enlightenment or, perhaps love.
                                I saw no alphabetical characters or strange dogs. The colors hit me first and remained. I learn from you every day. - Phil

                                • Michael Edwards

                                  Thank you so much Phil - wise words indeed. I do enjoy trying out different forms of poetry and different styles in art. I'm giving a demo to an art group in a weeks time on painting without using a brush and am still experimenting using different methods - anything to extend the experience and the mind.



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