Hans Hofmann in the Abstract and Nature - Essay Example

Hans Hoffman in the and Nature Table of Contents Hans Hoffman in the and Nature Abstract art is often difficult for most people to understand because they have little to no comprehension of the theories that lie behind this particular art form. Unlike traditional art, late modernist paintings such as those created by the lesser known Hans Hoffman sought to convey something more than the pictorial element while remaining free of the laws and rules of composition that had been constructed and built upon since the time of the ancient Greeks. These paintings seek to convey an emotional context that remains separate from any kind of recognizable subject. This is done through the artful use of color and form as they interact with or are a part of the materials and support. "In its purest form in Western art, an abstract art is ' completely non-objective or non-representational" (Boddy-Evans, 2006). The main concept behind abstract art is based on the idea that art is not static, but rather interactive with its audience and the political and social ideas of the audience's present as well as the symbols inherent in the particular forms used within the artwork. By reducing the recognizable forms, therefore, it becomes possible for the artist to attain a more pure expression in his or her creation. Jean-Francois Lyotard argues that avant-garde art uses experimental innovations in technique and structure to attempt "to make visible that there is something which can be conceived and which can neither be seen nor made visible" (Lyotard, 1997: 78). As an abstract artist, Hofmann was known as a synthesist because he brought together traditional methods and avant-garde concepts concerning the nature of painting, largely based on the works of Modern painters Cezanne, Kandinsky and Picasso's Synthetic Cubism. Because teaching dominated much of his creative life, his art was often critically measured against his theories. With his European sensibilities and his newly adopted American spirit, it needs to be remembered that Hofmann's work exemplifies a fusion of multiple aspects of 20th century art. A look into his biography reveals the development of his ideas regarding nature and abstraction while a glimpse into his career reveals how his teaching reflected this conceptual development. Biography Hans Hofmann was born in 1880 near Munich, Germany in a small city called Weissenburg, Bavaria. Growing up, he was surrounded by images of the past as his city still retained many remains of its ancient Roman past and of the countryside, with the closest large city being Ingolstadt more than 30 miles away. While this doesn't seem that far away to a modern audience accustomed to the use of cars to drive to the city every day from far off suburbs, Hoffman grew up in a time when the automobile was just springing to life. The first practical working horseless carriage was created in 1889 in Germany by Gottlieb Daimler and Wilhelm Maybach, when Hofmann was already 9 years old (Ament, 2005). It is possible that Hofmann had a chance to experience some of the technologies that were being developed in association with the automobile, however, because his father moved the family to Munich when Hofmann was just 6 when he took a job working for the government. "Hofmann developed an interest in mathematics, science, music and art at a very early age. When he was sixteen, his father helped him obtain a job with the Bavarian government as the assistant to the director of public works. During this time, Hofmann further developed his technical knowledge of mathematics, even inventing and patenting an electromagnetic comptometer" ("Hans Hofmann", 2007). Despite this, Hofmann's interest in art was superior to his interest in mathematics and, when his father died in the late 1800s, Hofmann decided to pursue this interest in greater detail. By 1898, Hofmann was studying art at the Mortiz Heymann's art school in Munich, where he came into contact with some of the new developments within the art world such as pointillism and impressionism. His skill and enthusiasm in embracing these movements spurred his instructor, Will Schwartz, to recommend Hofmann to continue his studies in Paris, the great art capital of the world at that time ("Hans Hofmann", 2007). Hofmann gained the support of Berlin art patron Phillip Freudenberg and spent the years from 1904-1914 in Paris. It was here that he "became associated with the leading artists and readily absorbed the most vital ideas and styles, chiefly symbolism, neoimpressionism, fauvism and cubism. He worked with Matisse and was a friend of Picasso and Delaunay" (Chipp, 1968: 511). With the outbreak of World War I, Hofmann felt it necessary to return to his homeland and opened a new modern art school in Munich, which he ran for 18 years. With the rise of the Nazi party in Germany, however, Hofmann decided, like many Germans nervous about the increasing restrictions on their artistic expression, to leave the country for New York in America. Hofmann reopened his school in New York "where many of the artists who were to become the leaders of the postwar generation became his students or were influenced by him, either through his teaching, his painting or by his powerful personality" (Chipp, 1968: 511). Hofmann died in 1966 after having brought to America the new ideas of Europe and providing artists in this country with the means to continue developing concepts of abstract art and expression into the new age. Approach to Art and Nature For Hofmann, art was something that could not be separated from the basic concepts found in nature. This might not be immediately apparent to the casual observer of his paintings, most of which are characterized by blocks of color defining nothing specific but managing to evoke entire ranges of emotion. "He combined Cubist structure and intense Fauvist color into a highly personal visual language with which he endlessly explored pictorial structures and chromatic relationships. Hofmann created volume in his compositions not by rendering or modeling but through contrasts of color, shape and surface" (Catalogue Raisonn' Project, 2007). In each of these explorations, Hofmann relied on the forms and structures of nature to inform the piece, allowing his thought and his motion to mirror one another in visible details on the surface of the canvas, building up texture and color to enhance an impression, a reaction or an interaction. "As an artist Hofmann tirelessly explored pictorial structure, spatial tensions and color relationships. In his earliest portraits done just years into the twentieth century, his interior scenes of the 1940s and his signature canvases of the late 1950s and the early 1960s, Hofmann brought to his paintings what art historian Karen Wilkin has described as a 'range from loose accumulations of brushy strokes ' to crisply tailored arrangements of rectangles ' but that somehow seems less significant than their uniform intensity, their common pounding energy and their consistent physicality" (Catalogue Raisonn' Project, 2007). To Hofmann, it was not necessary to view a landscape to be inspired by nature as everything the human mind conceives of is first and foremost informed by the shapes inherent in nature. An understanding of this passion for nature is the key to understanding his ideas on abstraction. Ideas on Nature As already stated, Hoffman believed that the natural world was the source of all human inspiration. Within the natural world, forms are created by the intersection of lines, squiggles, shapes, colors and definition of space as it is divided and organized by a variety of these forms. "He incessantly probed natural elements, focusing on volume, and geometric forms in positive and negative spaces" (Carasso, 2005). This investigation into volume and form slowly developed into a highly abstract approach to representation that emerged in his teaching and his artwork. This development can be traced as one compares his work throughout the course of his career. Hofmann's development of the use of nature within his work can be seen to develop into more and more abstract representation as it progressed from the early 'Landscape' of 1935 through 'Provocation' (1946) to the later works such as 'Frolicking' (1965). 'Landscape' portrays an impressionist-inspired and recognizable landscape image. Within the painting, one can clearly discern several small blue farm buildings scattered about the central ground with hay-colored hills stretching into the horizon, the suggestion of a tree to one side and the indication of a small farm garden in the foreground. The painting is done in somewhat washed out yellows, blues and greens, conveying a sense of friendliness without being too inviting. Ten years later, Hofmann's paintings had shifted into a more abstract mode yet still seemed probably inspired by natural settings as in 'Provocation'. Here, brighter colors and jagged lines are placed against a black central ground, giving the piece a much higher degree of impact. However, the spiked lighter form in the center of the canvas retains a sense of an old and bent tree, which is emphasized by bright red vaguely circular blotches seeming to 'fall' from the 'branches'. Without examining too far into the history of the piece, nature is still easily found within the forms used to express any ideas intended. In the year before he died, Hofmann created 'Frolicking' in which there are no clearly naturally inspired elements unless one considers the concept of colored smoke. However, the wispy shapes and solid forms still manage to convey a sense of the natural. These three paintings illustrate the development of Hofmann's abstraction while remaining focused on natural elements. "Hofmann produced a new type of landscape, one that is composed, not of trees and land, but of the tension between its space, form, color and planes" (Carasso, 2005). As Hofmann perfected his concentration on forms, he began seeing them in terms of objects that helped to divide the scene into positive and negative space rather than specific forms such as trees, houses or haystacks. "It was the object, he said, that creates the negative or positive space, not, as traditionally conceived, that an object is placed in a space. If an object creates space, then it is light that creates form. Similarly, light makes color in nature, but color creates light in painting" (Carasso, 2005). Thus, from this conception of nature, Hofmann developed his ideas of abstraction. Ideas on Abstraction In keeping with the ideas of the later Modernist movement, Hofmann's ideas on abstraction had their roots in attempts to find the truth of reality. Modern art devotes itself "to presenting the existence of something unpresentable"; "it will make one see only by prohibiting one from seeing" (Kant, 2000: 11). This idea remains visible in Hofmann's work as he allows color to bring out the form of objects found in his images rather than the form to dictate the color. This is also expressed in his stated conceptions regarding abstraction and its value to art. "When the artist is well equipped with conscious feeling, memory and balanced sensibilities, he intensifies his concepts by penetrating his subject and by condensing his experience into a reality of the spirit complete in itself. Thus he creates a new reality in terms of the medium" (Hofmann cited in Wessels, 1948: 73). Through the process of creating art as an expression of the interaction between the artist and the landscape, the artwork becomes more than a mere image but instead manages to communicate to the viewer some of this original impression as well as a secondary reaction that is completely between the artist, the piece and the viewer. An uneducated eye might suggest that, especially with his later works, the art of Hofmann consists of little more than meaningless squares and other shapes, nothing beyond the abilities of the smallest child and certainly nothing informed by complicated philosophical theories. "The difference between art produced by children and great works of art is that one is approached through the purely subconscious and emotional, and the other retains a consciousness of experience as the work develops and is emotionally enlarged through the greater command of the expression-medium" (Hofmann cited in Wessels, 1948: 74). Hofmann, as an instructor, was well aware of many theories relating to artistic expression, relativity, the medium of expression, pictorial laws, the influence of the picture plane and principles of light and color. Hofmann as a painter had an intuitive sense for his art and a spiritual, metaphysical connection to the images he produced. Together, Hofmann managed to effect a significant impact upon the development of art in the United States into the present day. Impact (approximately 1 page) What is his impact by being in NY City. Teaching Method (approximately 1 ' pages) His teaching method Conceptual Development (approximately 1 ' pages) His Conceptual development. Push-pull color theory Conclusion (approximately 1 ' pages) What connection I have to his work and how is connected to my work. ( the nature ) What is my opinion. Art has been part of my life. Through all these years of studies and experience, I explored myself into the school of abstrat expressionism. My work is about exploration of nature, color, texture, space and form. Nature is always the source of my inspiration and creativity.which that the commen between me and Homann ( the nature, beceause it's his inspiration to ceate his landscap using vivid and brilliant color, forms and cubisim as Cezane creating his own style ).I like his creativity in his painting that makes me also chose him because I see myself by using my creativity from the same source wich is the nature either from my imagination or from nature itself.Searching for the details in the nature,and that makes me go deeper through things to create my own vision. I apply paint with a lot of confedence showing my feelings and emotions with a strong dependence on what appear on my canvas. My influences are dependent on artists as Cezanne, monet and manet as impressionism's artists, Surrealism as Dali and abstract expressionisim as Hans Hofmann.I believe I have the tendency to view art as a process that enables me to extricate myself from all boundries to exceed my Art work. ' References Ament, Phil. (March 2005). "Automobile." The Great Idea Finder. Troy, MI: Vaunt Design Group. Available February 28, 2008 from Boddy-Evans, Marion. (2006). "Abstract Art: An Introduction." About Abstract Art. Available February 28, 2008 from Carasso, Roberta. (November 26, 2005). "Hans Hofmann." Imago Gallaries. Palm Desert. Available February 28, 2008 from Catalogue Raisonn' Project. (2007). New York. Available February 28, 2008 from Chipp, Herschel B. (1968). Theories of Modern Art. Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press. "Hans Hofmann." (January 2007). HansHofmann.net. Available February 28, 2008 from Kant, Immanuel. (2000). The Critique of Judgment. New York: Prometheus Books. Lyotard, Jean-Francois. (1997). The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge. Trans. Geoff. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota. Wessels, Glenn (Trans.). (1948). Search for the Real and Other Essays by Hans Hofmann. S.T. Weeks & B.H. Hayes Jr. (Eds.). Andover, MA: Addison Gallery of American Art. http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/ww2time.htm http://www.hanshofmann.net/bio/bio.html Read More