Frances to Chris with thanks... These nice pictorial abstractions perhaps show well that the formal properties of any object will have aesthetic qualities that are found to be pleasurable or enjoyable or admirable, even if not recognizable and familiar.
You wrote... Taking my new camera down to the museum yesterday, I thought I'd record some "marks" as found in a variety of paintings. I've posted them at: http://mountshang.blogspot.com/2009/06/marks.html. So here's a little game: Can anyone recognize any specific artists or group resemblances here? Or at least identify those marks that did not come from "a lofty work of art"? Or the ones from the 16th Century? Or the ones from the 21st Century? Actually, this is not a recognition test of "marks" if we define them as "whatever is done to a surface in a single, un-interrupted touch" because, more than just individual marks, I've presented entire areas of detail. (It just seemed that marks isolated from background would be completely unrecognizable. Doesn't everyone agree?)
