Rolina van Vliet
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Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> History & Criticism -> General AAS
Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> Instructional & How-To -> Watercolor Painting
Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> Instructional & How-To -> General
Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5
Average rating: 4.5 of 5
Best Instructional Art Book Ever 5 out of 5 stars.
11 of 12 people found this review helpful.
I love this book. I would recommend it to anyone who wants some instruction in abstract art. Very easy to follow & all kinds of ways to use all sorts of media.
No 'right' recipe 3 out of 5 stars.
4 of 5 people found this review helpful.
For me, this book is too formulaic; it is more about "getting it right" than about awakening creative inspiration. While it is true that the abstract artist needs a good grasp of design, this is not the essence of abstract art; it is a medium for expressing intangibles visually.
If you believe a 'paint by numbers' kind of approach will give you confidence to begin, by all means start with Painting Abstracts. But if you want your abstracts to sing, I would recommend working from Mary Todd Beam's book, "Celebrate Your Creative Self." (She also has a new book coming out in March of 2009.)
For me, all the examples in "Painting Abstracts" have the same emotional temperature and use exactly the same visual metaphors. To get the idea of different visual metaphors, I would recommend looking at works by artists using other mediums, especially fibre artists and ceramic artists.
What I most find missing in this book is help with awakening inspiration: in the texture of rocks and leaves and trees for example, in different moods of water. Have you ever looked at a sunset that made you gasp? No doubt we cannot all aspire to creating the same emotional impact, but it is possible to put some of that feeling into an abtract painting.
Look further than this book if you want to do more than know how to handle your medium or how to create a pleasant design.
Editorial Review:
Full instructions for 65 abstract paintings are provided in this guide that urges beginners to plunge right in, learning about composition, theme, and design while they paint. The history of abstract painting and its importance as a means of self-expression are covered in the guide's beginning pages, and each of the paintings that follow conventional step-by-step instruction is replaced with information on composition, imagery, method, materials, and technique, allowing the painter to copy straight from the book—or make changes according to the flow of creativity.
