Ornament and Abstraction

The importance of ornament in the emergence and development of abstract art has long been underestimated. Indeed, such pioneers as Wassily Kandinsky and Piet Mondrian looked upon ornament as a sin in which abstraction should not indulge. Yet ornament had a decided if surreptitious impact on abstract art, this book demonstrates. Featuring four artists who help to highlight the role of ornament in the history of art -- Kandinsky, Mondrian, Henri Matisse, and Frank Stella -- this generously illustrated volume examines in depth the influence of ornament as a formal and methodical element in abstract art.

The book begins with the innovative pictorial conception of Philipp Otto Runge, whose early nineteenth-century paintings featured the last genuine form in the history of ornament -- the arabesque. The authors trace the influence of the arabesque and show how, side by side with the "royal way" of Cubism, arabesque abstraction opens up a second doorway to the world of non-figurative art. Following other lines of inquiry, the authors explore theoretical findings on the theme of ornament and what it reveals about the relation between abstraction and figurative art; modern artists' preoccupation with the ornamentation found in distant cultures (such as Matisse with the Orient and Oceania, Ad Reinhardt with Asian culture, and Josef Albers and Barnett Newman with pre-Columbian ornament); and ornamentation's relation to Minimalism, new media, digital technology, the Renaissance, and the Rococo. Showcasing a remarkable array of masterpieces, this book is a celebration of ornament and its impact on abstract art.