The Science of Transforming Art Objects into Experiences

Upon entering the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO), immediately make a sharp left, wander past the collection of Canadian art and eventually, you’ll find yourself in a room of mid-20th-century, mostly American, modern art. Along the far wall, looking a bit lonely, is a painting with three greengrey squares.

Look closer! The perfectly painted squares, two with hues of gray, and a central greenish square all seem to float. These seemingly simple shapes were completed using primarily a palette knife, all by hand, and without masking tape! Looking even closer, it can be noticed that the colours within each square are not flat. There’s a delicate vibrancy in the tone. In my opinion, a quality that leans more towards the work of Mark Rothko than the hard-edge products that came later in New York’s art scene.

The artist, Joseph Albers, a Bauhaus instructor who eventually fled to America to escape the Nazis. In art communities around the world, he is known as one of the most influential colour theorists of modern times. And, despite the minimalist appearance of his artwork, he held a deep-rooted belief that art should be an experience. To Albers, every colour has the ability to change how surrounding colours are perceived. He was most interested in how a colour combination could impact the viewer. In short, he was exploring the science of colour differently from his predecessors as a means of better understanding visual engagement. Ultimately, his work wasn’t about making squares; it was about the visual engagement. https://youtu.be/l3xpTtn7zo8?si=mW9NMQKF79iufcyj

Within all the arts, when what is seen, heard, read, felt, tasted, or even sensed becomes greater than the sum of what is there (in front of you), art becomes an experience.

The merging of science and art is (probably) most commonly associated with the Italian Renaissance. Think Leonardo da Vinci, maybe having to pay small bribes to Lorenzo de’ Medici’s underground mafia for quick access to fresh, albeit not-so-smelly, corpses as a means of gaining a technological advantage in human anatomy and physiology.

More to the point, the science of colour has had a profound impact on creativity. Sir Isaac Newton is often credited with developing the first colour wheel, but later, the impressionists, with their full palettes of tube paint, products of the industrial revolution, packed up their portable studios, hopped on trains, and made their way to the countryside to document the world in vivid, never-imagined-before colours! The invention of photography certainly wasn’t going to stop this gang of creatives!

Later, artists like Georges Seurat, a post-impressionist who studied at École des Beaux-Arts, a very traditional French art academy, likely was influenced by the academy’s lessons in colour theory. The result was artwork that ultimately morphed into a pre-computerized version of digital art. And so the story goes, repeating itself over and over.

In summary, Joseph Alber’s squares may never receive the same attention as the works of other great masters, but that doesn’t mean his artwork shouldn’t be ignored. In my opinion, artists exist to engage their audiences. Since engagement is an emotional response (such as happiness, sadness, fear, satisfaction, etc.), when effective, audiences feel inspired and moved. And, it is at this crucial moment when an image (maybe one on the walls at the AGO) ceases to be an object and becomes an experience.

How we engage audiences is at the heart of creativity, and science is often a crucial element that ultimately makes the experience real!