The classification provides four or more codes placed on four axis (A - formalism, B - matériality, C - involvement body/mind, D - communication). These codes are positionning the artist in the art history.
A axis : FORMALISM
When looking at the work, what type of formalisation first strikes the eye? Is it more abstract or more figurative, etc ? (on a scale from more "immaterial" to more "realist").A320 : Representative works Traditional representative works
from the most poetic vision to the most delicate evocation of what constitutes our life and environment, represented by the various forms of painting we know as the "French Tradition" (from Cézanne's Provence landscapes to Van Gogh's bunches of flowers, from Boudin's seascapes to Kisling's portraits...). A340 : Representative works Work with active figures
shapes are more active but not really expressionist (Alberto Giacometti, Jean Hélion , ...).
B axis : MATERIALITY
How does the materiality of what is shown come across?
(on a scale from more "immaterial" to more "real").B130 : Materiality
in painting, but also with all other materials with the following possibilities: unstructured slight materiality
colours and material are more or less understated, diluted, evanescent, playing with their transparence (Zao Wou Ki, Olivier Debré, …). B180 : Materiality
in painting, but also with all other materials with the following possibilities: mixed materiality: structured / unstructured
when a work is "structured" in its "lack of structure", and vice versa (repetition of forms, signs, matter ... Viallat, Toroni, Degottex, Hantaï,...).
C axis : INVOLVEMENT BODY/ MIND
With what body:mind ratio does the artist enter into his work?
Classify from the most "intellectual" (e.g."Concept Art"...) to the most "physical" (e.g. "Body Art", ...).C180 : tending towards the corporeal / the senses via expression with a frank sensuality, or even openly sexual
either literal (Courbet's "Origin of the world", Lucian Freud, John Kacere, P. Klossowki, David Salle, Gilbert and George, ...),
- symbolic (Paul Armand Gette, Andreas Serrano, ...),
- humorous (Gilles Barbier "cerveau", Boyd Webb "the globe" , ...),
- or "realist" (certain "Body-artists" such as Otto Muehl, Paul Mc Carthy's "installations" , Zoran Naskovski's videos, ...), ... C190 : tending towards the corporeal / the senses the work as the result of an action gestural
the work as the result of a bodily movement, chiefly a hand movement: from Jackson Pollock's "Dripping" to Georges Mathieu's "Lyrical Abstraction", L. Fontana's "perforations" to the flayed figures of V. Vélickovic.
D axis : COMMUNICATION
Does the artist have the deliberate intention to convey a message of any sort through his work?
(classified from the most "mystical" to the most "worldly").D130 : via what is meaningful
based on the idea that work on what symbolizes forms an intentional message in itself (for example: Daniel Dezeuze's "Stretchers", etc., etc., ...). by variations in execution
seriality, multiplication (Claude Viallat, Niele Toroni, "figurines" by Antony Gormley, ...), accumulation or compression (J. Chamberlain, Arman, César, ...), subtleties and variability of the material (Rober Ryman's "Whites"; dissolutions of "matter / life" by Roman Opalka or by On Kawara; Gilberto Zorio, ...).
SALOU Jean
www.jean-salou.com |
