Abstract Art
Bold statement colour, quiet neutrals and richly textured knife work — every abstract here is painted by hand in oils on canvas, made in the size your wall actually needs.
What is abstract art?
Abstract art is painting that does not set out to depict anything recognisable. There is no landscape behind it, no figure, no bowl of fruit — colour, shape, line and texture are the subject in their own right rather than a means of describing something else.
It arrived remarkably late. For most of European history a painting was expected to represent the visible world, and it was only around 1910 that artists began removing the reference altogether. Wassily Kandinsky is usually credited with the first purely abstract works — though the Swedish painter Hilma af Klint had been making them since 1906, then left instructions that her work not be shown until twenty years after her death. It was not exhibited until 1986. Kazimir Malevich took the idea as far as it will go with Black Square in 1915: a black square, and nothing else.
That history is why abstract art asks something different of you. There is nothing to identify, so the useful question is not what is it but what does it do — whether it settles a room or charges it, whether its colour agrees with the light you actually get through your windows.
It is also why it works so well in a home. A landscape commits a wall to a place. An abstract commits it to a mood, which turns out to be a much easier thing to live with for ten years.
Choosing one for your room
Start with the light, not the sofa. A south-facing room in Australia gets cool, indirect light all day, which mutes warm colours — ochres and rusts can go flat. North-facing rooms take strong colour easily.
Go bigger than feels sensible. The most common regret with abstract art is scale. One large canvas reads as deliberate; three small ones usually read as indecision.
Texture carries further than colour. Heavily worked knife paintings hold up in a room you walk past all day, because the surface changes as the light moves. That is also the part a printed reproduction cannot give you.
Common questions
What is abstract art, simply put?
Art that does not try to represent anything you could name. Instead of depicting a subject, it uses colour, form, line and texture as the subject. It ranges from the almost-recognisable, where a landscape or figure has been simplified nearly out of existence, to work with no reference to the visible world at all.
When did abstract art start?
Around 1910. Wassily Kandinsky is conventionally credited with the first non-representational paintings, and Kazimir Malevich pushed the idea to its limit with Black Square in 1915. The Swedish artist Hilma af Klint was in fact painting abstract work from 1906, but she withheld it from public view and it was not exhibited until 1986.
Does abstract art have meaning?
Usually, but not the kind you decode. Kandinsky wrote at length about colour affecting the viewer the way music does, without needing a story attached. Most abstract painters are after a particular feeling rather than a hidden message, so there is generally no correct reading to be missed.
How much does abstract art sell for?
Anything from tens of dollars for a mass-produced print to over US$100 million at auction — Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko both sit in that bracket. Hand-painted abstracts here start at $249, roughly what a large printed canvas costs elsewhere.
What size abstract painting should I buy?
As a rule of thumb, a painting above a sofa or bed should be around two-thirds the width of the furniture beneath it. Most people go too small. Every work here is made to order, so you can have the size that suits the wall rather than the nearest size in stock.
Are these prints or real paintings?
Paintings. Every abstract in this collection is hand-painted in oils on canvas by a professional artist — never a print, never a giclée. We do sell canvas prints, but they are a separate range and are labelled as such.
