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University Daily Kansan Wednesday, May 12, 1965
Op Art Exploits Visual Perceptions, Illusions
By Harry Krause
Optical phenomena and the mechanics of visual perception form the basis of the art exhibit opening in Spooner-Thayer Museum of Art Friday, when, for the first time in this area, Op Art will be exhibited.
Op Art, loosely defined as a "kind of art that explores and exploits the processes of visual perception, is the latest development in contemporary painting." Bret Waller, curator of Spooner-Thayer Art Museum, said.
THE INTEREST IN PRESENTING visual deception is not a new innovation, however. Optical illusion art has been found dating from the second century, where the viewer's perception "alternates between a reading of the design as a set of upward-projecting cubes lighted from above, and a contradictory reading as downward-projecting cubes are lighted from below." Waller said.
A Christ engraving by Claude Mellan, seventeenth century engraver, utilized a single line of varying thickness which spiraled out from the tip of Christ's nose. This engraving, a portion of which forms the cover design for the art museum's catalog of Friday's show, created an optical effect produced by the swell and tapering of Mellan's spiral.
In this style of art, the paintings are commonly referred to as "researches." Waller said.
THIS RELATES TO THE fact that most of the literature describing Op Art tells of the relationships which exist between art and science—between "perceptual painting and perceptual learning." Waller said.
At the same time, if the angle is small enough, its apex clots with black, much as if two wet ink lines had bled into each other, William Seitz, a curator at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, said.
BECAUSE OF THE APPARENT connection between Op Art and science, a section of the KU exhibition will be devoted to perception and illusion as subjects of scientific rather than aesthetic interest, Waller said.
"Included in this section are two of the famous Ames Demonstrations devised by psychologist Adelbert Ames Jr., who began his career as a practicing artist, to investigate the mechanics of depth perception," he said. "Also included are demonstrations of moire effects and other illusions, the principles of which have been or might be utilized by artists."
"Artists and critics adopt or affect the detached, impersonal, objective vocabulary of scientific investigators, and analyze paintings by means of schematic diagrams using terms like 'Establishment of Unit,' 'Intensification of Contrast,' 'Climax' and 'Recapitulation.'" he continued.
Moire patterns are not new but have only recently been intensely studied. The effect of these perceptual forms results somewhat from simultaneous contrast and the extension of black and white units by overlapping.
Three of the artists in the show have organized a group called "Anonima." These men — Ernest Benkert, Francis R. Hewitt and Edwin Mieczkowski—have given an official statement of their organization.
A MAJOR UNIFYING phenomenon occurs when two lines cross at an angle of 30 degrees or less. Perceptually, they break at the intersection, widening the smaller angles so that the continuity of both lines is broken.
DON'T CONFUSE:
"Julian Stanczak and John Goodyear, two of the artists represented in our show, refer with clinical objectivity to the 'behavior of color, shapes and lines under varying conditions' and 'preoccupation with a world of movement and space and the effects which one moving pattern has on another.'" Waller added.
Art and Life
Geometry and Art
Perception and Optics
DON'T EQUATE:
Hands with Brains
Tools with Machines
Anonymity with Conformity
CLAY'S BVD'S—A member of the "Anonima" group. Francois Hewitt utilizes liquitex on canvas for this 48½" x 48" canvas.
ST. CECILIA BALL—51-year-old Henry Pearson creates magnetic groupings from the tensions between lines and the possibility of improvising through them. This sphere is $7 \frac{1}{4}$ in diameter.
ADELE'S CLASS RING-Another member of "Anonima," Edwin Mieczkowski's 36" x 24" liquitex on canvas painting has appeared in Time magazine.
ADDITIONAL CONFUSIONS (EQUATIONS):
Illusion and Unreality Reality and Nature Construction and Abstraction Repetition and Decoration Complexity and Disorder (Pro- fultility)
Simplicity and Originality
Artists and Movie Stars
Formalism and Repression
Informalism and Freedom
Responsive and Responsible
Publicity and Fame
Exposure and Acceptance
Remember: "Anonima" is not
"Unknown"
THESE MEN. TIME magazine states, "believe that the rule and the compass are proper artist's
tools. Like other op artists, they dislike artistic preciousness, the expression of the prima donna personality on canvas, and psychic plumbing into the meaning of art."
The reactions of the general public to the visual vibrations produced by Op Art are varied. A gallery guard in the Museum of Modern Art in New York reported that during one afternoon, seven women fainted while looking at "Nixe's Mate," a painting by Op Artist Larry Poons. The work, nine feet, four inches by six feet, is painted with blue, green and orange ellipses against a tomato-red background.
Mike Stoughton, Spooner-Thayer museum registrar, said it is
possible for the viewer looking at Poons' painting to become lost in it because of its large size and because of the color contrasts, where the ellipses seem to reverberate.
Some people become nauseous when viewing Op Art, and in others a mild headache is induced. An Op Art exhibit in Rochester, N.Y., drew 63,000 visitors during one Sunday afternoon.
THE ARTISTS IN THE KU exhibition themselves have extremely varied comments about what On Art is and what it does.
"In my work. I do not try to imitate or to interpret nature; but with the response to the behavior of colors, shapes, lines, I try to create relationships that would have run parallel to man's experiences with reality," Julian Stankzak said.
"For me, moire patterns, arrived at empirically, are tools which I employ with the other elements required for my art. These patterns permit the observations of another of the sets of opposites which engage my dynamics versus statics." Mon Levinson, another op artist, said.
Other comments include those involving the play of light on the patterns, as in the work of Yves Gaucher, and the plastic cube work of Leroy Lamis.
SUNDAY, MAY 16. from 3 to 5 p.m., there will be a reception in the Museum of Art for the opening of the exhibition. Refreshments will be served in the main lobby.
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