Minimalist Movement Analysis

The minimalist movement was started in the early 1960’s in the heart of New York. This movement stemmed as a reaction to the Abstract Expressionism movement. Many temporary names were used before the name Minimalist stuck. When the movement first appeared to the world, names such as “A.B.C. Art”, “Reductive Art”, “Literalism”, “Systematic Painting”, and “Art of the Real” were used to try and describe such an indescribable piece of work. We can only theorize why the current name stuck around, but perhaps it was that the new name came to describe the way artist used minimal colors, shapes, lines, and textures. While there were many that paved the way for this movement, you could say that there were a few popular leaders among them. They included …show more content…
She used a handmade paper as her canvas and to create the pictures upon them, she used screen printing, which at the time was very popular among the art world. Screen printing is most often recognized by the public in Andy Warhol’s “Marilyn”. Baer’s piece of work uses nine separate canvases all adorned with a small circle shaped figure in black ink. Each black figure is very different from the one before it or the one after it. The figures are made from a variety of placements of straight lines to rounded lines that follow the contour of a circle but are never fully shaded. Some of the figures contain more lines than others. However, all of the figures are seemingly perfectly aligned at the same level. Without it being pointed out, it is easy to miss the numbers that are printed on the canvas in cardinal order. Every time that the exhibit was on display Baer placed them in the same order on the wall. Occasionally one circle figure will closely resemble another that previously came before it or one that is soon to come after it. But no two figures are exactly alike. The content of the artwork is a bit difficult to understand due to the fact that most minimalist artist remove any type of implied meaning or metaphor. At a first glance it is common for people to over think, as well as overlook the obvious pictures that are right in front of them. This image created by Baer is a perfect example of …show more content…
The main element of the artwork is a line. This is one of the most prominent elements about “Cardination”. The circular figurines are located more towards the bottom of the canvas, which allows another element, space, to be brought in. The element of a line however is much more prominent in this artwork simply because the artwork is composed primarily of bold black lines. The main principle in this piece of work is repetition. Repetition is defined as a shape, color, or like elements that are taken and repeated throughout a single piece of art. The repetition that Baer includes is the implied circular template in which she recreates various images. It is repetition because, while the exact image is not replicated, the template in which was used to create each image