Dawn Peterson: About This Art

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The World At Our Feet

Naïve Art: expressionist

   Artists of the Naïve type are not usually very concerned with Art History and recognized styles of art when they go about their work.

  But if we were to consider Western Art for the time being, I think Naïve Art could be seen as a kind of Expressionism, a style in 20th century art. In most modern art, traditional ways of painting three dimensional form in perspective are often not honored nearly as much as they would be if the painter were a traditional landscaper or created real-looking seascapes or still life. And Expressionism as a style focused on individualism and feelings.

These similarities to a kind of modern art might not be intended by a Self-taught or Naïve painter. In some cases, the painter sometimes might have a favorite idea to express in search of a solution. Since it happens that unity and variation of form and color must be achieved some way, a perceptive Naïve-type artist might use lines and flat areas of color and create line art with colored-in areas, either bold and flat or nuanced and shaded. The lines could look either finely drawn or haphazardly drawn or sketched, depending on the artist's intentions and sometimes, skills.

Art and drawing might be well understood or not by a Naïve painter, but I propose that it might not make a whole lot of difference to whether the painting was a successful communication by the artist or whether it had a touch of the beautiful.

Also, the intentions of Naïve painters have somewhat less to do with art history or the prospect of recognition than with the expression in visual form of one's own ideas and imaginings. As they search for a way to articulate their fondest views of the world, self-taught painters sometimes cross paths with the world of modern art, but I think they frequently are strongly committed to an artistic vision, and a way of working it out, that is just their own.