Abstract Art

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"Like much else in our heritage, our conceptions about the role of drawing in the arts comes largely from the Renaissance. During the early years of that period, drawing as we now practice it became established as the foundation of training in the arts. A long-term academic apprenticeship, which called for drawing from nature as well as copying studies executed by master artists, prepared students for their profession. In later centuries this system, with only slight alteration, continued as the accepted means of artistic training.
In the 20th century this procedure has been seriously challenged. The impact of abstract painting, of Expressionism, Conceptualism, Minimal Art, and other contemporary movements tends to make the arduous disciplines of earlier times seem irrelevant to the needs of the contemporary student. Many teachers and students go further. They believe that highly structured training can even inhibit the development of original and innovative forms of expression by encouraging students to depend on trite and outworn formulas, rather than allowing their inner resouces free play."

I will post some of my drawings which I believe to be in this spirit. I have taken a couple of painting classes at university, and I have a pretty extensive background in drawing as a child--I went to a private school in which most academic subjects were taught artistically: we would draw a picture of a scene for a particular History topic. This gave me a natural eye and ability for art, but beyond basic drawing techniques I never formally studied things like composition or anatomy.

I started this thread to get a discussion going about the value of formal art instruction and to possibly get some feedback on my own art.