In the mid-1980s, Wang Guangyi espoused a humanist vision of art for post-Mao China. His series of paintings entitled "Frozen North Pole" sought to evoke, in the artist's words, "a kind of beauty of sublime reason which contains constant, harmonious feelings of humanity." Abstract human figures place
"Art," Yayoi Kusama once said, "is both the symptom and cause for my obsession." Indeed, her works -- many of which amalgamate thousands of polka dots into recognizable forms -- are the manifestation of the spots, nets, and flowers that she has seen in hallucinations since childhood. Many cite her tr
Andre Breton's hallucinatory approach to poetry emerged as a reaction against the tiresome literary conventions of Paris in the 1920s. Abandoning traditional notions of creativity and promoting the philosophical and political ideals of the Surrealist movement, Breton's highly stylized yet spontane
The still, calm atmosphere of a Los Angeles backyard, replete with swimming pool and handsome bathers -- this is where David Hockney dwells. He's inhabited other domains too, of course, but not for as long as he's sat poolside and studied the movements of the water, the lambent play of light on its s