Opaque Harmony

Shortly after completing Opaque Harmony, Richard Pousette-Dart made a note to himself: “Mine is an abstract vision fired by mystic shapes not by description.” Even in childhood he was familiar with “primitive” art and had a desire to move beyond waking experience. Along with his older peers Jackson Pollock and Adolph Gottlieb, he investigated the potential of Carl Jung’s psychoanalytic theories, especially the collective unconscious and universal symbols. The grids and glyphs he employed became major motifs of the avant-garde. In retrospect, they can be seen as significant steps toward Abstract Expressionism. In a blank-verse note of 1940, Pousette-Dart described the artist-art-beholder nexus. "Great art leaves half of the Creation to the onlooker—Gives the key to a creative experience Draws the spectator into infinite mysteries."