This is precisely right. And a great deal of modernist work is just like this... for reasons that may be obvious if you think about them: In a world with ubiquitous photography, the details that don't show up in photos are even more special, and art galleries have the time and space to focus on them.
Those paintings that seem to consist of just one black line on a field of white? They make sense in person. (Hint: Just because it's notionally a field of white doesn't mean it isn't made of seventy-five overlapping layers of slightly different shades of white paint. Just because it's notionally a black line doesn't mean the line is uniform.)
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This is precisely right. And a great deal of modernist work is just like this... for reasons that may be obvious if you think about them: In a world with ubiquitous photography, the details that don't show up in photos are even more special, and art galleries have the time and space to focus on them.
Those paintings that seem to consist of just one black line on a field of white? They make sense in person. (Hint: Just because it's notionally a field of white doesn't mean it isn't made of seventy-five overlapping layers of slightly different shades of white paint. Just because it's notionally a black line doesn't mean the line is uniform.)