In MoMa’s Inventing Abstraction, the nodes in the project are abstract artists during 1910-1925 who helped to create a new way of thinking within the arts. The edges are the documented productive relationships between the artists that helped them establish a new era of art. Moma’s project acknowledges the creation of abstraction, within multiple areas of the arts, as the result of effort from multiple artists and intellectuals. It was a process that did not stem from a singular person and took over a decade long to develop. To accurately represent this, MoMa highlights artists with more connections that, in turn, had greater development in the movement.
Inventing Abstraction allows the viewer to select the name of an artist to learn more about them. The information displayed gives information about the artwork, the artist’s background, and, if available, a short snippet describing their impact on the movement. The most interesting item available, I believe, is the network of other artists that are available when viewing information about an artist. It is a representation of the relationship that particular artist had with others at the time that were also involved within abstraction. The network can be clicked through an infinite number of times, keeping the viewer engaged as one can view what these artists had in common. The project does a good job of displaying the history of art and abstraction and even offers a more traditionally organized exhibit of the artists, conversations, and additional information. The only caveat I have, however, is that not all of the artists have descriptions and/or have rather limited information, making the impact of their work seem minor. Though this could be due to limited data on the art movement as it can be difficult to track down information on smaller artists who had limited connections.
