can you have your cake and eat it too?

 

I brought these two paintings to the semesters first crit. My crit group didn't have much

feedback regarding the paintings themselves, however an issue necessary of further thought was addressed.

The imagery of these paintings are derived from the reduction and reinterpretation of the figure.On the topic of titles, it was suggested that the knowledge of subject will heighten the interest of the viewer. My concern lies with in how the viewer experiences the paintings. Because my paintings are not easily read, will knowing these are figural images turn my paintings into a game of Where's Waldo?

By taking emphasis off the subject, i would leave the paintings as an open-ended experience. It has been my belief that illegibility of the subject will allow the viewer to contemplate, absorb and experience the painting in its entirety, in efforts that the expression of the whole will add up to more than the sum of its parts.

Because these paintings are constructed through an active dialogue with the painting and celebrate paint as paint, would diminishing importance of subject enhance the importance of the paint and process? Would the ambiguity encourage the viewer to construct their own reality? Which does more for the paintings?