Anique Taylor

Anique Taylor is a gifted visual artist and multi-faceted writer. She ran away to Paris, where she studied literature (Sorbonne, Diplome); afterward, she graduated high school (Greenwich), studied literature (Antioch College) and then taught creative writing to Jr. High Students on a co-op job, Angeles Crest Mountains. Taylor studied art – Silvermine College (AFA) Cooper Union, Pratt Institute, (BFA Highest Honors) and Pratt Graduate School (MFA). Taylor also studied at St. Mark’s Poetry Project with Alice Notely, Bernadette Mayer and Susie Timmons, subsequently she gave featured readings at St. Mark’s Poetry Project, Dixon Place, Speakeasy, ABC No Rio, Cedar Tavern and performed regularly with Eve Packer’s What Happens Next, in group readings at St. Mark’s Poetry Project, Tompkin’s Square Arts Festival, New Romantics, Charas, Knitting Factory, Bergen County Literary Salon, Ridgewood Library and Phoenicia Phirst Phriday. With Etan Ben-Ami, Taylor edited the much-acclaimed (& short-lived) poetry magazine, The Cheap Review of Poetry, publishing several wonderful poets, such as Alice Notley, Bill Kushner, Elinor Nauen, Sheila Alson, Norman MacAfee, Peter Bushyeager, Tom Savage and Bernadette Mayer. Taylor created a children’s show, performing as Pirouette-the-Clown in & around NYC, Bergen County. Her chapbook poems are published by Unimproved Editions Press. Additionally, her poems have been published in The World, Sing O Heavenly Muse, Cheap Review, Big Fish, Southern Review, Cover Magazine, Pome, What Happens Next and The National Poetry Magazine of the Lower East Side. As well as literary writing, Taylor has many co-authored books such as the Computer Joke Book, (Hayden), What to Do When You’re Bored, (Simon & Schuster), Snakes!, Bears! (EMC), How Many Nerds Does It Take to Screw in a Light Bulb?, Book of Silly Quizzes, (Scholastic), Nightmare Nina (Bowmar/Noble) and the filmstrips, Arachne & Athena, Atalanta, Prometheus & Pandora, (January Productions). Taylor also co-authored ABZ’s of Sex & Love (HBO), Bless Me, Father, for I Have Sinned, produced by Playwright’s Horizons, Phoenix Theatre, Williamstown Playhouse. She has also performed with the comedy group Raw Guts & American Know-How.

Beginning in the early 20th century, abstract art became a leading style of modernism. Rather than portray the world in a way that represented reality, as had been the dominating style of Western art in the previous centuries, abstract paintings, prints and sculptures are marked by a shift to geometric forms, gestural shapes and experimentation with color to express ideas, subject matter and scenes.

Although abstract art flourished in the early 1900s, propelled by movements like Fauvism and Cubism, it was rooted in the 19th century. In the 1840s, J.M.W. Turner emphasized light and motion for atmospheric paintings in which concrete details were blurred, and Paul Cézanne challenged traditional expectations of perspective in the 1890s.

Some of the earliest abstract artists — Wassily Kandinsky and Hilma af Klint — expanded on these breakthroughs while using vivid colors and forms to channel spiritual concepts. Painter Piet Mondrian, a Dutch pioneer of the art movement, explored geometric abstraction partly owing to his belief in Theosophy, which is grounded in a search for higher spiritual truths and embraces philosophers of the Renaissance period and medieval mystics. Black Square, a daringly simple 1913 work by Russian artist Kazimir Malevich, was a watershed statement on creating art that was free “from the dead weight of the real world,” as he later wrote.

Surrealism in the 1920s, led by artists such as Salvador Dalí, Meret Oppenheim and others, saw painters creating abstract pieces in order to connect to the subconscious. When Abstract Expressionism emerged in New York during the mid-20th century, it similarly centered on the process of creation, in which Helen Frankenthaler’s expressive “soak-stain” technique, Jackson Pollock’s drips of paint, and Mark Rothko’s planes of color were a radical new type of abstraction.

Conceptual art, Pop art, Hard-Edge painting and many other movements offered fresh approaches to abstraction that continued into the 21st century, with major contemporary artists now exploring it, including Anish Kapoor, Mark Bradford, El Anatsui and Julie Mehretu.

Find original abstract paintings, sculptures, prints and other art on 1stDibs.

Explore a vast range of abstract prints on 1stDibs to find a piece to enhance your existing collection or transform a space.

Unlike figurative paintings and other figurative art, which focuses on realism and representational perspectives, abstract art concentrates on visual interpretation. An artist may use a single color or simple geometric forms to create a world of depth. Printmaking has a rich history of abstraction. Through materials like stone, metal, wood and wax, an image can be transferred from one surface to another.

During the 19th century, iconic artists, including Edvard Munch, Paul Cézanne, Georgiana Houghton and others, began exploring works based on shapes and colors. This was a departure from the academic conventions of European painting and would influence the rise of 20th-century abstraction and its pioneers, like Pablo Picasso and Piet Mondrian.

Some leaders of European abstraction, including Franz Kline, were influenced by the gestural shapes of East Asian calligraphy. Calligraphy interprets poetry, songs, symbols or other means of storytelling into art, from works on paper in Japan to elements of Islamic architecture.

Bold, daring and expressive, abstract art is constantly evolving and dazzling viewers. And entire genres have blossomed from it, such as Color Field painting and Minimalism.

The collection of abstract art prints on 1stDibs includes etchings, lithographs, screen-prints and other works, and you can find prints by artists such as Joan Miró, Alexander Calder and more.