Composition After Botticelli: A Critical Analysis

Composition after Botticelli is not a pretty piece of art. It is not a particularly skillful piece of art. It is neither poignant nor humorous, neither emotive, nor awe-inspiring. As a whole, Werner Drewes’ abstract oil painting does not stand out from its comrades in the Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art in any apparent way. But upon closer inspection, one can see that this small, 20 x 30 inch work is full of meaning.

Composition after Botticelli is thought to be an abstraction of Three Miracles of Saint Zenobius, a work by Alessandro Botticelli. Bottcelli’s oil painting depicted the life of Saint Zenobius, a bishop who performed several miracles. Botticelli presents three of these miracles in his painting. Drewes copies Botticelli’s work almost exactly: like Botticelli, he paints two buildings framing the three miracles. Like Botticelli, he paints a clump of trees on the horizon. Like Botticelli, he uses bright reds as a contrast against the dull tan buildings. But he deviates from the Renaissance master’s style in one major aspect: he completely deconstructs the scene, depicting figures, buildings, and animals using flat shapes and matte colors. Though I was confused by the abstract painting at first, I was better able to appreciate the work after analyzing three things: its visual elements, its abstract form, and its resultant meaning. After taking a closer look at Werner Drewes’ painting, I can now appreciate how beautiful and meaningful abstract art can be.

Composition after Botticelli, like most abstract paintings, emphasizes and distorts many of the visual elements. The visual element that affected me the most, however, was the element of color. Drewes’ use of color is unusual, borderline sickening. He utilizes a complementary color scheme, tinting his sky a pasty green, and his ground a flesh-like pink. Drewes also chooses to utilize extremely strange hues in his painting. Aside from a few spots of bright red and yellow, most of the colors were foreign to me. Drewes seems to be using these unfamiliar colors to unsettle the viewer. I approached the painting, expecting to see some recognizable hues. I was subconsciously grasping at color to ground me in reality. But Drewes takes this anchor away, replacing familiar hues with unnatural, alien colors. I was confused at first by Drewes’ color choices. But as I kept looking at the painting, I began to become familiar with Drewes’ palette, and when I began looking at other paintings, I was more alert to the myriad of colors present. Composition after Botticelli challenged me to broaden my color vocabulary and allowed me to look at my surroundings through a new and more abstract lens.

Drewes’ choice of color is not the only element that is calculated to unsettle viewers. His abstract form also changes his audience’s perspective. As a westerner, I have been raised with a Renaissance view of art. Since my artistic heritage comes out of Europe, I often consider the “highest” form of art to be photo-realistic art. Most abstract art is anything but realistic, however, and Drewes’ work is no exception. Composition after Botticelli doesn't present anything recognizable to the viewer: no curve of an arm or crook of a tree branch. I was definitely biased against Composition after Botticelli because its abstract composition was alien to me. I felt like the painting was closed off to me because I couldn’t tell at a glance what Drewes was trying to paint. The work made me feel inferior, and vaguely irritated. I subconsciously disliked the egotistical artist for displaying an image that didn’t make sense. But I finally realized that the work wasn’t closed off to me, not if I was willing to make an effort to understand it. I read the story behind it, researched Werner Drewes, and explored the time period in which Drewes was working. After I analyzed the picture and the history behind it, I realized that abstract art isn’t always “elitist” or “egotistical”. It may be harder to understand, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be comprehended. In looking at Composition after Botticelli, I began to see that it was just as valuable as the hyper-realistic paintings from the northern Renaissance. Though I wasn’t able to understand it immediately, it still does have meaning and purpose.

Once I understood that Composition after Botticelli did indeed have meaning behind it, I began to look for what Drewes could have meant by his abstraction. In his painting, he tells the same story as Boticelli, but tells it with unrecognizable shapes. He departs from Botticelli’s vibrant retelling of the miracles of Zenobius, making the groups of people indistinguishable from trees, man-made structures, and even the ground. Perhaps this is Drewes’ point; Botticelli’s original painting was focused on Zenobius, the great saint of the early church. He was the hero of the story, instantly recognizable with his big white hat and bright red cloak. In Drewes’ painting, however, I could barely tell which shape was supposed to be a human, much less which one was Zenobius. Perhaps Drewes is implying that, in the end, people are people. Zenobius may have done great things, but he was still a human, just like the other humans surrounding him. Realizing the implications of Drewes’ style not only changed the way I looked at Drewes’ painting, but it also changed how I saw Botticelli’s picture. Looking at the Renaissance painting, I was now more conscious of the people crowded around Zenobius, alert to their individual nuances and personal beauty.

My opinion of Composition after Botticelli has definitely changed as a result of my analysis. After thinking about the painting, I was better able to appreciate the colors Drewes uses, the style he employs, and the meaning he weaves into the picture. This analysis has also helped me appreciate other abstract works, as well. I now realize that abstract art is meaningful; it just takes more work to understand. In the end, no art is truly "elitist"; if you take time to look into the story behind it, you can identify the meaning of even the most enigmatic work.