Peter Halley, 303, 1991, Day-Glo acrylic, acrylic and Roll-A-Tex on canvas, 88 1/2 x 91 1/2", collection Cooperfund, Inc.

Peter Halley disagrees with the utopian outlook of earlier abstractionists. He opposes their widely held belief that colors, forms, and lines can communicate directly with our souls though a kind of mystical osmosis. Halley asserts that neither abstract art nor our souls can be separated from the society in which they exist. For him, abstract geometry should possess "social meaning." Although they resemble earlier forms of abstraction, Halley's paintings are, he says, "diagrammatic"; he sets out to represent contemporary life. According to Halley, his colors and designs connote such things as computer circuitry, walls, jail cells, motel ceilings, and the "afterglow of radiation."