Taking a radically new approach to the history of abstractart, Pepe Karmel applies a scholarly yet fresh visionto reconsider the history of abstraction from a globalperspective and to demonstrate that abstraction isembedded in the real world. Moving beyond the orthodoxcanonical terrain of abstract art, he surveys artists fromacross the globe, examining their work from the pointof view of content rather than form. Previous writershave approached the history of abstraction as a seriesof movements solving a series of formal problems. Incontrast, Karmel focuses on the subject matter of abstractart, showing how artists have used abstract imagery toexpress social, cultural and spiritual experience.An introductory discussion of the work of theearly modern pioneers of abstraction opens up into acompletely new approach to abstract art based aroundfive inclusive themes bodies, landscapes, cosmologies,architectures, and signs and patterns each of whichhas its own chapter. Starting from a figurative example,Karmel works outwards to develop a series of narrativesthat go far beyond the established figures and movementstraditionally associated with abstract art. Each narrative iscomplemented by a number of featured' abstract works,which provide an in-depth illustration of the breadth ofKarmel's distinctive vision.A wide-ranging examination of topics fromembryos to the surface of skin, from vortexes to waves,planets to star charts, towers to windows is interwovenwith detailed analysis of works by established figures likeJoan Miró and Jackson Pollock alongside pieces by lesserknown artists such as Wu Guanzhong, Hilma af Klint andOdili Donald Odita.