Abstract vis a vis Abstraction

My passion is abstraction...

Yet one must understand that abstraction is not at all a synonym for abstract as far as artistic genres go.

In an abstract piece, such as in Stepanov's Milky Way (2005) -



...one can generally not identify any specific construct (e.g. a still life, a landscape, a portrait etc.) that had led to the creation of a piece of work.

In an abstraction, however, the base construct is very clear.
As an example consider the following art by Georgia O'Keefe - (1932, originally untitled by artist)



This painting is clearly modeled after an urban landscape.
Some may even recognize specific buildings in Manhattan.

This then is the difference between abstract art and abstractions. Abstract art does not depict specific constructs or objects; it is non-representational. Abstractions are always representational of some real or imagined object or construct.

Raging Academic