EXPRESSION Vol. 13, 2016	In picture genesis, the "abstract" precedes and enables depiction and coding Some arguments and speculations based on the investigation of early pictures in ontogeny Dieter Maurer Institute for Contemporary Art Research Zurich University of the Arts, Switzerland
	Figure 3 >> Back	Text Experiencing line formations, from the age of two onwards (Figure 3), children discover how to bring the end of the line to its beginning thus producing a closed form. Succeeding in doing so, in the third and fourth year of life, they progressively become able to produce and differentiate various kinds of closed forms, such as circles, ovals, trapezoids, rectangles, squares, triangles, polygons, and so on. At the same time, the variety of graphic manifestations, both of drawing and painterly kind, sharply increases. Forms are further varied, they are composed in very different ways in order to appear as graphic combinations, complexes, structures, patterns, and aggregates, they include geometrical aspects such as radiuses and diagonals, they are arranged in very different ways, such as overlapping, abutting, adjacent, into one another, with a gap, reciprocally aligned, arranged in a series, or as parallels, or orthogonally, or concentric, mirroring a symmetry, showing distinct proportions, and so on. Colour application includes variation in line density and thickness width, and effects of circumscribed surfaces and colour relations are produced. Figure 3 Pictures of children (age range = third and fourth year; excerpts of drawings or paintings, or entire pictures) representing: (a) Early closed forms and form differentiation    (b) Production and differentiation of various kinds of closed forms, such as circles, ovals, trapezoids, rectangles, squares, triangles, polygons          (c) Graphic compositions and configurations such as combinations of a single or of different form elements forming complexes, structures, patterns, and aggregates, including geometrical aspects such as radiuses and diagonals          (d) An example of early geometrical reflection   (e) Topological arrangements such as overlapping, abutting, adjacent, into one another, with a gap, reciprocally aligned, arranged in a series, or as parallels, or orthogonally, or concentric, mirroring a symmetry, showing distinct proportions                   (f) Effects of colour application based on variation of line density and thickness width, and of circumscribed pained surfaces and colour relations