From Figurative Painting to Painting of Substance – The Concept of an Artist

This article aims at a brief analysis of the artistic processes in Bulgaria during the discussed decades, and it is also an attempt to pinpoint the stages in the work of the artist Petar Dochev (1935-2005) in the respective period. The stages and the changes in his work are not considered as an end in itself, but on the one hand as a part of the dynamics in the Bulgarian fine arts, and on the other – as an artistic practice which is fundamental to the work of some contemporary Bulgarian artists and, which further develops the experience of the abstract and informal art in Bulgaria. The main problem in the text is also provoked by the fact that the trends in the contemporary Bulgarian painting (from the mid-90s to present day) draw our attention more and more to objects of the so-called “conceptual” painting and other forms of visual arts (video art, digital arts, conceptual art, etc.), while there are still no deeper studies of the informal and the abstract.