And if the artist is intentionally being not subtle, but obscure, then he's just a pretentious ass who's stacking the deck to make his work seem more high-brow. Maybe the audience has to look long and hard at the artist s work to see it, but they should be able to see it for themselves. That s pretty much just craft, too. The Modern Era has freed the artist from slavery to all of that, to a great extent. The artist can pursue a personal vision, rather than have it dictated from without.
Artists are free, which scares and intimidates some people.
It sounds more like you re intimidated by the prospect of not being able to defend your own work by saying, you just don t understand it .