The Abstract-Expressionist Movement and a List Of Artists.
The Abstract-Expressionist Movement was an American post–World War II creation. It was the first specifically American group of Artists to achieve worldwide influence and also the one that put New York City at the center of the art world, a role formerly filled by Paris. Although the term "abstract expressionism" was first applied to American art in 1946 by the art critic Robert Coates, it had been first used in Germany in 1919 in the magazine Der Sturm, regarding German Expressionism. In the USA, Alfred Barr was the first to use this term in 1929 in relation to works by Wassily Kandinsky.
Technically, an important predecessor is Surrealism, with its emphasis on spontaneous, automatic or subconscious creation. Jackson Pollock's dripping paint onto a canvas laid on the floor is a technique that has its roots in the work of Max Ernst. Another important early manifestation of what came to be regarded as Abstract-Expressionist is the work of American Northwest artist Mark Tobey, especially his "white writing" canvases, which, though generally not large in scale, anticipate the "all over" look of Pollock's drip paintings. The movement's name is derived from the combination of the emotional intensity and self-denial of the German Expressionists with the anti-figurative aesthetic of the European abstract schools such as Futurism, the Bauhaus and Synthetic Cubism . Additionally, it has an image of being rebellious, anarchic, highly idiosyncratic and, some feel, rather nihilistic.In practice, the term is applied to any number of artists working (mostly) in New York who had quite different styles, and even applied to work which is not especially abstract nor expressionist. Pollock's energetic "action paintings", with their "busy" feel, are different both technically and aesthetically, to the violent and grotesque Women series of Willem de Kooning (which are figurative paintings) and to the rectangles of color in Mark Rothko's work (which is not what would usually be called expressionist and which Rothko denied was abstract), yet all three are classified as Abstract- Expressionist. (See Rothko graphics on this page.)
Why the Abstract-Expressionist style gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s is a matter of debate. American social realism had been the mainstream in the 1930s.
It had been influenced not only by the Great Depression but also by the Social Realists of Mexico such as David Alfaro Siqueiros and Diego Rivera.
The political climate after World War II did not long
tolerate the social protests of these painters. Abstract
expressionism arose during World War II and began to be
showcased during the early forties at galleries in New York
like The Art of This Century Gallery. The McCarthy era after
World War II was a time of extreme artistic censorship in
the United States. Since the subject matter was often totally
abstract it became a safe strategy for artists to pursue this
style. Abstract art could be seen as apolitical. Or if the
art was political, the message was largely for the insiders.
A List of Major Artists.Significant artists whose mature work defined the American Abstract-Expressionist: William Baziotes Norman Bluhm Louise Bourgeois James Brooks Hans Burkhardt Jack Bush Alexander Calder John Chamberlain Elaine de Kooning Willem de Kooning Robert De Niro, Sr. Richard Diebenkorn Enrico Donati Friedel Dzubas Norris Embry Jimmy Ernst Herbert Ferber Jane Frank Helen Frankenthaler Sam Francis Arshile Gorky Adolph Gottlieb Philip Guston Elaine Hamilton David Hare Grace Hartigan Hans Hofmann Paul Jenkins Franz Kline Albert Kotin Lee Krasner Ibram Lassaw Richard Lippold Seymour Lipton Morris Louis Conrad Marca-Relli Nicholas Marsicano Joan Mitchell Robert Motherwell Jan Müller Louise Nevelson Barnett Newman Isamu Noguchi Kenzo Okada
Jackson Pollock
Fuller Potter
Richard Pousette-Dart
Ad Reinhardt
Milton Resnick
George Rickey
Jean-Paul Riopelle
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