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Jackson Pollock abstract expressionist painting Autumn Rhythm

Abstract Expressionism

What is it?

Abstract Expressionism is a modern art movement that flowered in America after the Second World War and held sway until the dawn of Pop Art in the 1960's. With this movement New York replaced Paris as the center of the art world.

Jackson Pollock "Autumn Rhythm"




Where did it start?

Abstract Expressionism has its roots in other earlier 20th century art movements such as Cubism and Surrealism that promoted abstraction rather than representation. The psychoanalytic theories of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung provided the intellectual context in this quest for new subject matter.




Willem de Kooning abstract expressionist painting Woman IV

Who were the major artists in this movement?

The major players in Abstract Expression were:
Jackson Pollock,
Willem de Kooning,
Clyfford Still, Arshile Gorky, Franz Kline, Robert Motherwell,
Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman, Philip Guston,
Lee Krasner, Ad Reinhardt and sculptor David Smith.

These artists formed what is known as The New York School. Some were Americans by birth, but others came from Europe to the United States as a result of pre-war & wartime upheavals.

Willem de Kooning "Woman IV"








What were these artists trying to achieve?

The Abstract Expressionists' goal was a raw and impulsive art. What mattered were the qualities of the paint itself and the act of painting itself.



As American poet-critic Harold Rosenberg said in a famous Art News article of 1952:
"...the canvas was not a picture, but an event."
--guest editor Margaret Morse






Masquerade abstract painting Lynne Frehm

See how Abstract Expressionism continues to influence contemporary art in the work of New York abstract painters:
Lynne Frehm, Richard Mock, James Burnett and Charlie Hewitt Biddington's Abstract Art Gallery

Lynne Frehm "Masquerade"

More PEDIGREE & PROVENANCE:
P&P: Abstract Expressionism
P&P: architectonic
P&P: Arte Povera
P&P: Ash Can School
P&P: bronze patina
P&P: citrine
P&P: Colorfield painting
P&P: Greek columns
P&P: Conceptual Art
P&P: coromandel
P&P: depression glass
P&P: enamel
P&P: encaustic
P&P: etching
P&P: faux
P&P: foreshortening
P&P: gouache
P&P: Iconography & Iconology
P&P: New Image painting
P&P: Newcomb pottery
P&P: parfleche
P&P: Pop Art
P&P: porcelain
P&P: realism
P&P: Senufo
P&P: Surrealism
P&P: turquoise

ABOUT THIS FEATURE

In the art & antiques world, experts bandy about arcane words as though they were part of everyone's standard vocabulary. To a fledgling collector, this practice can be maddening. In PEDIGREE & PROVENANCE, BIDDINGTON'S picks a word or phrase and gives it a good, hard going over: defining it, explaining it and showing how to use it.

Glance regularly at PEDIGREE & PROVENANCE, and soon you'll be able to toss those obscure phrases back at the experts with confidence and agility and be fully prepared to bid on items at BIDDINGTON'S upmarket, online art & antiques auctions.

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