Art history: Understanding abstract expressionism – Part 3

After World War II, there was a profound shift in the world of art. With personal safety in Europe so tenuous, there was a migration of prominent artists (such as Piet Mondrian and Max Ernst) to the United States, most notably to New York City. As a result, in the 1940s and 1950s, for the first time, American artists became important internationally, and their new vision became the movement that is now called Abstract Expressionism.

The term “Abstract Expressionism” was coined by Robert Coates in the March 1936 issue of “The New Yorker” magazine, and the movement’s success was due in part to the support of critics like Harold Rosenberg and Clement Greenberg (who also originally termed the style used by Jackson Pollock to be “Action Painting” and labeled this movement the “American Style”). Along with Jackson Pollock, the main artists who were considered to be the backbone of Abstract Expressionist genre were Willem de Kooning and Mark Rothko.

If one compares the work of these and other Abstract Expressionists, such as Clyfford Still, Franz Kline, Barnett Newman, Robert Motherwell, and Phillip Guston, it’s clear that the painters who came under this label shared a similarity of outlook, rather than style. This outlook was characterized by a spirit of revolt and a belief in the freedom of expression.

THE IRASCIBLES

This spirit of revolt is probably nowhere better illustrated than in the discontent expressed by these artists with the Metropolitan Museum of Art on the museum’s position on avant garde painting. A group of 18 Abstract Expressionists (none more vocal than Jackson Pollock) wrote a letter to the museum, saying they would not participate in exhibiting at the museum.

After the letter appeared in the “New York Herald” newspaper, where it was criticized for the tactics the artists were pursuing, the group became labeled “The Irascible 18.” Yet, as Pollock would argue, they felt that each era of artists must choose for themselves their own style to encapsulate their expression of contemporary culture. Neither museum nor newspaper could stop them.

NEW MOVEMENT

For the Abstract Expressionists, attitude characterized the movement more than style. Ironically, not all the work of the artists in this movement was abstract, nor was it all expressive. Instead, what these artists had in common was a vision that spoke to the morality of the times. The artwork addressed important social themes, often on a grand scale, frequently loaded with weight and tragedy.