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Books : Arts & Photography : Schools, Periods & Styles : Abstract Expressionism
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This book provides an entertaining and humorous introduction to the famous artist, Jackson Pollock. Full-colour reproductions of the actual paintings are enhanced by Venezia''s clever illustrations and story line.'
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The language of paint "Abstract expressionism" refers to the non-representational use of form and color as a means of expression that emerged in America in the 1940s, largely thanks to the innovative work of Arshile Gorky. Interestingly, abstract expressionism is considered to be the first movement originating in America to have a worldwide influence. Two very different sub-categories of the movement developed: "action painting" (exemplified notably by Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock) and "color field painting," made most famous by Mark Rothko. Abstract expressionists strove to express pure emotion directly on canvas, via color and especially texture (the surface quality of the brushstroke), by embracing "accidents," and celebrating painting itself as a communicative action.
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Joan Mitchell (1926-1992) was one of the few women among the first-rank Abstract Expressionist painters. She outpaced all but a handful of her male mentors and counterparts, while only Lee Krasner stands as a possible rival among her female counterparts. Although well regarded by critics, fellow artists, and the general public, Mitchell's achievement has never received full recognition; her work has not been shown in New York for more than twenty-five years. This exquisitely illustrated volume and the exhibition that it accompanies restore the artist to her rightful place in the history of American painting. Spanning Mitchell's entire career, from early works of 1951 until the year of her death, The Paintings of Joan Mitchell includes a wealth of breathtaking paintings, both intimate and grand in scale, that reveal Mitchell's fierce dedication to her art and reflect both the struggles and the artistic triumphs she achieved with her distinctive vision of Abstract Expressionism.
Jane Livingston draws on the artist's personal papers, including her journals and extensive correspondence, to provide an illuminating interpretation of the artist and her work. Linda Nochlin, who was a friend of Mitchell, discusses the artist's experience working in a field dominated by men. A third text by Whitney Curator Yvette Lee explores a distinctive and little-known suite of paintings entitled La Grande Vallée, created in 1983-84. Mounted with the full cooperation of the estate of Joan Mitchell, the exhibition contains many paintings rarely seen before--and in some cases never publicly exhibited. This book includes an exhibition history; an extensive artist bibliography of related monographs, reviews, and filmed interviews; and color plates and listing of all the works appearing in the exhibition.
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In the 1950s and 1960s a group of young artists forged a fresh, representational art that made use of the Abstract Expressionists' spontaneous brushwork and brilliant colour to document the world. One of the leaders of this group, Wolf Kahn, specialized in landscape painting, which he has developed over the last 40 years. This book aims to demonstrate how his use of colour has placed him at the forefront of American representational art. The text presents an overview of Kahn's life and career - his childhood in Germany, his study at the Hans Hofman school, his early success as a latter-day Expressionist, and his ten years as a painter of austere, tonalist canvases, before he turned to the luminous landscapes that established his reputation. There is also an analytical essay by the painter and critic Louis Finkelstein which discusses the origins and value of Kahn's fusion of abstraction and representation.
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The most important art movement since the Second World War, Abstract Expressionism revolutionized the way Americans viewed art and culture alike. Drawing on a vast array of scholarly research, David Anfam examines the politically radical spirit of a nucleus of artists who transgressed the traditional forms of American art and faced the tensions of a modernizing society. The author places the movement within a broad cultural background, while at the same time giving a close account of the visual art of Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning and Mark Rothko, as well as the photography of Aaron Siskind and the sculpture of David Smith.
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"A provocative interpretation of the political and cultural history of the early cold war years. . . . By insisting that art, even art of the avant-garde, is part of the general culture, not autonomous or above it, he forces us to think differently not only about art and art history but about society itself."--New York Times Book Review
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Acclaimed as the definitive volume on Kline, this book provides firsthand accounts of his Bohemian life and powerful work.Franz Kline spent years struggling to find a style for himself and then achieved "overnight success" with his dramatic black and white abstractions. They were, in fact, so successful that they overwhelmed every other aspect of Kline's art, and as a result he has been oversimplified and underestimated. Now, after nearly twenty years of research, Harry F. Gaugh has written the definitive volume on Kline, which provides the first comprehensive view of his life and work, and reveals how unexpectedly complex they both were.
Using interviews and correspondence with dozens of Kline's friends and critics, and quoting from the artist's own letters, the author has created an evocative portrait of Kline's evolution from an ambitious art student in Boston and London to a penniless Greenwich Village artist painting murals in bars just to pay the rent, and finally to a mature artist in command of his own unique and hard-won style. Kline made his initial, admittedly modest, reputation as a figurative artist, and rare photographs of that early work--sketches from life-drawing class, portraits of Nijinsky, scenes of the Pennsylvania countryside--offer an intriguing background for his later paintings. Not until his late thirties did Kline begin to develop an abstract mode, working his way through a series of strikingly dissimilar styles. Dr. Gaugh illuminates how talent, training, experimentation, the influence of fellow artists, and pure chance interacted to yield the famous black and white abstractions. When he died in 1962, Kline had begun exploring the potential of vibrant color, and the vivid full-color reproductions of his late paintings make poignantly clear how much the art world lost with his death at the relatively young age of fifty-one.
With its detailed yet thoroughly readable text and 170 illustrations (many never before published) this comprehensive volume brings to light much new information about Kline and enriches the reader's appreciation and understanding of his art. Ê Other Details: 170 illustrations, 70 in full color. 9 x 11" trim size. First published 1985.
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(20100101)The abstract paintings of Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Barnett Newman, Lee Krasner, Clyfford Still, Helen Frankenthaler, and others revolutionized the art world in the 1940s and 1950s and continue to inspire passionate arguments to this day. What were these artists trying to achieve? Who were the critical voices of the time that rallied public interest in Abstract Expressionism and sparked rancorous debate?
Drawing on recent critical, historical, and biographical work, this lavishly illustrated book offers a sharp new focus on a pivotal art movement. It also presents an extensive commentary on the two most influential critics of postwar American art—Clement Greenberg and Harold Rosenberg—whose powerful views shaped perceptions of Abstract Expressionism and other contemporary art movements. In one essay, Norman L. Kleeblatt traces the influence of Abstract Expressionism into the mid-1970s and examines its connection to subsequent art styles. Other essays range from the literary and intellectual culture of New York during that period and an analysis of sculpture and representation to a discussion of Jewish issues in relation to postwar American Art. In addition, the book features a magisterial essay by eminent critic Irving Sandler and a copiously illustrated cultural timeline by Maurice Berger.
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Irving Sandler, the preeminent chronicler of postwar American art, returns to the subject with this new study drawing fresh conclusions about Abstract Expressionism that he has arrived at since his first publication of the movement 1970.
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Clyfford Still (1904-1980), best known for his compelling abstract works with jagged fields and powerful expanses of color, stands among the giants of post-World War II art. Together with his peers Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, and Barnett Newman, Still helped shape the new vision of art that came to be called Abstract Expressionism. This vividly illustrated book presents more than thirty of Still's greatest works, paintings that represent the full flowering of his style.The contributors to this volume explore various aspects of Still's art, his accomplishments, and the Abstract Expressionism movement. David Anfam presents an overview of Still's career from the 1930s through 1950s. Brooks Adams examines Still's artistic legacy and influence on succeeding generations of artists. And Neal Benezra's chapter focuses on a provocative, unexplored element of Still's studio practice: his habit of painting replicas of many of his own works.
This book accompanies an exhibition at the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., from 21 June through 16 September, 2001. The exhibition will offer an unprecedented opportunity to view outstanding examples of Still's work, many of which have not been on public display for decades.
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Nature's purpose in relation to the visual arts is to provide stimulus-not imitation....From its ceaseless urge to create springs all Life-all movement and rhythm-time and light, color and mood-in short, all reality in Form and Thought." -Hans HofmannThis book is the only comprehensive treatment of one of Abstract Expressionism's most important forefathers: Hans Hofmann. Hans Hofmann attends to every stage of his prolific career. Nearly 300 gorgeous color plates reveal this modern master's extraordinary sense of color: beautifully vibrant greens, rich blues and brilliant reds organized in strikingly powerful patterns. Sam Hunter, Professor Emeritus at Princeton University, writes a substantive essay on every aspect of Hofmann's distinguished body of work. Five important essays by the artist himself are included, revealing his philosophy of art which was so influential to the generations that followed him. Frank Stella, an important painter who deeply admired his work, also contributes an essay.
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With the emergence of Abstract Expressionism after World War II, the attention of the international art world turned from Paris to New York. Dore Ashton captures the vitality of the cultural milieu in which the New York School artists worked and argued and critiqued each other's work from the 1930s to the 1950s. Working from unsifted archives, from contemporary newspapers and books, and from extensive conversations with the men and women who participated in the rise of the New York School, Ashton provides a rich cultural and intellectual history of this period. In examining the complex sources of this important movementfrom the WPA program of the 1930s and the influx of European ideas to the recognition in the 1950s of American painting on an international scaleshe conveys the concerns of an extraordinary group of artists including Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Ad Reinhardt, Philip Guston, Barnett Newman, Arshile Gorky, and many others. Rare documentary photographs illustrate Ashton's classic appraisal of the New York School scene.
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Tate Publishing is proud to announce a new series on important international artists, beautifully designed and with superbly printed reproductions. The Essential Artists series provides, in each volume, everything necessary for the enjoyment and understanding of the world’s greatest artists:
• Introduction to the artists’ lives and works
• Information on materials and working methods
• Writings by the artists and by contemporary and current critics
• Where to see the art
• More than 100 expertly printed color reproductions
Written by leading experts on the artists Mark Rothko (1903–1970) was one of the greatest artists of the twentieth century. His work is intensely charged with meaning and emotion, portraying human feelings rather then color or form. In this lavishly illustrated survey, Bonnie Clearwater traces the development of Rothko’s career, from his arrival in the United States as a child through to the formation of his mature style, and examines his initial influences and interactions with other artists. Drawing on the artist’s own letters and writings, The Rothko Book provides the most comprehensive introduction yet to this complex and fascinating figure.
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This revised edition, featuring ten new articles, is fully updated to take account of new critical approaches to post-war American art. Section one examines the legacy of the influential Modernist critic, Clement Greenberg, and section two focuses on revisionist texts, questioning the adequacy of Modernist art history and examining the role of cultural institutions in the United States and the relationship between Abstract Expressionism and the politics of McCarthyism during the Cold War.
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Cecily Brown creates lush, visceral canvases based on a combination of figuration and abstraction. Her technical proficiency has earned her comparisons to Lucian Freud, Willem de Kooning, and Francis Bacon, yet it is her unique ability to convey the pleasurable and fleeting aspects of sensation that drive her work.Cecily Brown rapidly rose to success in the late 1990's, and was credited with having contributed to the resurgence of painting at the turn of the millennium. With a visual repertoire indebted as much to the classical themes of the old masters as to porn magazines and Hollywood films, Brown’s paintings challenge traditional interpretations and compel us to reconsider the act of painting from a decidedly feminine viewpoint.
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Mitchell, a master of color and abstraction, was one of the most respected American artists in the world.
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Willem de Kooning arrived in the United States in 1926 as a 22-year-old stowaway from Holland--soon to become a leading figure in the emergence of Abstract Expressionist painting in New York. This volume presents over 100 illustrations from each phase of de Kooning's career, and describes the personal and art historical background behind his work and its critical reception. Sally Yard, author of Willem de Kooning: The First Twenty-Six Years in New York, details the progress of de Kooning's career, from his brief stint as a WPA painter, to his first one-person exhibition of abstract work in 1948. Five years later, his series of women rendered in aggressive, lashing gestures stunned contemporaries, not only for their vehemence but for their supposed reversal in direction from "pure" abstraction to figuration. Of course, the alternation, struggle and intertwining between these two tendencies remained essential to de Kooning's work over six decades (as he once commented, "I was reading Kierkegaard and I came across the phrase 'To be pure is to will one thing.' It made me sick.") Featuring some of de Kooning's most remarkable writings, interviews with Harold Rosenberg and James T. Valliere, lavish illustrations and Yard's accessible scholarly discussion, Willem de Kooning: Works, Writings, Interviews is invaluable for anyone seeking to understand the work and impact of this twentieth-century master.
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A free-spirited wave of creative energy swept through the San Francisco art community after World War II. Challenging accepted modes of painting, Abstract Expressionists produced highly experimental works that jolted the public out of its postwar complacency. Susan Landauer's comprehensive examination of this dynamic movement provides the first clear picture of the artists and influences that came together in San Francisco's invigorating world of Abstract Expressionism.
Landauer argues that Abstract Expressionism resulted from a broad collective impulse rather than the inspiration of a small band of New York artists. Documenting the interchanges between the East and West Coasts, she cites areas of mutual influence and shows the impact of San Francisco on the New York School, including artists such as Mark Rothko and Ad Reinhardt. San Francisco's Beat poets, Dixieland jazz musicians, and the area's stunning vistas were essential parts of Abstract Expressionism, as were artistic and spiritual contacts with Asia.
Under Douglas MacAgy and Clyfford Still, the California School of Fine Arts became the undisputed center of vanguard abstraction on the West Coast. Artists such as Edward Corbett, Jay DeFeo, James Budd Dixon, Frank Lobdell, and Hassel Smith produced gritty, provocative images whose impact extended well beyond California. Landauer also notes the importance of Grace L. McCann Morley, director of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, who opened the museum to major Abstract Expressionist figures, and Jermayne MacAgy, who brought local and international artists together.
Enlivened by oral histories, Landauer's book is a rewarding exploration of a vital period in modern art. Richly illustrated with 96 color plates, it celebrates the energy and lasting impact of a special time.