Abstract Expressionism

Although this was an American art movement which flourished in the 1950s, Abstract Expressionism has to be mentioned because of its great influence upon art of the 60s. This movement is considered to be the first original school of painting in America and it made New York City the center of the art world after World War II (this role was formerly filled by Paris). Another major center of this movement was California, especially the San Francisco Bay area.

The movement gets its name because it is seen as combining the emotional intensity of the German Expressionists with the anti-figurative aesthetic of the European abstract schools (Futurism, Bauhaus, Cubism). The term itself was initially used by the art critic Robert Coates in 1946.

The movement was inspired by the main principles of surrealism and emphasized spontaneous, automatic or subconscious creation. What is in common to all artists is that they produced large-scale, dramatic abstract paintings, and they used an “all-over” approach. This means that the whole canvas deserves should be treated with equal importance and value.

Abstract Expressionism can be divided into two main types. The first one is action painting which involves dripping and splashing of paint in an impulsive manner without predetermined reason. The main representative of this type of painting was Jackson Pollock. The second type is called colorfield painting. It used broad expanses of color and relied more on color association. The main representative of colorfield painting is Mark Rothko. One more artist has to be mentioned as a representative of the Abstract Expressionism and he is Willem de Kooning. He is famous for his violent and grotesque Women series and his specific usage of energetic brushstrokes, twisted forms and surfs of color.

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