World's premier fine art portal includes artists,art galleries and museums, exhibitions, artworks, animation,architecture guides, crafts, photography, digital art and art contents - Art & Painting

Abstract Expressionism

“We are freeing ourselves from the impediments of memory, association, nostalgia, legend, myth, or what have you, which have been the devices of European painting. - Barnett Newman

No doubt; the abstract expressionist movement shook the art world. Abstract expressionism was an American post-World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement 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. The term "Abstract expressionism" was first applied to American art in 1946 by the critic Robert Coates.

Its progress was influenced by the radical work of Arshile Gorky and Hans Hofmann and by the immigration in the late 1930s and early '40s of many European avant-garde artists to New York. The Abstract Expressionist movement itself is generally regarded as having begun with the paintings done by Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning in the late 1940s and early '50s. Other artists who came to be associated with the style include Franz Kline, Mark Rothko, Clyfford Still, Philip Guston, Helen Frankenthaler, Barnett Newman, Adolph Gottlieb, Robert Motherwell, Lee Krasner, and Ad Reinhardt. The movement comprised many styles but shared several characteristics. Because each artist emphasized his or her own absolute individuality, abstract expressionists continually rejected the notion that they had coalesced into a school.

Initially influenced by surrealism and cubism, abstract expressionists rejected the social realism, regionalism, and geometric abstraction so popular with American painters of the 1930s. Instead, they turned first to mythology and then to their own experiences and insights as subject matter for their bold, at times dizzying, abstract compositions. The works were usually abstract (i.e., they portrayed forms not found in the natural world); they highlighted freedom of emotional expression, technique, and execution; they displayed a single unified, undifferentiated field, network, or other image in unstructured space; and the canvases were large, to enhance the visual effect and project monumentality and power.

The movement had a great impact on U.S. and European art in the 1950s; it marked the shift of the creative centre of modern painting from Paris to New York.

Categorizing Art Style

The term abstract expressionism serves as a misty catchall for several different sub-categories.

Gestural abstraction: This style is known for harsh lines, bold brushstrokes, and total figureless abstraction. Artists who often worked in this style include Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Lee Krasner, and Robert Motherwell. Color field painting is characterized by the even flat fields of luminous, often symbolic color created by Rothko, Newman, and Still.

Color-field painters: This style suppressed all references to the past by painting unified fields of varying color. Un-like their counterparts, who often valued the act of painting as much as the finished product, Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman, and other color-field painters strove to reproduce the metaphysical experience of the sublime.

Exploring Art Style

There is a general sense of “If you don’t get it, then I can’t explain it to you.” about most abstract expressionist work. With its emphasis on spontaneous, automatic or subconscious creation; Surrealism was an important predecessor.

Here the intention was for the work to wholly and absolutely speak for itself!!

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 abstract expressionism 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.

It’s named as ‘Abstract Expressionism’ due to its blend of the emotional intensity and self-expression of the German Expressionists with the anti-figurative aesthetic of the European abstract schools such as Futurism, the Bauhaus and Synthetic Cubism.

Further 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 in New York who had quite different styles, and even applied to work which is neither 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 serenely shimmering blocks of colour 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 expressionists.

Abstract Expressionism has many stylistic similarities to the Russian artists of the early twentieth century such as Wassily Kandinsky. Although it is true that spontaneity or of the impression of spontaneity characterized many of the abstract expressionists works, most of these paintings involved careful planning, especially since their large size demanded it. An exception might be the drip paintings of Pollock.

Why this style gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950’s, is a matter of debate. American social realism had been the mainstream in the 1930’s. It had been influenced not only by the Great Depression but also by the Social Realists of Mexico such as Jose 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.

Although the abstract expressionist school spread quickly throughout the United States, the major centers of this style were New York City and California, especially the San Francisco Bay area.

Nevertheless, abstract expressionist paintings share certain characteristics, including the use of large canvases, and an "all-over" approach, in which the whole canvas is treated with equal importance (as opposed to the center being of more interest than the edges, for example). As the first truly original school of painting in America, abstract expressionism demonstrated the vitality and creativity of the country in the post-war years, as well as its ability (or need) to develop an aesthetic sense that was not constrained by the European standards of beauty.

Art Style and Criticism

In the 1940s there were not only few galleries but also few critics who were willing to follow the work of the New York Vanguard.

There were also a few artists with a literary background, among them Robert Motherwell and Barnett Newman who functioned as critics as well.

As surprising as it may be, while New York and the world were unfamiliar with the New York avant-garde, by the late 1940s most of the artists who have become household names today had their well established patron critics: Clement Greenberg advocated Jackson Pollock and the Color field painters like Clyfford Still, Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman, Adolph Gottlieb and Hans Hofmann. Harold Rosenberg seemed to prefer the action painters like Willem de Kooning and Franz Kline. Thomas B. Hess, the managing editor of Art News, championed Willem de Kooning.

The new critics elevated their proteges by casting other artists as "followers" or ignoring those who did not serve their promotional goal.

As an example, in 1958, Mark Tobey "became the first American painter since Whistler (1895) to win top prize at the Biennale of Venice. New York's two leading art magazines were not interested. Arts mentioned the historic event only in a news column and Art News (Managing editor: Thomas B. Hess) ignored it completely. The New York Times and Life magazine printed feature articles." Mark Tobey by William C. Seitz, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1962).

Barnett Newman, a late member of the Uptown Group wrote catalogue forewords and reviews and by the late 1940s became an exhibiting artist at Betty Parsons Gallery. His first solo show was in 1948. Soon after his first exhibition, Barnett Newman remarked in one of the Artists' Session at Studio 35: "We are in the process of making the world, to a certain extent, in our own image." [Utilizing his writing skills, Newman fought every step of the way to reinforce his newly established image as an artist and to promote his work. An example is his letter in April 9, 1955, "Letter to Sidney Janis: ---It is true that Rothko talks the fighter. He fights, however, to submit to the philistine world. My struggle against bourgeois society has involved the total rejection of it."

Strangely the person thought to have had most to do with the promotion of this style was a New York Trotskyist, Clement Greenberg. As long time art critic for the Partisan Review and The Nation, he became an early and literate proponent of abstract expressionism. Artist Robert Motherwell, well heeled, joined Greenberg in promoting a style that fit the political climate and the intellectual rebelliousness of the era.

Clement Greenberg proclaimed Abstract Expressionism and Jackson Pollock in particular as the epitome of aesthetic value. It supported Pollock's work on formalistic grounds as simply the best painting of its day and the culmination of an art tradition going back via Cubism and Cézanne to Monet, in which painting became ever 'purer' and more concentrated in what was 'essential' to it, the making of marks on a flat surface.

Jackson Pollock's work has always polarized critics. Harold Rosenberg spoke of the transformation of painting into an existential drama in Pollock's work, in which "what was to go on the canvas was not a picture but an event". "The big moment came when it was decided to paint 'just to paint'. The gesture on the canvas was a gesture of liberation from value--political, aesthetic, moral."

One of the most vocal critics of Abstract expressionism at the time was New York Times art critic John Canaday. Meyer Shapiro, and Leo Steinberg along with Clement Greenberg and Harold Rosenberg were important art historians of the post-war era who voiced support for Abstract expressionism. During the early to mid sixties younger art critics Michael Fried, Rosalind Krauss and Robert Hughes (critic) added considerable insights into the critical dialectic that continues to grow around Abstract expressionism.
Other people, such as British comedian/satirist Craig Brown, have been astonished that decorative 'wallpaper', essentially brainless, could gain such a position in art history alongside Giotto, Titian and Velazquez.

Outcomes

Canadian artist, Jean-Paul Riopelle (1923-2002), helped introduce abstract impressionism to Paris in the 1950s.

By the 1960s, the movement's initial impact had been assimilated, yet its methods and proponents remained highly influential in art, affecting profoundly the work of many artists who followed.

Abstract Expressionism preceded Tachisme, Color Field painting, Lyrical Abstraction, Fluxus, Pop Art, Minimalism, Postminimalism, Neo-expressionism, and the other movements of the sixties and seventies and it influenced all those later movements that evolved.

Movements which were direct responses to, and rebellions against abstract expressionism began with Hard-edge painting (Frank Stella, Robert Indiana and others) and Pop artists, notably Andy Warhol, Claes Oldenberg and Roy Lichtenstein who achieved prominence in the US, accompanied by Richard Hamilton in Britain. Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns in the US formed a bridge between abstract expressionism and Pop art. Minimalism was exemplified by artists such as Donald Judd, Robert Mangold and Carl Andre.

However, many painters, such as Fuller Potter, Jane Frank (a pupil of Hans Hofmann), and Elaine Hamilton, continued to work in the abstract expressionist style for many years, extending and expanding its visual and philosophical implications as do many abstract artists continue to do today including Hal Fielding and Marti Garaughty.

Famous Quotes

 “We are freeing ourselves from the impediments of memory, association, nostalgia, legend, myth, or what have you, which have been the devices of European painting. “ - Barnett Newman

If you don’t get it, then I can’t explain it to you.

 “The liberation from Paris as the center of the art world resulted not in the establishment of an American art or genre, but rather the end of a need for one,” – Rosenberg

“There was no sense of solidarity, there was no ideology. If there was any sense of solidarity, it was out of a sense of mutual self protection… like everybody was out to get you so you had to stick together a little bit” – Gottlieb

Since multinational giants couldn't have little pictures of red barns or weeping clowns in the lobbies of their Bauhaus buildings, Abstract Expressionism emerged as the world's most overrated form of interior decoration.” - Brad Holland

“Abstract painting is abstract. It confronts you. There was a reviewer a while back who wrote that my pictures didn't have any beginning or any end. He didn't mean it as a compliment, but it was.” - Jackson Pollock

Further Definitions

An art movement, primarily in painting, that originated in the United States in the 1940s and remained strong through the 1950s. Artists working in many different styles emphasized spontaneous personal expression in large paintings that are abstract or nonrepresentational One type of Abstract Expressionism is called action painting. .
arts-technology.com/art/collectors/artTerms.asp

A term used generally to describe contemporary painting. It was originally applied to Kandinsky’s abstract painting of the 1920’s, but many painters are still painting in this style today. Paintings of this style are abstractions, with no recognizable relationship to anything in nature. The style reflects the innermost feeling of the artist and usually results as an emotional release of the artist’s anger, fear or frustration. ...
artinsider.com/blue/education/glossary-fine-arts.html

A 20th-century American painting style, also called "action painting." Artists working in this style applied paint freely with sweeping, flinging, and dripping gestures in an effort to express their subconscious emotions.
artsmia.org/art_in_america/glossary.html

a style and movement of non-representational painting where artists apply paint quickly and forcefully to express feeling and emotion. Developed in the 1940's and 1950's, the often-large works appear to be accidental but are very intentional. Jackson Pollock is the movement's most important figures.
worldimages.com/art_glossary.php

A 1940's New York painting movement based on Abstract Art. This type of painting is often referred to as action painting.
nonprofitart.com/Nonprofit_files/Glossary.html

The expression of the subconscious through renderings of involuntary shapes and by the free use of color. The English counterpart is known as "action painting."
tvdecorators.com/infopages/dictionary.html

The Russian Wassily Kandinsky sought Expressionism emotions in non-objective, or abstract, paintings. He saw that objects and figures were not necessary to produce feelings in art. He could do it with lines, shapes, and colors alone. Kandinsky painted Expressionistic art that was abstract: hence, Abstract Expressionism. The individual styles of Abstract Expressionists are as varied and individual as a person's handwriting. ...
buena-vista.k12.va.us/ArtIcons/Glossaryofterms.html

Movement in painting, originating in New York City in the 1940s. It emphasized spontaneous personal expression, freedom from accepted artistic values, surface qualities of paint, and the act of painting itself. Pollock, de Kooning, Motherwell, and Kline, are important abstract expressionists.
members.aol.com/GRBowles/art-hist/mod-periods-def-nypl93.html

A blanket term for the various non-figurative trends in painting in the 1940s, 50s and 60s, in which expression and meaning are conveyed solely by color, form and manner of painting.
indianartworks.com/artopaedia/

A term which came into common use from c.1950 to describe a movement in abstract art that developed in New York in the 1940s. The painters embraced by the term shared a similarity of outlook rather than of style - an outlook rather than characterized by a spirit of revolt against affiliations with traditional styles or prescribed technical procedures and a strong demand for spontaneous freedom of expression. ...
lominago.com/art_terms_styles.htm

­­ An American art movement that began in the 1940s emphasizing free, spontaneous and personal emotional expression. Pioneered by such artists as Jackson Pollock (1912-1956), Willem de Kooning (1904-1997) and Mark Rothko (1903-1970), Abstract Expressionism is seen by many critics as representing a dividing line between "traditional" American painting and the broader, global movement now studied under the rubric of "Modern Art."
1earth.com.au/collect/american_art_glossary.html

As the name implies this refers to a combination of ABSTRACT and EXPRESSIONIST styles whereby an artist allows his subconscious to create involuntary shapes with splatters and dribbles of paint. It is best typified by the paintings of Jackson Pollock.
1001resources.com/hosting/users/AT/IslandArts/paTerms%20and%20materials.html

a New York school of painting characterized by freely created abstractions; the first important school of American painting to develop independently of European styles
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

Abstract Expressionism was an American post-World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement 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.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_expressionism

Art Works by Abstract Expressionism Artists

• Hans Hofmann (American, born Germany, 1880-1966), Self-Portrait with Brushes, casein paint on plywood, 1942, André Emmerich Gallery, New York City.
• Hans Hofmann, Rising Sun, 1958, oil on canvas, 60 x 72 inches, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO.
• Hans Hofmann, Pompeii, 1959, oil on canvas, 214.0 x 132.7 cm, Tate Gallery, London. See push and pull.
• Hans Hofmann, Simplex Munditis, 1962, oil on canvas, 84 x 72 inches, Santa Barbara Museum of Art, CA.
• Mark Tobey, Written Over the Plains, 1950, tempera and oil on hardboard, 30 1/8 x 40 in. (76.7 x 101.7 cm), San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, CA.
• Mark Tobey, Cloud, 1954, tempera on paper, 21 x 20 cm, Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, Iran.
• Mark Tobey, Untitled, 1961, color lithograph, image 23.2 x 31.8 cm, sheet 44.1 x 51.9 cm inches, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, CA.
• Mark Tobey, Coming and Going, 1970, tempera on cardboard, 39 1/2 x 27 1/2 in. (100.3 x 69.9 cm), Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.
• Mark Tobey, Trio, 1970, intaglio, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• Adolf Gottlieb, Apaquogue, 1961, oil on canvas, 72 x 90 inches, Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, TX.
• Adolph Gottlieb, Blues, 1962, National Museum of American Art, Washington, D.C.
• Adolph Gottlieb, Night Glow, 1971, National Museum of American Art, Washington, D.C.
• Mark Rothko (born Marcus Rothkowitz) (American, born Russia, 1903-1970), Number 2, 1954, oil on canvas, 291.5 x 207 cm, Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, Iran. See rectangle.
• Mark Rothko, Sienna, Orange & Black on Dark Brown, 1962, oil on canvas, 193 x 175 cm, Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, Iran.
• Mark Rothko, N° 14 (Browns over Dark), 1963, oil and acrylic on canvas, 228.5 x 176 cm, Georges Pompidou Center, Paris.
• Arshile Gorky (born Vosdanig Manoog Adoian) (American, born in Turkish Armenia, 1904-1948), Still Life of Flowers, 1928, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Arshile Gorky, Composition, 1936-1939, oil on canvas, 30 x 37 inches, Minneapolis Institute of Arts. See New Deal art.
• Arshile Gorky, The Artist's Mother, 1938, charcoal, 63 x 48.5 cm, Art Institute of Chicago, IL.
• Arshile Gorky, The Liver is the Cock's Comb, 1944, oil on canvas, 73 1/4 x 98 inches (186 x 249 cm), Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.
• Arshile Gorky, Virginia Landscape, 1944, oil on canvas, 40 x 51 inches (101.6 x 129.5 cm), Cincinnati Art Museum, OH.
• Arshile Gorky, Landscape-Table, 1945, oil on canvas, 92 x 121 cm, Georges Pompidou Center, Paris.
• Arshile Gorky, Summation, 1947, pencil, pastel, and charcoal on buff paper mounted on composition board, 6 feet 7 5/8 inches x 8 feet 5 3/4 inches (202.1 x 258.2 cm), Museum of Modern Art, NY.
• Willem de Kooning (American, born Netherlands, 1904-1997), Woman, 1944, oil and charcoal on canvas, 46 x 32 inches (116.8 x 81.3 cm), Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY.
• Willem de Kooning, Light in August, 1946, oil and enamel on canvas, 139.8 x 105.5 cm, Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, Iran.
• Willem de Kooning, Night, 1948, oil on canvas, 23 x 28 inches, Minneapolis Institute of Arts. See nocturne.
• Willem de Kooning, Seated Woman, 1952, pastel, pencil, and oil on two hinged sheets of paper, overall 12 1/8 x 9 1/2 inches (30.8 x 24.2 cm), Museum of Modern Art, NY.
• Willem de Kooning, Woman and Bicycle, 1952-53, oil on canvas, 76 1/2 x 49 inches (194.3 x 124.5 cm), Whitney Museum of American Art, NY.
• Willem de Kooning, Women Singing II, 1966, oil on paper laid on canvas, 91.4 x 61.0 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Willem de Kooning, The Visit, 1966-1967, oil on canvas, 152.4 x 121.9 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Clyfford Still (American, 1904-1980), Painting, 1951, 1951, oil on canvas, width 192.4 cm, Detroit Institute of the Arts, MI.
• Clyfford Still, 1951-N, 1951, oil on canvas, 92 5/16 x 69 1/8 inches (2.345 x 1.756 m), National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• Clyfford Still, 1956-J No. 1, Untitled, 1956, oil on canvas, 104 1/2 x 115 inches, Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, TX.
• John Ferren (American, 1905-1970), The Windows,1958, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Barnett Newman (American, 1905-1970), Moment, 1946, oil on canvas, 76.2 x 40.6 cm, Tate Gallery, London. See zip.
• Barnett Newman, Pagan Void, 1946, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• Barnett Newman, Dionysius, 1949, oil on canvas, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• Barnett Newman, The Name, 1949, brush and black ink, .611 x .380 m (24 1/16 x 15 inches), National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• Barnett Newman, Eve, 1950, oil on canvas, 238.8 x 172.1 x 5.0 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Barnett Newman, The Name II, 1950, Magna and oil on canvas, 104 x 94 1/2 inches (2.642 x 2.400 m), National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC. See zip.
• Barnett Newman, Adam, 1951-2, oil on canvas, 242.9 x 202.9 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Barnett Newman, Not There-Here, 1962, oil and casein on canvas, 198 x 89.4 cm, Georges Pompidou Center, Paris.
• Barnett Newman, The Third, 1962, oil on canvas, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN.
• Barnett Newman, Untitled Etching #1, 1969, etching and aquatint, National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• David Smith (American, 1906-1965), Hudson River Landscape, 1951, welded painted steel and stainless steel, 49 15/16 x 73 3/4 x 16 9/16 inches (126.8 x 187.3 x 42.1 cm), Whitney Museum of American Art, NY.
• David Smith, Becca, 1965, stainless steel, 113 1/4 x 123 x 30 1/2 inches (287.7 x 312.4 x 77.5 cm), Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY.
• Lee Krasner (American, 1908-1984), Self-Portrait, c. 1930, oil on linen, 30 1/8 x 25 1/8 inches, Estate of Lee Krasner. See feminism and feminist art and self-portrait.
• Lee Krasner, Gothic Landscape, 1961, oil on canvas, 176.8 x 237.8 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Jack Bush (Canadian, 1909-1977), Indian Red Low, 1965, acrylic on canvas, 70 x 89 inches, U of Lethbridge Art Gallery, Alberta, Canada.
• Enrico Donati (American, 1909-), From Body to Soul, oil on canvas, Detroit Institute of Arts, MI.
• Morris Graves (American, 1910-2001), Wheelbarrow, 1934, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC. See New Deal art.
• Morris Graves, Logged Mountains, c. 1935-1943, oil on canvas, 26 1/8 x 36 1/8 inches (66.3 x 91.6 cm), National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Morris Graves, Oregon, from the United States Series, c. 1948, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Morris Graves, Hibernation, 1954, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Franz Kline (American, 1910-1962), Palmerton, Pa., 1941, painting, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Franz Kline, New York, N.Y., 1953, oil on canvas, 79 x 51 in. (200.6 x 129.5 cm), Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY.
• Franz Kline, Untitled, c. 1954, oil on paper, 11 x 8 1/2 inches, Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, TX.
• Franz Kline, Four Square, 1956, oil on canvas, 1.99 x 1.29 m (78 3/8 x 50 3/4 inches), National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• Franz Kline, C & O, 1958, oil on canvas, 1.96 x 2.79 m (77 x 110 inches), National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• Franz Kline, Siskind, 1958, oil on canvas, Detroit Institute of Arts, MI.
• Franz Kline, Untitled, c. 1959, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Franz Kline, Merce C, 1961, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Franz Kline, Untitled, 1961, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• William Baziotes (American, 1912-1963), Dusk, 1954, oil on canvas, New Britain, CT.
• Jackson Pollock (American, 1912-1956), Naked Man with Knife, c. 1938-40, oil on canvas, 127.0 x 91.4 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Jackson Pollock, Birth, c. 1941, oil on canvas, 116.4 x 55.1 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Jackson Pollock, The Moon-Woman Cuts the Circle, 1943, oil on canvas, 109.5 x 104 cm, Georges Pompidou Center, Paris. See the WebMuseum's page about Pollock.
• Jackson Pollock, Night Mist, 1945, oil on canvas, Norton Museum, West Palm Beach, FL.
• Jackson Pollock, Shimmering Substance (Sounds in the Grass Series), 1946, oil on canvas, 30 1/8 x 24 1/4 inches (76.3 x 61.6 cm), Museum of Modern Art, NY.
• Jackson Pollock, Cathedral, 1947, enamel and aluminum paint on canvas, 71 1/2 x 35 1/8 inches (181.6 x 89.2 cm), Dallas Museum of Art.
• Jackson Pollock, Summertime: Number 9A, 1948, oil, enamel and house paint on canvas, 84.8 x 555.0 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Jackson Pollock, Number 23, 1948, enamel on gesso on paper, 57.5 x 78.4 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Jackson Pollock, Number 26 A, Black and White, 1948, oil on canvas, 205 x 121.7 cm, Georges Pompidou Center, Paris.
• Jackson Pollock, Painting (Silver over Black, White, Yellow and Red), 1948, painting on paper mounted on canvas, 61 x 80 cm, Georges Pompidou Center, Paris.
• Jackson Pollock, Mural on Indian Red Ground, 1950, oil and enamel on board, 183 x 243.5 cm, Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art, Iran.
• Jackson Pollock, Number 27, 1950, oil on canvas, 49 x 106 inches (124.5 x 269.2 cm), Whitney Museum of American Art, NY.
• Jackson Pollock, Autumn Rhythm (#30), 1950, oil on canvas, 105 x 207 inches (266.7 x 525.8 cm), Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY.
• Jackson Pollock, One (Number 31, 1950), 1950, oil and enamel on unprimed canvas, 8 feet 10 inches x 17 feet 5 5/8 inches (269.5 x 530.8 cm), Museum of Modern Art, NY.
• Jackson Pollock, Untitled, c. 1950, ink on paper, 17 1/2 x 22 1/4 inches (44.5 x 56.6 cm), Museum of Modern Art, NY.
• Jackson Pollock, Number 14, 1951, enamel on canvas, 146.5 x 269.5 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Jackson Pollock, Yellow Islands, 1952, oil on canvas, 143.5 x 185.4 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Jackson Pollock, The Deep, 1953, painting on canvas, 220.4 x 150.2 cm, Georges Pompidou Center, Paris.
• Philip Guston (American, 1913-1980), The Return, 1956-8, oil on canvas, 178.1 x 199.1 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Philip Guston, Barnett Newman (American, 1905-1970), c. 1960, ink on paper, Estate of Philip Guston, courtesy McKee Gallery, New York City.
• Conrad Marca-Relli (American, 1913-), Winter Blue, 1982, mixed-media on canvas, Columbia Museum of Art, SC.
• Ad Reinhardt (American, 1913-1967), Untitled, 1940, oil on canvas, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Ad Reinhardt, Red and Blue Composition, 1941, oil on canvas, National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.
• Ad Reinhardt, Untitled, 1947, oil on canvas, 40 x 32 inches (1.016 x .813 m), National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.
• Ad Reinhardt, Abstract Painting, c. 1951-2, oil on canvas, 203.2 x 106.7 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Ad Reinhardt, Abstract Painting No. 9, 1960-1966, oil on canvas, 62 x 62 inches, Minneapolis Institute of Arts.
• Ad Reinhardt, Black Painting No. 34, 1964, oil on canvas, 60 1/4 x 60 1/8 inches (1.530 x 1.526 m), National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC. See Minimalism.
• Robert Motherwell (American, 1915-1991), Personage (Autoportrait) , December 9, 1943, paper collage, gouache, and ink on board, 108 x 65.9 cm, Peggy Guggenheim Collection.
• Robert Motherwell, Ulysses, 1947, oil and cardboard on wood, 85.7 x 71.1 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Robert Motherwell, Mural Fragment, 1950, oil on composition board, 96 x 144 inches, Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum, U of Minnesota.
• Elmer Bischoff (American, 1916-1991). Elmer Bischoff is most widely known for the paintings he did after he had broken away from abstract expressionism, as a proponent of Bay Area Figuration (also called West Coast Figuration).
• Elaine Fried de Kooning (American, 1920-1989), Self-Portrait, 1946, oil on Masonite, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. See feminism and feminist art.
• Elaine Fried de Kooning, Bacchus #3, 1978, acrylic and charcoal on canvas, 78 x 50 inches, National Museum of Women in Art, Washington, DC.
• Grace Hartigan (American, 1922-), The Massacre, 1952, oil on canvas, 81 x 130 inches, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO.
• Sam Francis (American, 1923-1994), In Lovely Blueness, 1955-1957, oil on canvas, 300 x 700 cm, Georges Pompidou Center, Paris.
• Sam Francis, Around the Blues, 1957 / 62, oil and acrylic on canvas, 275.1 x 487.1 cm, Tate Gallery, London.
• Jean-Paul Riopelle (Canadian, 1923-), Pavane, 1954, oil on canvas, 300 x 550.2 cm, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa.
• Joan Mitchell (American, 1926-1992), City Landscape, 1955, oil on canvas, 80 x 80 inches (203.2 x 203.2 cm), Art Institute of Chicago, IL.
• Joan Mitchell, Untitled, 1959-60, oil on canvas, 76 x 114 inches, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO.
• Joan Mitchell, Wet Orange, 1971, oil on canvas, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA.
• Helen Frankenthaler (American, 1928-), Coral Wedge, 1972, acrylic on canvas, 81 1/2 x 46 1/2 inches, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO.
• Cy Twombly (American, living in Italy since 1957, 1928-), Untitled, c. 1953, oil based house paint and graphite on paper, 19 1/4 x 27 1/4 inches, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City, MO.
• Cy Twombly (American, 1928-), The Italians, 1961, oil, pencil, and crayon on canvas, 6 feet 6 5/8 inches x 8 feet 6 1/4 inches (199.5 x 259.6 cm), Museum of Modern Art, NY. Art critics have described Twombly's paintings as akin to painted palimpsests.
• Cy Twombly, Untitled, 1961, oil and charcoal on canvas, St. Louis Art Museum.
• Cy Twombly, Leda and the Swan, 1962, oil, pencil and crayon on canvas, 6 feet 3 inches x 6 feet 6 3/4 inches (190.5 x 200 cm), private collection.
• Cy Twombly, Ohne Titel (Roma), 1969, oil and crayon on canvas.
• Raphael Collazo (American, born Puerto Rico, 1943-1990), The Magic Is Back, 1986, mixed media on panel, 96 x 80 inches, Collazo Foundation, NY.
• Visit the Museo Collazo website (Collazo Foundation) for reproductions of and information about 300 paintings.
• Raphael Collazo, Wing Venation, 1986, mixed media on panel, 90 x 96 inches, Collazo Foundation, NY.
• Raphael Collazo, Forest Rendezvous, 1989, mixed media on panel, 80 x 82 inches, Collazo Foundation, NY.
• Hans Namuth, Pollock seated by his car, 1950, gelatin silver print, National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC.
• Hans Namuth, Barnett Newman, Jackson Pollock, and Tony Smith at the Betty Parsons Gallery, gelatin silver print, April 1951, National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC.
• Hans Namuth, Clyfford Still, 1951, gelatin silver print, National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC.