The history of 'Western painting' represents a continuous, though disrupted, tradition from
Antiquity. Until the early 20th century it relied primarily on
representational and
Classical motifs, after which time more purely
abstract and
conceptual modes gained favor.
Developments in Western painting historically parallel those in Eastern painting, in general a few centuries later.
African art,
Islamic art,
Indian art,
Chinese art, and
Japanese art each had significant influence on Western art, and, eventually, vice-versa.
Initially serving
religious patronage, Western painting later found audiences in the
aristocracy and the
middle class. From the
Middle Ages through the
Renaissance painters worked for the church and a wealthy aristocracy. Beginning with the
Baroque era artists received private commissions from a more educated and prosperous middle class. By the 19th century painters became liberated from the demands of their patronage to only depict scenes from religion, mythology, portraiture or history. The idea "
art for art's sake" began to find expression in the work of painters like
Francisco de Goya,
John Constable, and
J.M.W. Turner.
Western painting's zenith takes place in Europe, during the Renaissance in conjunction with the refinement of
drawing, use of
perspective, ambitious
architecture,
tapestry,
stained glass,
sculpture, and the period before and after the advent of the
printing press. Following the depth of discovery and the complexity of innovations of the Renaissance the rich heritage of Western painting (from the
Baroque to
Contemporary art) continues into the 21st century.
|
| Pre-history |
| Western painting |
| Egypt, Greece and Rome |
| Middle Ages |
| Renaissance and Mannerism |
| Baroque and Rococo |
| 19th century: Neo-classicism, Romanticism, Impressionism, Hudson River School |
| 20th century |
| Pioneers of abstraction |
| Fauvism, Der Blaue Reiter |
| Dada and Surrealism |
| Expressionism, Symbolism, American Modernism |
| Social realism, regionalism, American Scene painting, Symbolism |
| Abstract expressionism |
| Pop art |
| Color Field painting, Bay Area Figurative Movement, Neo-Dada |
| Geometric abstraction, Op Art, Minimalism, Color field |
| Shaped canvas, Washington Color School, Abstract Illusionism, Lyrical Abstraction |
| Neo-expressionism |
| Contemporary painting into the 21st century |
| References |
| Outline of painting history |
| Prehistoric painting |
| Ancient painting |
| Western painting |
| Medieval painting |
| The Renaissance |
|
|
| 18th century |
| 19th century |
| 20th century |
| See also |
| Sources |
| References |
| External links |
Pre-history
The
history of painting reaches back in time to artifacts from pre-historic humans, and spans all cultures. The oldest known paintings are at the
Grotte Chauvet in
France, claimed by some historians to be about 32,000 years old. They are engraved and painted using
red ochre and black pigment and show horses, rhinoceros, lions, buffalo, mammoth, or humans often hunting. There are examples of
cave paintings all over the world—in France, India,
Spain,
Portugal,
China,
Australia etc. There are many common themes throughout the many different places that the paintings have been found; implying the universality of purpose and similarity of the impulses that might have created the imagery. Various conjectures have been made as to the meaning these paintings had to the people who made them. Prehistoric men may have painted animals to "catch" their
soul or
spirit in order to hunt them more easily, or the paintings may represent an
animistic vision and homage to surrounding
nature, or they may be the result of a basic need of
expression that is
innate to human beings, or they may be recordings of the life experiences of the artists and related stories from the members of their circle.
Western painting
Main articles: History of painting
Egypt, Greece and Rome
''Also see
Ancient art''
Ancient Egypt, a civilization with strong traditions of
architecture and
sculpture (both originally painted in bright colours), had many mural paintings in temples and buildings, and painted illustrations to
papyrus manuscripts. Egyptian wall painting and decorative painting is often graphic, sometimes more symbolic than realistic. Egyptian painting depicts figures in bold outline and flat
silhouette, in which symmetry is a constant characteristic.
Egyptian painting has close connection with its written language - called
Egyptian hieroglyphs. The Egyptians also painted on linen, remnants of which survive today. Painted symbols are found amongst the first forms of written language.
To the north of
Egypt was the
Minoan civilization on the island of
Crete. The wall paintings found in the palace of
Knossos are similar to those of the
Egyptians but much more free in style.
Around 1100 B.C., tribes from the north of
Greece conquered Greece and its art took a new direction. The culture of
Ancient Greece is noteworthy for its outstanding contributions to the visual arts. Painting on
pottery of Ancient Greece and
ceramics gives a particularly informative glimpse into the way society in Ancient Greece functioned. Many fine examples of
Black-figure vase painting and
Red-figure vase painting still exist. Some famous Greek painters who worked on wood panels and are mentioned in texts are
Apelles,
Zeuxis and Parrhasius; however, no examples of Ancient Greek panel painting survive, only written descriptions by their contemporaries or later Romans. Zeuxis lived in 5-6 BC and was said to be the first to use
sfumato. According to
Pliny the Elder, the realism of his paintings was such that birds tried to eat the painted grapes. Apelles is described as the greatest painter of
Antiquity, and is noted for perfect technique in drawing, brilliant color, and modeling.
Roman art was influenced by Greece and can in part be taken as descendant from ancient Greek painting. However, Roman painting does have important unique characteristics. The only surviving Roman works are wall paintings, many from villas in
Campania, in Southern Italy. Such painting can be grouped into 4 main "styles" or periods
[1] and may contain the first examples of
trompe-l'oeil, pseudo-perspective, and pure landscape.
[2] Almost the only painted portraits surviving from the Ancient world are a large number of coffin-portraits of bust form found in the
Late Antique cemetery of
Al-Fayum. Although these were neither of the best period nor the highest quality, they are impressive in themselves, and suggest the quality of the finest ancient work. A very small number of
miniatures from Late Antique illustrated books also survive, as well as a rather larger number of copies of them from the Early Medieval period.
Middle Ages
The rise of Christianity imparted a different spirit and aim to painting styles.
Byzantine art, once its style was established by the 6th century, placed great emphasis on retaining traditional
iconography and style, and has changed relatively little through the thousand years of the
Byzantine Empire and the continuing traditions of Greek and Russian
Orthodox icon-painting. Byzantine painting has a particularly hieratic feeling and icons were and still are seen as a reflection of the divine. There were also many wall-paintings in
fresco, but fewer of these have survived than Byzantine
mosaics. In general Byzantium art borders on
abstraction, in its flatness and highly stylised depictions of figures and landscape. However there are periods, especially in the so-called
Macedonian art of around the 10th century, when Byzantine art became more flexible in approach.
In post-Antique Catholic Europe the first distinctive artistic style to emerge that included painting was the
Insular art of the British Isles, where the only surviving examples (and quite likely the only medium in which painting was used) are miniatures in
Illuminated manuscripts such as the
Book of Kells. These are most famous for their abstract decoration, although figures, and sometimes scenes, were also depicted, especially in
Evangelist portraits.
Carolingian and
Ottonian art also survives mostly in manuscripts, although some wall-painting remain, and more are documented. The art of this period combines Insular and "barbarian" influences with a strong Byzantine influence and an aspiration to recover classical monumentality and poise.
Walls of
Romanesque and
Gothic churches were decorated with
frescoes as well as sculpture and many of the few remaining
murals have great intensity, and combine the decorative energy of Insular art with a new monumentality in the treatment of figures. Far more miniatures in
Illuminated manuscripts survive from the period, showing the same characteristics, which continue into the
Gothic period.
Panel painting becomes more common during the
Romanesque period, under the heavy influence of Byzantine icons. Towards the middle of the 13th century,
Medieval art and
Gothic painting became more realistic, with the beginnings of interest in the depiction of volume and perspective in Italy with
Cimabue and then his pupil
Giotto. From Giotto on, the treatment of composition by the best painters also became much more free and innovative. They are considered to be the two great medieval masters of painting in western culture. Cimabue, within the Byzantine tradition, used a more realistic and dramatic approach to his art. His pupil, Giotto, took these innovations to a higher level which in turn set the foundations for the western painting tradition. Both artists were pioneers in the move towards naturalism.
Churches were built with more and more windows and the use of colorful
stained glass become a staple in decoration. One of the most famous examples of this is found in the
cathedral of
Notre Dame de Paris. By the 14th century Western societies were both richer and more cultivated and painters found new patrons in the nobility and even the
bourgeoisie. Illuminated manuscripts took on a new character and slim, fashionably dressed court women were shown in their landscapes. This style soon became known as International style and
tempera panel paintings and altarpieces gained importance.
Renaissance and Mannerism
The Renaissance (French for 'rebirth'), a cultural movement roughly spanning the
14th through the mid 17th century, heralded the study of classical sources, as well as advances in science which profoundly influenced European intellectual and artistic life. In Italy artists like
Paolo Uccello,
Fra Angelico,
Masaccio,
Piero della Francesca,
Andrea Mantegna,
Filippo Lippi,
Giorgione,
Tintoretto,
Sandro Botticelli,
Leonardo Da Vinci,
Michelangelo Buonarroti,
Raphael,
Giovanni Bellini and
Titian took painting to a higher level through the use of
perspective, the study of
human anatomy and proportion, and through their development of an unprecedented refinement in drawing and painting techniques.
Flemish, Dutch and German painters of the Renaissance such as
Hans Holbein the Younger,
Albrecht Dürer,
Lucas Cranach,
Matthias Grünewald,
Hieronymous Bosch, and
Pieter Brueghel represent a different approach from their Italian colleagues, one that is more realistic and less idealized. The adoption of
oil painting whose invention was traditionally, but erroneously, credited to
Jan Van Eyck, (an important transitional figure who bridges painting in the Middle Ages with painting of the early Renaissance), made possible a new
verisimilitude in depicting reality. Unlike the Italians, whose work drew heavily from the art of ancient Greece and Rome, the northerners retained a stylistic residue of the sculpture and
illuminated manuscripts of the Middle Ages.
Renaissance painting reflects the revolution of ideas and science (
astronomy,
geography) that occurred in this period, the
Reformation, and the invention of the
printing press. Dürer, considered one of the greatest of printmakers, states that painters are not mere
artisans but
thinkers as well. With the development of
easel painting in the Renaissance, painting gained independence from architecture. Following centuries dominated by religious imagery, secular subject matter slowly returned to Western painting. Artists included visions of the world around them, or the products of their own imaginations in their paintings. Those who could afford the expense could become patrons and commission portraits of themselves or their family.
In the 16th century, movable pictures which could be hung easily on walls, rather than paintings affixed to permanent structures, came into popular demand .
[3]
The
High Renaissance gave rise to a stylized art known as
Mannerism. In place of the balanced compositions and rational approach to perspective that characterized art at the dawn of the sixteenth century, the Mannerists sought instability, artifice, and doubt. The unperturbed faces and gestures of
Piero della Francesca and the calm Virgins of Raphael are replaced by the troubled expressions of
Pontormo and the emotional intensity of
El Greco.
Baroque and Rococo
During the period beginning around 1600 and continuing throughout the 17th century, painting is characterized as
Baroque. Among the greatest painters of the
Baroque are
Caravaggio,
Rembrandt,
Rubens,
Velazquez,
Poussin, and
Vermeer. Caravaggio is an heir of the
humanist painting of the
High Renaissance. His
realistic approach to the human figure, painted directly from life and dramatically spotlit against a dark background, shocked his contemporaries and opened a new chapter in the history of painting. Baroque painting often dramatizes scenes using
chiaroscuro light effects; this can be seen in works by Rembrandt, Vermeer,
Le Nain and
La Tour.
The Flemish painter
Antony Van Dyck developed a graceful but imposing portrait syle that was very influential, especially in England.
The prosperity of seventeenth century Holland led to an enormous production of art by large numbers of painters who were mostly highly specialised and painted only
genre scenes,
landscapes,
Still-lifes,
portraits or
History paintings. Technical standards were very high, and
Dutch Golden Age painting established a new repertoire of subjects that was very influential until the arrival of
Modernism.
During the 18th century,
Rococo followed as a lighter extension of Baroque, often frivolous and erotic. The French masters
Watteau,
Boucher and
Fragonard represent the style, as do
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo and
Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin who was considered by some as the best French painter of the 18th century - the Anti-Rococo.
Portraiture was an important component of painting in all countries, but especially in England, where the leaders were
William Hogarth in a blunt realist style, and
Thomas Gainsborough and
Joshua Reynolds in more flattering styles influenced by Van Dyck.
19th century: Neo-classicism, Romanticism, Impressionism, Hudson River School
''also see main articles
Impressionism,
Post Impressionism,
Hudson River School''
After
Rococo there arose in the late 18th century, in
architecture, and then in painting severe
neo-classicism, best represented by such artists as
David and his heir
Ingres. Ingres' work already contains much of the sensuality, but none of the spontaneity, that was to characterize
Romanticism.
This movement turned its attention toward landscape and nature as well as the human figure and the supremacy of natural order above mankind's will. There is a
pantheist philosophy (see
Spinoza and
Hegel) within this conception that opposes
Enlightenment ideals by seeing mankind's destiny in a more tragic or pessimistic light. The idea that human beings are not above the forces of
Nature is in contradiction to
Ancient Greek and Renaissance ideals where mankind was above all things and owned his fate. This thinking led romantic artists to depict the
sublime, ruined churches, shipwrecks, massacres and madness.
Romantic painters turned
landscape painting into a major genre, considered until then as a minor genre or as a decorative background for figure compositions.
Some of the major painters of this period are
Eugene Delacroix,
Théodore Géricault,
J. M. W. Turner,
Caspar David Friedrich and
John Constable.
Francisco de Goya's late work demonstrates the Romantic interest in the irrational, while the work of
Arnold Böcklin evokes mystery and the paintings of
Aesthetic movement artist
James McNeill Whistler evoke both sophistication and
decadence. In the
United States the Romantic tradition of landscape painting was known as the
Hudson River School. Important painters of that school include
Thomas Cole,
Frederick Church,
Albert Bierstadt,
Thomas Moran, and
John Frederick Kensett among others.
Luminism was another important movement in American landscape painting related to the Hudson River School.
The leading
Barbizon School painter
Camille Corot painted in both a romantic and a
realistic vein; his work prefigures
Impressionism, as does the paintings of
Eugène Boudin who was one of the first French landscape painters to paint outdoors. Boudin was also an important influence on the young
Claude Monet, whom in 1857 he introduced to
Plein air painting. A major force in the turn towards
Realism at mid-century was
Gustave Courbet. In the latter third of the century Impressionists like
Édouard Manet,
Claude Monet,
Pierre-Auguste Renoir,
Camille Pissarro,
Alfred Sisley,
Berthe Morisot,
Mary Cassatt, and
Edgar Degas worked in a more direct approach than had previously been exhibited publicly. They eschewed allegory and narrative in favor of individualized responses to the modern world, sometimes painted with little or no preparatory study, relying on deftness of drawing and a highly chromatic pallette. Manet, Degas, Renoir, Morisot, and Cassatt concentrated primarily on the human subject. Both Manet and Degas reinterpreted classical figurative canons within contemporary situations; in Manet's case the re-imaginings met with hostile public reception. Renoir, Morisot, and Cassatt turned to domestic life for inspiration, with Renoir focusing on the female nude. Monet, Pissarro, and Sisley used the landscape as their primary motif, the transience of light and weather playing a major role in their work. While Sisley most closely adhered to the original principals of the impressionist perception of the landscape, Monet sought challenges in increasingly chromatic and changeable conditions, culminating in series of monumental works, and Pissarro adopted some of the experiments of
Post-Impressionism. Slightly younger Post-Impressionists like
Vincent Van Gogh,
Paul Gauguin, and
Georges Seurat, along with
Paul Cezanne led art to the edge of
modernism; for Gauguin impressionism gave way to a personal symbolism; Seurat transformed impressionism's broken color into a scientific optical study, structured on frieze-like compositions; Van Gogh's turbulent method of paint application, coupled with a sonorous use of color, predicted
Expressionism and
Fauvism, and Cezanne, desiring to unite classical composition with a revolutionary abstraction of natural forms, would come to be seen as a precursor of 20th century art.
The spell of Impressionism was felt throughout the world, and nowhere more profoundly than in the United States, where it became integral to the painting of
American Impressionists such as
Childe Hassam,
John Twachtman, and
Theodore Robinson. It also exerted influence on painters who were not primarily impressionistic in theory, like the portrait and landscape painter
John Singer Sargent. At the same time in America there existed a native and nearly insular realism, as richly embodied in the figurative work of
Thomas Eakins and the landscapes and seascapes of
Winslow Homer, both of whose paintings were deeply invested in the solidity of natural forms. The visionary landscape, a motive largely dependent on the ambiguity of the nocturne, found its advocates in
Albert Pinkham Ryder and
Ralph Blakelock.
20th century
The heritage of painters like
Van Gogh,
Cézanne,
Gauguin, and
Seurat was essential for the development of modern art. At the beginning of the 20th century
Henri Matisse and several other young artists including the pre-cubist
Georges Braque,
André Derain,
Raoul Dufy and
Maurice de Vlaminck revolutionized the
Paris art world with "wild", multi-colored, expressive, landscapes and figure paintings that the critics called
Fauvism - (as seen in the gallery above).
Pablo Picasso made his first
cubist paintings based on Cézanne's idea that all depiction of nature can be reduced to three solids:
cube,
sphere and
cone. With the painting
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon 1907, (see gallery) Picasso dramatically created a new and radical picture depicting a raw and primitive brothel scene with five prostitutes, violently painted women, reminiscent of
African tribal masks and his own new
Cubist inventions.
Analytic cubism (see gallery) was jointly developed by Pablo Picasso and
Georges Braque from about 1908 through 1912. Analytic cubism, the first clear manifestation of cubism, was followed by
Synthetic cubism, practised by Braque, Picasso,
Fernand Léger,
Juan Gris,
Albert Gleizes,
Marcel Duchamp and countless other artists into the 1920s.
Synthetic cubism is characterized by the introduction of different textures, surfaces,
collage elements,
papier collé and a large variety of merged subject matter.
During the years between 1910 and the end of
World War I and after the heyday of
cubism, several movements emerged in Paris.
Giorgio De Chirico moved to Paris in July 1911, where he joined his brother Andrea (the poet and painter known as
Alberto Savinio). Through his brother he met Pierre Laprade a member of the jury at the Salon d’Automne, where he exhibited three of his dreamlike works: ''Enigma of the Oracle'', ''Enigma of an Afternoon'' and ''Self-Portrait''. During 1913 he exhibited his work at the
Salon des Indépendants and Salon d’Automne, his work was noticed by
Pablo Picasso and
Guillaume Apollinaire and several others. His compelling and mysterious paintings are considered instrumental to the early beginnings of
Surrealism. (see gallery)
In the first two decades of the 20th century and after cubism, several other important movements emerged;
Futurism (
Balla),
Abstract art (
Kandinsky),
Der Blaue Reiter),
Bauhaus, (
Kandinsky) and (
Klee),
Orphism, (
Robert Delaunay and
František Kupka),
Synchromism (
Morgan Russell),
De Stijl (
Mondrian),
Suprematism (
Malevich),
Constructivism (
Tatlin),
Dadaism (
Duchamp,
Picabia,
Arp) and
Surrealism (
De Chirico,
André Breton,
Miró,
Magritte,
Dalí,
Ernst). Modern painting influenced all the visual arts, from
Modernist architecture and
design, to
avant-garde film,
theatre and
modern dance and became an experimental laboratory for the expression of visual experience, from
photography and
concrete poetry to
advertising art and
fashion. Van Gogh's painting exerted great influence upon 20th century
Expressionism, as can be seen in the work of the
Fauves,
Die Brücke (a group led by German painter
Ernst Kirchner), and the Expressionism of
Edvard Munch,
Egon Schiele,
Marc Chagall,
Amedeo Modigliani,
Chaim Soutine and others..
Pioneers of abstraction
Wassily Kandinsky a
Russian painter,
printmaker and art
theorist, one of the most famous
20th-century artists is generally considered the first important painter of
modern abstract art. As an early
modernist, in search of new modes of visual expression, and spiritual expression, he theorized as did contemporary
occultists and
theosophists, that pure visual abstraction had corollary vibrations with sound and music. They posited that pure abstraction could express pure spirituality. . His earliest abstractions were generally titled as the example in the (above gallery) ''Composition VII'', making connection to the work of the composers of music. Kandinsky included many of his theories about abstract art in his book ''Concerning the Spiritual in Art''.
Piet Mondrian's art was also related to his spiritual and philosophical studies. In 1908 he became interested in the
theosophical movement launched by
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky in the late 19th century. Blavatsky believed that it was possible to attain a knowledge of nature more profound than that provided by empirical means, and much of Mondrian's work for the rest of his life was inspired by his search for that spiritual knowledge. Other major pioneers of early abstraction include Russian painter
Kasimir Malevich, and
Swiss painter
Paul Klee.
Robert Delaunay was a French artist who is associated with
Orphism, (reminiscent of a link between pure abstraction and cubism). His later works were more abstract, reminiscent of
Paul Klee. His key contributions to abstract painting refer to his bold use of color, and a clear love of experimentation of both depth and tone. At the invitation of
Wassily Kandinsky, Delaunay and his wife the artist
Sonia Delaunay, joined The Blue Rider (
Der Blaue Reiter), a
Munich-based group of
abstract artists, in 1911, and his art took a turn to the abstract. Still other important pioneers of abstract painting include
Czech painter,
František Kupka and
Synchromism, an art movement founded in 1912 by American artists
Stanton MacDonald-Wright and
Morgan Russell that closely resembles
Orphism.
Fauvism, Der Blaue Reiter
Les Fauves (
French for ''The Wild Beasts'') were early 20th century painters, experimenting with freedom of expression through color. The name was given, humourously and not as a compliment, to the group by art critic
Louis Vauxcelles.
Fauvism was a short-lived and loose grouping of early 20th century artists whose works emphasized
painterly qualities, and the imaginative use of deep color over the representational values. Fauvists made the subject of the painting easy to read, exaggerated perspectives and an interesting prescient prediction of the Fauves was expressed in 1888 by
Paul Gauguin to
Paul Sérusier,
''"How do you see these trees? They are yellow. So, put in yellow; this shadow, rather blue, paint it with pure
ultramarine; these red leaves? Put in
vermilion."''
The leaders of the movement were
Henri Matisse and
André Derain — friendly rivals of a sort, each with his own followers. Ultimately
Matisse became the ''yang'' to
Picasso's ''yin'' in the 20th century. Fauvist painters included
Albert Marquet,
Charles Camoin,
Maurice de Vlaminck,
Raoul Dufy,
Othon Friesz, the Dutch painter
Kees van Dongen, and Picasso's partner in Cubism,
Georges Braque amongst others.
Fauvism, as a movement, had no concrete theories, and was short lived, beginning in 1905 and ending in 1907, they only had three exhibitions. Matisse was seen as the leader of the movement, due to his seniority in age and prior self-establishment in the academic art world. He said he wanted to create art to delight; art as a decoration was his purpose and it can be said that his use of bright colors tries to maintain serenity of composition.
Der Blaue Reiter was a German movement lasting from 1911 to 1914, fundamental to Expressionism, along with
Die Brücke which was founded the previous decade in 1905.
Wassily Kandinsky,
Franz Marc,
August Macke,
Alexej von Jawlensky,
Marianne von Werefkin,
Lyonel Feininger and others founded the group in response to the rejection of Kandinsky's painting ''Last Judgement'' from an exhibition. Der Blaue Reiter lacked a central artistic manifesto, but was centered around Kandinsky and Marc. Artists
Gabriele Münter and
Paul Klee were also involved.
The name of the movement comes from a painting by Kandinsky created in 1903 (see illustration). It is also claimed that the name could have derived from Marc's enthusiasm for horses and Kandinsky's love of the colour blue. For Kandinsky, ''blue'' is the colour of spirituality: the darker the blue, the more it awakens human desire for the eternal.
Dada and Surrealism
Marcel Duchamp, came to international prominence in the wake of his notorious success at the
New York City Armory Show in 1913, (soon after he denounced artmaking for
chess). Duchamp became closely associated with the
Dada movement that began in neutral
Zürich, Switzerland, during
World War I and peaked from 1916 to 1920. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature (poetry, art manifestoes, art theory), theatre, and graphic design, and concentrated its anti war politic through a rejection of the prevailing standards in
art through
anti-art cultural works.
Francis Picabia (see above),
Man Ray,
Kurt Schwitters,
Tristan Tzara,
Hans Richter,
Jean Arp,
Sophie Taeuber-Arp, along with Duchamp and many others are associated with the Dadaist movement. Duchamp and several
Dadaists are also associated with Surrealism, the movement that dominated European painting in the 1920s and 1930s.
In 1924
André Breton published the ''
Surrealist Manifesto.'' The
Surrealist movement in painting became synonymous with the
avant-garde and which featured artists whose works varied from the abstract to the super-realist.
René Magritte and
Salvador Dalí are particularly known for their realistic depictions of dream imagery and fantastic manifestations of the imagination. The more abstract
Joan Miró,
Jean Arp,
André Masson, and
Max Ernst were very influential, especially in the United States during the 1940s.
Throughout the 1930s, Surrealism continued to become more visible to the public at large. A
Surrealist group developed in Britain and, according to Breton, their 1936
London International Surrealist Exhibition was a high water mark of the period and became the model for international exhibitions. Surrealist groups in
Japan, and especially in
Latin America, the
Caribbean and in
Mexico produced innovative and original works.
Dalí and
Magritte created some of the most widely recognized images of the movement. Dalí joined the group in 1929, and participated in the rapid establishment of the visual style between 1930 and 1935.
Surrealism as a visual movement had found a method: to expose psychological truth by stripping ordinary objects of their normal significance, in order to create a compelling image that was beyond ordinary formal organization, and perception, sometimes evoking empathy from the viewer, sometimes laughter and sometimes outrage and bewilderment.
1931 marked a year when several Surrealist painters produced works which marked turning points in their stylistic evolution: in one example (see gallery above) liquid shapes become the trademark of Dalí, particularly in his ''
The Persistence of Memory'', which features the image of watches that sag as if they are melting. Evocations of time and its compelling mystery and absurdity.
The characteristics of this style - a combination of the depictive, the abstract, and the psychological - came to stand for the alienation which many people felt in the
modernist period, combined with the sense of reaching more deeply into the psyche, to be "made whole with one's individuality".
Long after personal, political and professional tensions have fragmented the Surrealist group into thin air and ether, Magritte, Miro, Dalí and the other Surrealists continue to define a visual program in the arts.
Expressionism, Symbolism, American Modernism
In the
USA during the period between
World War I and
World War II painters tended to go to Europe for recognition.
Modernist artists like
Marsden Hartley,
Patrick Henry Bruce,
Gerald Murphy and
Stuart Davis, created reputations abroad. While
Patrick Henry Bruce, created
cubist related paintings in Europe, both
Stuart Davis and
Gerald Murphy made paintings that were early inspirations for American
pop art and
Marsden Hartley experimented with
expressionism. During the 1920s photographer
Alfred Stieglitz exhibited
Georgia O'Keeffe,
Arthur Dove,
Alfred Henry Maurer,
Charles Demuth,
John Marin and other artists including European Masters
Henri Matisse,
Auguste Rodin,
Henri Rousseau,
Paul Cezanne, and
Pablo Picasso, at his New York City gallery ''
the 291.''
''
Expressionism'' and ''
Symbolism'' are broad rubrics that describes several important and related movements in 20th century painting that dominated much of the
avant-garde art being made in Western, Eastern and Northern Europe. Expressionism was painted largely between
World War I and
World War II, mostly in France,
Germany,
Norway, Russia,
Belgium, and
Austria. Expressionist artists are related to both Surrealism and Symbolism and are each uniquely and somewhat eccentrically personal.
Fauvism,
Die Brücke, and
Der Blaue Reiter are three of the best known groups of
Expressionist and Symbolist painters. Artists as interesting and diverse as
Marc Chagall,
Gustav Klimt,
Egon Schiele,
Edvard Munch,
Emil Nolde,
Chaim Soutine,
James Ensor,
Oskar Kokoschka,
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner,
Max Beckmann,
Franz Marc,
Käthe Schmidt Kollwitz,
Georges Rouault,
Amedeo Modigliani and some of the Americans abroad like
Marsden Hartley, and
Stuart Davis, were considered influential expressionist painters.
Social realism, regionalism, American Scene painting, Symbolism
During the 1930s and the
Great Depression, Surrealism, late Cubism, the
Bauhaus,
De Stijl, Dada, Expressionism, and
modernist and masterful color painters like
Henri Matisse and
Pierre Bonnard characterized the European art scene. While in America
American Scene painting and the
Social Realism and
Regionalism movements that contained both political and social commentary dominated the art world. Artists like
Ben Shahn,
Thomas Hart Benton,
Grant Wood,
George Tooker,
John Steuart Curry,
Reginald Marsh, and others became prominent. In Latin America the
muralist movement with
Diego Rivera,
David Siqueiros,
José Orozco,
Pedro Nel Gómez and
Santiago Martinez Delgado and the Symbolist paintings by
Frida Kahlo was a renaissance of the arts for the region, with a use of color and historic, and political messages.
Frida Kahlo's Symbolist works also relate strongly to Surrealism and to the
Magic Realism movement in literature.
Diego Rivera is perhaps best known by the public world for his 1933 mural, "
Man at the Crossroads", in the lobby of the RCA Building at
Rockefeller Center. When his patron
Nelson Rockefeller discovered that the mural included a portrait of
Lenin and other
communist imagery, he fired Rivera, and the unfinished work was eventually destroyed by Rockefeller's staff. The film ''
Cradle Will Rock'' includes a dramatization of the controversy.
Frida Kahlo (Rivera's wife's) works are often characterized by their stark portrayals of pain. Of her 143 paintings 55 are
self-portraits, which frequently incorporate symbolic portrayals of her physical and psychological wounds. Kahlo was deeply influenced by indigenous Mexican culture, which is apparent in her paintings' bright colors and dramatic symbolism.
Christian and
Jewish themes are often depicted in her work as well; she combined elements of the classic religious Mexican tradition--which were often bloody and violent--with
surrealist renderings. While her paintings are not overtly Christian - she was, after all, an avowed communist - they certainly contain elements of the macabre Mexican Christian style of religious paintings.
Political activism was an important piece of
David Siqueiros' life, and frequently inspired him to set aside his artistic career. His art was deeply rooted in the
Mexican Revolution, a violent and chaotic period in Mexican history in which various social and political factions fought for recognition and power. The period from the 1920s to the 1950s is known as the Mexican Renaissance, and Siqueiros was active in the attempt to create an art that was at once Mexican and universal. He briefly gave up painting to focus on organizing miners in Jalisco. He ran a political art workshop in New York City in preparation for the 1936 General Strike for Peace and
May Day parade. The young
Jackson Pollock attended the workshop and helped build
floats for the parade. Between 1937 and 1938 he fought in the
Spanish Civil War alongside the Spanish Republican forces, in opposition to
Francisco Franco's military coup. He was
exiled twice from Mexico, once in 1932 and again in 1940, following his assassination attempt on
Leon Trotsky.
Abstract expressionism
The 1940s in New York City heralded the triumph of American
Abstract expressionism, a modernist movement that combined lessons learned from
Henri Matisse,
Pablo Picasso, Surrealism,
Joan Miró, Cubism,
Fauvism, and early Modernism via great teachers in America like
Hans Hofmann and
John D. Graham. American artists benefited from the presence of
Piet Mondrian,
Fernand Leger,
Max Ernst and the
Andre Breton group, Pierre Matisse's gallery, and
Peggy Guggenheim's gallery ''
The Art of This Century'', as well as other factors.
Post-
Second World War American painting called Abstract expressionism included artists like
Jackson Pollock,
Willem de Kooning,
Arshile Gorky,
Mark Rothko,
Hans Hofmann,
Clyfford Still,
Adolph Gottlieb,
Barnett Newman,
Philip Guston,
Robert Motherwell, and
Franz Kline, among others. American Abstract expressionism got its name in 1946 from the art critic
Robert Coates. It is seen as combining the emotional intensity and self-denial of the German Expressionists with the anti-figurative aesthetic of the European abstract schools such as
Futurism, the
Bauhaus and Synthetic Cubism. Abstract expressionism,
Action painting, and
Color Field painting are synonymous with the
New York School.
Technically Surrealism was an important predecessor for Abstract expressionism with its emphasis on spontaneous,
automatic or subconscious creation.
Jackson Pollock's dripping paint onto a canvas laid on the floor is a technique that has its roots in the work of
André Masson. Another important ear
ly 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.
Additionally, Abstract expressionism 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 (mostly) in New York who had quite different styles, and even applied to work which is not 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 color 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 1950s is a matter of debate. American
Social realism had been the mainstream in the 1930s. It had been influenced not only by the
Great Depression but also by the
Social Realists of Mexico such as
David Alfaro Siqueiros and
Diego Rivera. The political climate after
World War II did not long tolerate the social protests of those painters. Abstract expressionism arose during
World War II and began to be showcased during the early 1940s at galleries in New York like ''
The Art of This Century Gallery''. The late 1940s through the mid 1950s ushered in the
McCarthy era. It was after World War II and a time of political conservatism and extreme artistic
censorship in the United States. Some people have conjectured that since the subject matter was often totally abstract, Abstract expressionism 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. However those theorists are in the minority. 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.
Although Abstract expressionism spread quickly throughout the United States, the major centers of this style were New York City and California, especially in the
New York School, and the San Francisco Bay area. Abstract expressionist paintings share certain characteristics, including the use of large canvases, 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. The canvas as the ''arena'' became a credo of
Action painting, while the ''integrity of the picture plane'' became a credo of the Color Field painters.
In Europe there was the continuation of Surrealism, Cubism, Dada and the works of
Matisse. Also in Europe,
Tachisme (the European equivalent to Abstract expressionism) took hold of the newest generation.
Serge Poliakoff,
Nicolas de Staël,
Georges Mathieu,
Vieira da Silva,
Jean Dubuffet,
Yves Klein and
Pierre Soulages among others are considered important figures in post-war European painting.
Eventually abstract painting in America evolved into movements such as
Neo-Dada, Color Field painting,
Post painterly abstraction,
Op art,
hard-edge painting,
Minimal art,
shaped canvas painting,
Lyrical Abstraction,
Neo-expressionism and the continuation of Abstract expressionism. As a response to the tendency toward abstraction imagery emerged through various new movements, notably
Pop art.
Pop art
Pop art in America was to a large degree initially inspired by the works of
Jasper Johns,
Larry Rivers, and
Robert Rauschenberg. Although the paintings of
Gerald Murphy,
Stuart Davis and
Charles Demuth during the 1920s and 1930s set the table for Pop art in America. In New York City during the mid 1950s
Robert Rauschenberg and
Jasper Johns created works of art that at first seemed to be continuations of
Abstract expressionist painting. Actually their works and the work of Larry Rivers, were radical departures from abstract expressionism especially in the use of banal and literal imagery and the inclusion and the combining of mundane materials into their work. The innovations of Johns' specific use of various images and objects like chairs, numbers, targets, beer cans and the
American Flag; Rivers paintings of subjects drawn from popular culture such as
George Washington crossing the
Delaware, and his inclusions of images from advertisements like the camel from
Camel cigarettes, and Rauschenberg's surprising constructions using inclusions of objects and pictures taken from popular culture, hardware stores, junkyards, the city streets, and
taxidermy gave rise to a radical new movement in
American art. Eventually by 1963 the movement came to be known worldwide as Pop art.
Pop art is exemplified by artists:
Andy Warhol,
Claes Oldenburg,
Wayne Thiebaud,
James Rosenquist,
Jim Dine,
Tom Wesselmann and
Roy Lichtenstein among others. Pop art merges popular and mass culture with fine art, while injecting humor, irony, and recognizable imagery and content into the mix. In October 1962 the
Sidney Janis Gallery mounted ''The New Realists'' the first major Pop art group exhibition in an uptown art gallery in New York City.
Sidney Janis mounted the exhibition in a 57th Street storefront near his gallery at 15 E. 57th Street. The show sent shockwaves through the
New York School and reverberated worldwide. Earlier in the fall of 1962 an historically important and ground-breaking ''
New Painting of Common Objects'' exhibition of Pop art, curated by
Walter Hopps at the
Pasadena Art Museum sent shock waves across the Western United States.
Earlier in England in 1958 the term "Pop Art" was used by
Lawrence Alloway to describe paintings that celebrated consumerism of the post World War II era. This movement rejected Abstract expressionism and its focus on the hermeneutic and psychological interior, in favor of art which depicted, and often celebrated material consumer culture, advertising, and iconography of the mass production age.
[4]The early works of
David Hockney and the works of
Richard Hamilton and
Eduardo Paolozzi were considered seminal examples in the movement.
While in the downtown scene in
New York's
East Village 10th Street galleries artists were formulating an American version of Pop art.
Claes Oldenburg had his storefront, and the Green Gallery on 57th Street began to show
Tom Wesselmann and
James Rosenquist. Later
Leo Castelli exhibited other American artists including the bulk of the careers of Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein and his use of Benday dots, a technique used in commercial reproduction. There is a connection between the radical works of Duchamp, and
Man Ray, the rebellious Dadaists - with a sense of humor; and Pop Artists like
Alex Katz,
Claes Oldenburg,
Andy Warhol,
Roy Lichtenstein and the others.
Color Field painting, Bay Area Figurative Movement, Neo-Dada
During the 1950s Color Field painting initially referred to a particular type of
abstract expressionism, especially the work of
Mark Rothko,
Clyfford Still,
Barnett Newman,
Robert Motherwell and
Adolph Gottlieb. It essentially described abstract paintings with large, flat expanses of color that expressed the sensual, and visual feelings and properties of large areas of nuanced surface.
Art critic Clement Greenberg perceived Color Field painting as related to but different from Action painting. The overall expanse and gestalt of the work of the early color field painters speaks of an almost religious experience, awestruck in the face of an expanding universe of sensuality, color and surface. During the early to mid-1960s Color Field painting was the term used to describe artists like
Jules Olitski,
Kenneth Noland, and
Helen Frankenthaler, whose works were related to second generation abstract expressionism, and to younger artists like
Larry Zox, and
Frank Stella, - all moving in a new direction. Artists like
Clyfford Still,
Mark Rothko,
Hans Hofmann,
Morris Louis,
Jules Olitski,
Kenneth Noland,
Helen Frankenthaler,
Larry Zox, and others often used greatly reduced references to nature, and they painted with a highly articulated and psychological use of color. In general these artists eliminated recognizable imagery.
During the 1950s and 1960s as abstract painting in America evolved into movements such as
Neo-Dada, Color Field painting,
Post painterly abstraction,
Op art,
hard-edge painting,
Minimal art,
shaped canvas painting,
Lyrical Abstraction, and the continuation of Abstract expressionism. Other artists reacted as a response to the tendency toward abstraction allowing imagery to re-emerge through various new movements like Pop art, the
Bay Area Figurative Movement and later in the 1970s
Neo-expressionism. In fact throughout the 20th century many painters continued to use imagery, practicing landscape and figurative painting with contemporary subjects and solid technique, and unique expressivity like
Milton Avery,
John D. Graham,
Fairfield Porter,
Edward Hopper,
Andrew Wyeth,
Balthus,
Francis Bacon,
Frank Auerbach,
Lucian Freud,
Philip Pearlstein,
David Hockney,
Alex Katz,
Chuck Close,
Susan Rothenberg,
Eric Fischl, and
Vija Celmins.
After
World War II the term
School of Paris often referred to
Tachisme, the European equivalent of American Abstract expressionism and those artists are also related to
Cobra. Important proponents being
Jean Dubuffet,
Pierre Soulages,
Nicholas de Staël,
Hans Hartung,
Serge Poliakoff, and
Georges Mathieu, among several others. During the early 1950s
Dubuffet (who was always a figurative artist), and
de Staël, abandoned abstraction, and returned to imagery via figuration and landscape. De Staël 's work was quickly recognised within the post-war art world, and he became one of the most influential artists of the 1950s. His return to representation (seascapes, footballers, jazz musicians, seagulls) during the early 1950s can be seen as an influential precedent for the American
Bay Area Figurative Movement, as many of those abstract painters like
Richard Diebenkorn,
David Park,
Elmer Bischoff,
Wayne Thiebaud, and others made a similar move; returning to imagery during the mid-1950s. Much of de Staël 's late work - in particular his thinned, and diluted oil on canvas abstract landscapes of the mid-1950s predicts Color Field painting and
Lyrical Abstraction of the 1960s and 1970s.
Nicolas de Staël 's bold and intensely vivid color in his last paintings predict the direction of much of contemporary painting that came after him including Pop art of the 1960s.
Neo-Dada is also a movement that started 1n the 1950s and 1960s and was related to Abstract expressionism only with imagery. Featuring the emergence of combined manufactured items, with artist materials, moving away from previous conventions of painting. This trend in art is exemplified by the work of
Jasper Johns and
Robert Rauschenberg, whose "combines" in the 1950s were forerunners of Pop Art and
Installation art, and made use of the assemblage of large physical objects, including stuffed animals, birds and commercial photography.
Robert Rauschenberg,
Jasper Johns,
Larry Rivers,
John Chamberlain,
Claes Oldenburg,
George Segal,
Jim Dine, and
Edward Kienholz among others were important pioneers of both abstraction and Pop Art; creating new conventions of art-making; they made acceptable in serious contemporary art circles the radical inclusion of unlikely materials as parts of their works of art.
Also during the 1960s and 1970s, there was a reaction against painting. Critics like Douglas Crimp viewed the work of artists like
Ad Reinhardt, and declared the 'death of painting'. Artists began to practice new ways of making art. New movements gained prominence some of which are:
Postminimalism,
Earth art,
Video art,
Installation art,
arte povera,
performance art,
body art,
fluxus,
mail art, the
situationists and
conceptual art among others.
Geometric abstraction, Op Art, Minimalism, Color field
During the 1960s and 1970s abstract painting continued to develop in America through varied styles.
Geometric abstraction, Op art,
hard-edge painting, Color Field painting and
minimal painting, were some interrelated directions for advanced abstract painting as well as some other new movements. Two influential teachers
Josef Albers and
Hans Hofmann introduced a new generation of American artists to their advanced theories of color and space.
Josef Albers is best remembered for his work as an
Geometric abstractionist painter and theorist. Most famous of all are the hundreds of paintings and prints that make up the series ''Homage to the Square.'' In this rigorous series, begun in 1949, Albers explored chromatic interactions with flat colored squares arranged concentrically on the canvas. Albers' theories on art and education were formative for the next generation of artists. His own paintings form the foundation of both
hard-edge painting and Op art.
Josef Albers,
Hans Hofmann,
Ilya Bolotowsky,
Burgoyne Diller,
Victor Vasarely,
Bridget Riley,
Richard Anuszkiewicz,
Frank Stella,
Morris Louis,
Kenneth Noland,
[5] Ellsworth Kelly,
Barnett Newman,
Ronald Davis,
Larry Zox, and
Al Held are artists closely associated with
Geometric abstraction, Op art, Color Field painting, and in the case of Hofmann and Newman Abstract expressionism as well.
Agnes Martin,
Robert Mangold,
Brice Marden,
Jo Baer,
Robert Ryman,
Richard Tuttle, Neil Williams, David Novros, Paul Mogenson, are examples of artists associated with
Minimalism and (exceptions of Martin, Baer and Marden) the use of the
shaped canvas also during the period beginning in the early 1960s. Many
Geometric abstract artists, minimalists, and
Hard-edge painters elected to use the edges of the image to define the shape of the painting rather than accepting the rectangular format. In fact, the use of the
shaped canvas is primarily associated with paintings of the 1960s and 1970s that are coolly abstract, formalistic, geometrical, objective, rationalistic, clean-lined, brashly sharp-edged, or
minimalist in character. The
Bykert Gallery, and the
Park Place Gallery were important showcases for
Minimalism and
shaped canvas painting in New York City during the 1960s.
Italian painter
Giorgio Morandi was an important 20th century, early pioneer of Minimalism. Born in
Bologna, Italy in 1890, throughout his career, Morandi concentrated almost exclusively on still lives and landscapes, except for a few self-portraits. With great sensitivity to tone, color, and compositional balance, he would depict the same familiar bottles and vases again and again in paintings notable for their simplicity of execution. Morandi executed 133 etchings, a significant body of work in its own right, and his drawings and watercolors often approach abstraction in their economy of means. Through his simple and repetitive motifs and economical use of color, value and surface, Morandi became a prescient and important forerunner of
Minimalism. He died in Bologna in 1964.
In 1965, an exhibition called ''The Responsive Eye'', curated by William C. Seitz, was held at the
Museum of Modern Art, in New York City. The works shown were wide ranging, encompassing the[Minimalism of
Frank Stella, the Op art of Larry Poons, the work of
Alexander Liberman, alongside the masters of the Op Art movement:
Victor Vasarely,
Richard Anuszkiewicz,
Bridget Riley and others. The exhibition focused on the perceptual aspects of art, which result both from the illusion of movement and the interaction of color relationships. Op art, also known as optical art, is used to describe some paintings and other works of art which use
optical illusions. Op art is also closely akin to
geometric abstraction and
hard-edge painting. Although sometimes the term used for it is perceptual abstraction.
Op art is a method of painting concerning the interaction between illusion and picture plane, between understanding and seeing.
[6] Op art works are abstract, with many of the better known pieces made in only black and white. When the viewer looks at them, the impression is given of movement, hidden images, flashing and vibration, patterns, or alternatively, of swelling or warping.
Shaped canvas, Washington Color School, Abstract Illusionism, Lyrical Abstraction
Color Field painting clearly pointed toward a new direction in American painting, away from
abstract expressionism. Color Field painting is related to
Post-painterly abstraction,
Suprematism, Abstract Expressionism,
Hard-edge painting and
Lyrical Abstraction.
Color Field painting sought to rid art of superflous rhetoric. Artists like
Clyfford Still,
Mark Rothko,
Hans Hofmann,
Morris Louis,
Jules Olitski,
Kenneth Noland,
Helen Frankenthaler,
Larry Zox, and others often used greatly reduced references to nature, and they painted with a highly articulated and psychological use of color. In general these artists eliminated recognizable imagery. Certain artists quoted references to past or present art, but in general color field painting presents abstraction as an end in itself. In pursuing this direction of
modern art, artists wanted to present each painting as one unified, cohesive, monolithic image.
Frank Stella,
Kenneth Noland,
Ellsworth Kelly,
Barnett Newman,
Ronald Davis, Neil Williams,
Robert Mangold, Charles Hinman,
Richard Tuttle, David Novros, and Al Loving are examples of artists associated with the use of the
shaped canvas during the period beginning in the early 1960s. Many
Geometric abstract artists,
minimalists, and
Hard-edge painters elected to use the edges of the image to define the shape of the painting rather than accepting the rectangular format. In fact, the use of the
shaped canvas is primarily associated with paintings of the 1960s and 1970s that are coolly abstract, formalistic, geometrical, objective, rationalistic, clean-lined, brashly sharp-edged, or
minimalist in character. The Andre Emmerich Gallery, the
Leo Castelli Gallery, the Richard Feigen Gallery, and the
Park Place Gallery were important showcases for Color Field painting,
shaped canvas painting and
Lyrical Abstraction in New York City during the 1960s. There is a connection with
post-painterly abstraction, which reacted against abstract expressionisms' mysticism, hyper-subjectivity, and emphasis on making the act of painting itself dramatically visible - as well as the solemn acceptance of the flat rectangle as an almost ritual prerequisite for serious painting. During the 1960s Color Field painting and
Minimal art were often closely associated with each other. In actuality by the early 1970s both movements became decidedly diverse.
Another related movement of the late 1960s
Lyrical Abstraction is a term that was originally coined by Larry Aldrich (the founder of the
Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, Ridgefield Connecticut) in 1969 to describe what Aldrich said he saw in the studios of many artists at that time.
[7] It is also the name of an exhibition that originated in the Aldrich Museum and traveled to the
Whitney Museum of American Art and other museums throughout the United States between 1969 and 1971.
[8]
Lyrical Abstraction along with the
Fluxus movement and
Postminimalism (a term first coined by Robert Pincus-Witten in the pages of
Artforum in 1969)
[9] sought to expand the boundaries of abstract painting and Minimalism by focusing on process, new materials and new ways of expression. Postminimalism often incorporating industrial materials, raw materials, fabrications, found objects, installation, serial repetition, and often with references to Dada and Surrealism is best exemplified in the sculptures of
Eva Hesse.
[9] Lyrical Abstraction,
Conceptual Art,
Postminimalism,
Earth Art,
Video,
Performance art,
Installation art, along with the continuation of
Fluxus, Abstract Expressionism, Color Field painting,
Hard-edge painting,
Minimal Art, Op art, Pop art,
Photorealism and
New Realism extended the boundaries of
Contemporary Art in the mid-1960s through the 1970s.
[11] Lyrical Abstraction is a type of freewheeling abstract painting that emerged in the mid-1960s when abstract painters returned to various forms of painterly, pictorial, expressionism with a predominate focus on process, gestalt and repetitive compositional strategies in general.
Lyrical Abstraction shares similarities with Color Field painting and Abstract Expressionism especially in the freewheeling usage of paint - texture and surface. Direct drawing, calligraphic use of line, the effects of brushed, splattered, stained, squeegeed, poured, and splashed paint superficially resemble the effects seen in Abstract Expressionism and Color Field painting. However the styles are markedly different. Setting it apart from Abstract Expressionism and Action Painting of the 1940s and 1950s is the approach to composition and drama. As seen in Action Painting there is an emphasis on brushstrokes, high compositional drama, dynamic compositional tension. While in Lyrical Abstraction there is a sense of compositional randomness, all over composition, low key and relaxed compositional drama and an emphasis on process, repetition, and an all over sensibility.
During the 1960s and 1970s artists as powerful and influential as
Robert Motherwell,
Adolph Gottlieb,
Phillip Guston,
Lee Krasner,
Cy Twombly,
Robert Rauschenberg,
Jasper Johns,
Richard Diebenkorn,
Josef Albers,
Elmer Bischoff,
Agnes Martin,
Al Held,
Sam Francis,
Ellsworth Kelly,
Morris Louis,
Helen Frankenthaler,
Gene Davis,
Frank Stella,
Kenneth Noland,
Joan Mitchell,
Friedel Dzubas, and younger artists like
Brice Marden,
Robert Mangold,
Sam Gilliam,
Sean Scully,
Pat Steir,
Elizabeth Murray,
Larry Poons,
Walter Darby Bannard,
Larry Zox,
Ronnie Landfield,
Ronald Davis,
Dan Christensen, Joan Snyder,
Ross Bleckner,
Archie Rand,
Susan Crile, and dozens of others produced vital and influential paintings.
Neo-expressionism
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, there was also a return to painting that occurred almost simultaneously in
Italy, Germany, France and
Britain. These movements were called
Transavantguardia,
Neue Wilde,
Figuration Libre,
Neo-expressionism and the
School of London respectively. These painting were characterized by large formats, free expressive mark making, figuration, myth and imagination. All work in this genre came to be labeled
neo-expressionism. Critical reaction was divided. Some critics regarded it as driven by profit motivations by large commercial galleries. This type of art continues in popularity into the 21st century, even after the art crash of the late 1980s.
Neo-expressionism was a style of
modern painting that became popular in the late 1970s and dominated the art market until the mid-1980s. It developed in Europe as a reaction against the conceptual and
minimalistic art of the 1960s and 1970s. Neo-expressionists returned to portraying recognizable objects, such as the human body (although sometimes in a virtually abstract manner), in a rough and violently emotional way using vivid colours and banal colour harmonies. The veteran painters
Philip Guston,
Frank Auerbach,
Leon Kossoff,
Gerhard Richter, and
Georg Baselitz, along with slightly younger artists like
Anselm Kiefer,
Eric Fischl,
Susan Rothenberg,
Francesco Clemente,
Damien Hirst,
Jean-Michel Basquiat,
Julian Schnabel,
Keith Haring, and many others became known for working in this intense expressionist vein of painting.
Painting still holds a respected position in
contemporary art. Art is an open field no longer divided by the objective versus non-objective dichotomy. Artists can achieve critical success whether their images are representational or abstract. What has currency is content, exploring the boundaries of the medium, and a refusal to recapitulate the works of the past as an end goal.
Contemporary painting into the 21st century
Main articles: Contemporary art,
Postmodern art,
Modernism
At the beginning of the 21st century Contemporary painting and Contemporary art in general continues in several contigious modes, characterized by the idea of
pluralism. The "crisis" in painting and current art and current
art criticism today is brought about by
pluralism. There is no consensus as to a representative style of the age. There is an ''anything goes'' attitude that prevails; an "everything going on", and consequently "nothing going on" syndrome; except for an aesthetic traffic jam, with no firm and clear direction, with every lane on the artistic
superhighway filled to capacity. Consequently magnificent and important works of art continue to be made albeit in a wide variety of styles.
Hard-edge painting,
Geometric abstraction,
Hyperrealism,
Photorealism,
Expressionism,
Minimalism,
Lyrical Abstraction, Pop art, Op art, Abstract Expressionism, Color Field painting,
Monochrome painting,
Neo-expressionism,
Collage,
Intermedia painting,
Assemblage painting,
Computer art painting,
Postmodern painting, Neo-Dada painting,
Shaped canvas painting, environmental
mural painting,
Graffiti, traditional
figure painting,
Landscape painting,
Portrait painting, are a few continuing and current directions in painting at the beginning of the 21st century.
References
1. http://www.art-and-archaeology.com/roman/painting.html
2. http://www.accd.edu/sac/vat/arthistory/arts1303/Rome4.htm
3. Jackson, Catherine Charlotte, Lady, ''The Court of France in the Sixteenth Century: 1514-1559'', 1896, p.113. "At about this time [speaking of the painter Raphael] only, movable pictures, to be hung on walls as ornaments, began to be in frequent demand. It is considered doubtful whether before the sixteenth century any such existed. For what would now be termed the easel pictures of the older masters have been detached from some articles of civil or ecclesiastical furniture."
4. Topics in American Art since 1945, ''Pop art the words'', p.119-122, by Lawrence Alloway, copyright 1975 by W.W.Norton and Company, NYC ISBN 0-393-04401-7
5. Terry Fenton, online essay about Kenneth Noland, and acrylic paint, [1] accessed April 30, 2007
6. John Lancaster. ''Introducing Op Art'', London: BT Batsford Ltd, 1973, p. 28.
7. Aldrich, Larry. Young Lyrical Painters, Art in America, v.57, n6, November-December 1969, pp.104-113.
8. Lyrical Abstraction, Exhibition Catalogue, the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, Conn. 1970.
9. ''Movers and Shakers, New York'', "Leaving C&M", by Sarah Douglas, Art and Auction, March 2007, V.XXXNo7.
10. ''Movers and Shakers, New York'', "Leaving C&M", by Sarah Douglas, Art and Auction, March 2007, V.XXXNo7.
11. Martin, Ann Ray, and Howard Junker. The New Art: It's Way, Way Out, Newsweek 29 July 1968: pp.3,55-63.
Outline of painting history
Prehistoric painting
★
Pre-historic art
★
Cave painting
Ancient painting
★
Art of Ancient Egypt
★
Knossos
★
Mycenaean Greece
★
Pottery of ancient Greece
★
Roman art
★
Pompeian Styles
★
Fayum mummy portraits
Western painting
Medieval painting
★
Byzantine art
★
Insular art
★
Carolingian art
★
Ottonian art
★
Romanesque art
★
Gothic art
★
Early Netherlandish painting
★
Illuminated manuscript
★
Panel painting
The Renaissance
★
Early Renaissance painting
★
Renaissance Classicism
★
Italian Renaissance painting
★
Northern European Renaissance painting
★
High Renaissance painting
★
Mannerism
Baroque
★
Baroque art
★
Dutch Golden Age painting
★
Spanish Golden Age
★
French Baroque and Classicism
18th century
★
Rococo
★
Neoclassicism
19th century
★
Romanticism
★
Academic art
★
Realism
★
Naturalism (art)
★
Hudson River School
★
Luminism
★
Impressionism
★
Pre-Raphaelites
★
Symbolism
★
Post-Impressionism
★
Neo-Impressionism
★
Pointillism
★
Divisionism
★
Art Nouveau
20th century
This list is in random order. Date given is for the start of the style or movement.
★
Fauvism (Les Fauves) 1905
★
Cubism 1907
★
Jack of Diamonds 1910
★
Orphism
★
Dada
★
Surrealism
★
Geometric abstraction
★
Rayonnism
★
Neoplasticism
★
Expressionism
★
Abstract art
★
Abstract expressionism 1946
★
Post-painterly abstraction 1964
★
Neo-expressionism
★
Art Deco
★
Futurism 1909
★
Op art
★
Pop art
★
Minimalism
★
Art Brut /
Folk Art /
Naïve Art /
Outsider Art
★
Suprematism 1913
★
Vorticism 1914
★
Tachism
★
Constructivism
★
Russian avant-garde
★
De Stijl
★
Neue Sachlichkeit
★
American realism
★
Social Realism
★
Socialist realism
★
Action painting
★
Lyrical Abstraction 1967
★
Monochrome painting
★
Russian Non-Conformist
★
Photorealism
★
Concept art
★
Neue Wilde
★
Figuration Libre
★
Graffiti
★
Stuckism 1999
See also
★
Painting
★
History of art
★
History of painting
★
Art periods
★
List of painters
★
Hierarchy of genres
★
Early Renaissance painting
★
Self portrait
★
Annunciation (van Eyck, Washington)
Sources
★
Clement Greenberg, ''Art and Culture,'' Beacon Press, 1961
★ ''The Triumph of
Modernism'': The Art World, 1985-2005,
Hilton Kramer, 2006, ISBN 0 1-56663-708
★ ''Pictures of Nothing: Abstract Art since Pollock'' (A.W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts),
Kirk Varnedoe, 2003
★ O'Connor, Francis V. ''
Jackson Pollock'' Exhibition Catalogue, (New York,
Museum of Modern Art, [1967]) OCLC 165852
★ ''
Lyrical Abstraction'', Exhibition Catalogue,
Whitney Museum of American Art, NYC, 1971.
References
1. http://www.art-and-archaeology.com/roman/painting.html
2. http://www.accd.edu/sac/vat/arthistory/arts1303/Rome4.htm
3. Jackson, Catherine Charlotte, Lady, ''The Court of France in the Sixteenth Century: 1514-1559'', 1896, p.113. "At about this time [speaking of the painter Raphael] only, movable pictures, to be hung on walls as ornaments, began to be in frequent demand. It is considered doubtful whether before the sixteenth century any such existed. For what would now be termed the easel pictures of the older masters have been detached from some articles of civil or ecclesiastical furniture."
4. Topics in American Art since 1945, ''Pop art the words'', p.119-122, by Lawrence Alloway, copyright 1975 by W.W.Norton and Company, NYC ISBN 0-393-04401-7
5. Terry Fenton, online essay about Kenneth Noland, and acrylic paint, [1] accessed April 30, 2007
6. John Lancaster. ''Introducing Op Art'', London: BT Batsford Ltd, 1973, p. 28.
7. Aldrich, Larry. Young Lyrical Painters, Art in America, v.57, n6, November-December 1969, pp.104-113.
8. Lyrical Abstraction, Exhibition Catalogue, the Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, Conn. 1970.
9. ''Movers and Shakers, New York'', "Leaving C&M", by Sarah Douglas, Art and Auction, March 2007, V.XXXNo7.
10. ''Movers and Shakers, New York'', "Leaving C&M", by Sarah Douglas, Art and Auction, March 2007, V.XXXNo7.
11. Martin, Ann Ray, and Howard Junker. The New Art: It's Way, Way Out, Newsweek 29 July 1968: pp.3,55-63.
External links
★
History of Painting
★
History of Art: From Paleolithic Age to Contemporary Art
★
Robert Hughes from Artchive
★
[2] Kandinsky Concerning the Spiritual in Art, accessed online
May 28,
2007
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