Abstract Expressionism

抽象表現主義 / 1940s–1950s / Style / Postwar American Art

Leaves the act of painting and intense inner feeling on vast canvases — bodily strokes, drips, stains, broad fields — rather than depicted subjects.

Vast canvases / Bodily brushwork / All-over composition / Drips and stains

ポロックのアトリエの床(CC BY-SA 4.0)ポロックのアトリエ納屋(CC BY-SA 3.0)

Dictionary entry

Best used for
Comparing primary sources and canonical works · Extracting principles that transfer to other media
Type
Observe the letters, signs and scale of reference works
Composition
Extract the one structure that governs gaze and information
Material
Verify the materials and behaviors specific to era, region and process
Caution
Not just flung paint. Read each artist's method, postwar politics, the relation of scale to body.
Further study
Lee Krasner / Jackson Pollock / Norman Lewis / Willem de Kooning

Related entries

Source: MoMA — Abstract Expressionism

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