Abstract Expressionism

Overview

In New York during and after the Second World War, a loose group of painters developed the first American movement to gain international influence. Jackson Pollock laid his canvases on the floor and dripped and poured paint across them, making the act of painting itself the subject.

Others, including Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman, worked with large fields of color intended to envelop the viewer and prompt contemplation. The scale of the work and its emphasis on the individual artist helped shift the center of the art world from Paris to New York.

What defines it

• Very large canvases without a central focus
• Gestural "action painting" or broad fields of color
• Abstraction as a vehicle for emotion and the subconscious

Works to know

• Autumn Rhythm (Number 30) Jackson Pollock · 1950 · The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
• Vir Heroicus Sublimis Barnett Newman · 1950–51 · Museum of Modern Art, New York
• Woman I Willem de Kooning · 1950–52 · Museum of Modern Art, New York
• No. 61 (Rust and Blue) Mark Rothko · 1953 · Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles