Abstract Expressionism Essay

Though, throughout this time period, “the great majority of Americans disliked or even despised modern art,” it was an essential art movement in the 1950s and 1960s, and the “CIA fostered and promoted American Abstract Expressionist painting around the world for more than 20 years,” creating a meaningful impact on the outcome of the Cold War (Saunders). “Abstract Expressionism stood for, above all else,

The largest downfall in the lives a century ago was the spanish flu that started during the november of 1918. It infected one in every five people of u.s during the calamity and took the lives of 675,000 people, close to 10 times as many lives as from ww1, leaving a deep wound on to the history of U.S. the next difficulties faced by the people of U.S was their work difficulties. 85% of adult men were working for labors in many factories for an average of 55 hours a week. And they were not working in good A.C conditions. Instead their fatality rate at work was 30 times higher than present day. And you would think that they would get a bad for it right? Indeed they did get a bad pay for it. They had to spend half of their pay for feeding themselves.yeah. It was not good. Now unlike men who had to work hard, women were treated differently coz women.. Working… let's move on…. Ok im not being a feminist. Contrary to popular belief, i treat women and men equally.. Coz i beat people no matter their what their gender is. Next up is Art…. the tool to find yourself and lose yourself at the same time. Now there is only one thing i want to talk about in art and that is the rise in expressionism, or like I call it, the start of a disaster.*rage*. If there is one thing the future generation will make fun of, it is the fact that people buy these. Let's get to the conclusion before i kill all the expressionists in the world*tear the paper.*. In

It has been argued that the German expressionist movement has had an influence on many later filmmakers and genres. I agree with this argument and in this essay I will be explaining why I believe this to be the case by discussing the common traits of expressionism and applying them to later films and genres.

In turn, the Expressionist movement was influenced by Post-Impressionism, continuing the reaction against Impressionism and academic art. Expressionist paintings come from within the artist, inspired by the Post-Impressionist distortion of images in order to portray soul and emotion, and in contrast to the Impressionist desire to portray the world external. Quality in Expressionism is not judged so much on composition as it is on the ability to convey artist anxiety about the world (TheArtStory.org, n.d., para. 3-4). Additional reaction against Impressionism's portrayal of modern life is Expressionism's criticisms of social treatment of the exploited individual. Portrayed are the vulnerable, alienated in their own society by the very middle class that Impressionist painting makes look like as "typical people", as if the lower class does not even

The Federal Art Project was part of President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal during the Great Depression in 1929 through 1943. One of the great programs of the FAP was established by nearly 100 community art centers that provided art classes for children and new artists. Having made previous attempts such as ‘Public Works of Art Project’ which lasted from 1933-1934, Roosevelt was inspired to create the Works Progress Administration. During the mid 1930s, the US had still been at the center of the Great Depression, with an effort to give people economic relief, Franklin Delano Roosevelt established the Works Progress Administration, which was created under Federal Project One. The Federal Art Project was designed to enhance the incomes of artists’ and fund patriotic art projects to try and rally disheartened Americans.

n reflecting on this week’s readings, I can see the connection between the previous readings on the Harlem Renaissance and the one on Abstract Expressionism, especially as it relates to art being used for social change. Just as our society was moving at a fast pace, so was our art. Looking back, it’s amazing to see how racism, women’s rights and war brought on so many different attitudes and the art of the 20th century represented these different ideas. As it relates to war, many people were concerned about the dangers of democracy, while others emphasized patriotism. In either case, you can see a split between people’s perceptions and beliefs. It’s clear that most of the artist of the 20th century that we discussed were always on the cutting edge toward cultural change. Their shocking and innovative techniques reflected the changing values that represented a forever changing society; and often times their art helped shaped our culture, and at the same time, reflected that culture back on to us. From all the different art movements discussed during this course, this week’s readings represents the changing role they art is beginning to play in the political area. I believe that art plays a vital role in democracy, by creating openness and the freedom of expression. It’s amazing how art, be that it through a painting, literature, sculpting or through music can bring about change. Art really makes an impact on our culture and society, from instilling values or by changing opinions. It seems at the heart of every major change throughout our history, you will find an artist that created that change through his or her works. We form our ideas by seeing,

Gottlieb and Rothko were inspired by primitive and archaic art, but removed any symbols from their original context, making their connotations inaccessible to the general public. The viewer could not tell what these symbols meant to the artist by simply viewing the painting, but this was perhaps not their intention. The artists themselves viewed their work as a `poetic expression of the essence of the myth.' (Page 10, David and Cecil) Primitive mythology often inspired the Abstract Expressionist's painting, including

Many of the Avante Garde contemporary art were either laughed about in cartoon strips, puzzled viewers or made them angry. The American people felt the European art often relished by wealthy art connoisseurs was a step backward in American culture. Moreover, several Americans found the primitive, distorted imagery threatening to American civilization and the United States progress. Also many American’s were afraid the art form itself represented an adaptation to modern society.

As Nazi’s army occupies cities and countries all over the Europe, Paris was inevitably erupted and ruined by the pervasion of Fascism. Many influential European avant-garde artists such as Duchamp and Matisse either immigrated or traveled to the United States of America in order to take a break from the European social disorders. Paris was no longer the symbol represents freedom and liberty, so the artists were actively seeking a new location to express their thoughts and to create contemporary artworks without any constraints. These artists and their works were officially exhibited in the Armory Show. The exhibition introduced American with Impressionism, Fauvism, Cubism, and Dadaism, which opens the possibilities of the American Modernity.

American Regionalism art was made during the 1930’s and 40’s. The movement coincided with the Great Depression (1929-1939), with the height of popularity from 1930-35. Artists involved were from the rural Midwest & South and used local traditions, farm landscapes, American values, & realistic images as inspiration. Opposite of the style represented by abstract expressionists/post modernists.The artists rejected European Avant-garde by embracing a more realist style of art. The art is representative of the strength of the people by showing the Country and its roots of farming. The movement eventually ended in the 1940’s as Abstract began to expand in popularity.

During the 1870s a new category of art formed known as the Aesthetic Movement, which was based upon not what world was around the art, but the art itself (Pohl 284). The movement originated in England and spread throughout the Americas opposing the current views about art during the time this movement arose, which was the ideology that art must always serve some sort of clandestine purpose. Artists who supported the Aesthetic Movement also denied any moral values that people gave to art. The painting that I chose that best fits the ideals of aestheticism is In the Studio, 1880 by William Merritt Chase. During the 19th century industrialization rapidly began to change American culture bringing on consumerism and capitalism, which focused

The 1920’s became an iconic era in the world of art as it was a generation that revolutionized the way art was defined all over the artistic and expressive world. The artistic elements of the Dada and Cubist movements were combined and manipulated to form and create the Surrealist movement, which was primarily rejected as an art movement due to its abnormality and synthetic representation, but its iconic ideas and unique techniques paved the way for a new form of art where artists developed a new, appalling and unique style of their own.

The abstract expressionist movement, with artists such as Mark Rothko and Bernat Newman were articulating a response to an apocalyptic era in which selfhood, not to mention art, was dwarfed by the enormity of manifold historical cataclysm including the Great Depression, the Second World War and the mass tension of the Cold War. Clyfford Still, on the other hand objective was not to express the relationship between the past, the individual or the organic life force embodied by the art, but his answer was to “internalize the awful forces outside” until despair and revelation occurred. It is through Clifford Still’s development of jagged, vertical forms, which he sets against vast reaches of space, and the tiny bits or threads of color tracing through great vaults of color in his painting evoke a greater natural force that operates within the inner self.

During the period of Abstract Expressionism, many of the artists were starting their works of art after World War ll. This started around the 1950s and it was a major point in time for the American artists. During this time, artists interpreted their own way how they viewed European art and made a type of new genre into the American art world. Jackson Pollock, “Two Statements” interprets that during this time, it was not about how the viewer was supposed to see what the art, “looked like” but to feel how the paintings moved with the colors, lines, and space. Abstract Expressionism was a movement for artists to show their works of how they interpreted the way a painting should represent itself as shown by the artwork, “Number 1, 1950” from Pollock.

German Expressionism is an art movement that began and thrived during the beginning of the twentieth century. Expressionism, as it suggests, expresses an emphasis on emotional subject matter. These emotions are conveyed in Expressionist art through thematic context, and also by the use of technique and medium. German Expressionist artists strayed far from the academic influences that were being taught in art schools during this time. They thought of new techniques to create expressive art. Two of the famous art associations that were fundamental to Expressionism were Die Brücke and Der Blaue Reiter. One group focused on the idea of placement and form, while the other focused on the idea of psychological emotions.