The critical literature of abstract expressionism Item Type text; Thesis-Reproduction (electronic) Authors Whittaker, Larry, 1941- Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 30/09/2021 18:02:30 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/317997 THE CRITICAL LITERATURE OE ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM by Larry Whittaker A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the DEPARTMENT OE- ART In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS in the History of Art .In the Graduate College THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA 19 6? STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This thesis has been submitted, in partial fulfill­ ment of requirements.for an advanced.degree at The Univer­ sity of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the Library. Brief quotations from this thesis are allowable without special permission, provided that accurate acknowledgement of source is made. Requests for permis­ sion for extended quotation from or reproduction of '.this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the head of the major department or the Dean of the Graduate College when in his judgment the proposed use of the material is- in the interests of scholarship. In all other instances, however, permission must be obtained from the author. • SIGNED: APPROVAL BY THESIS DIRECTOR This thesis has been approved on the date shown below: SHELDON REICH Professor of Art History TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABS TRACToeooooooeooooooooeoo eo IV I INTRODUCTION ...... .. 1 II FORMAL HISTORICISM VERSUS REVOLUTIONISM .... 13 III REACTIONS TO ACADEMIZATION, DECLINE, AND NEW" ART 00900000.0OO.o'.00.0000 31 IV SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION o , . S4 APBENDIY 000000.00.00.000000 000 03 SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY o... .... o. 95 iii ABSTRACT This thesis ■ examines the art criticism which emerged in support of a new painting.style,Abstract Expressionism, in America during the forties and fifties. This criticism broke with prevailing standards of objec­ tivity to provide partisan support for Abstract Expres­ sionism. •However, the critical literature comprised two diametrically opposed philosophies. Clement Greenberg, who may be taken as representative of one concept, concentrated upon analyzing the formal qualities of the painting. More­ over, he insisted upon the close relation of the new American movement to preceding modern art. Harold Rosenberg, who provided the most important counte.rconcept to the historicist-formal philosophy felt an obligation to interpret the content of the work of art in psychological and social terms. He also believed that Abstract Expressionism embodied certain innovations which set it apart from pre­ vious modern art. As Abstract Expressionism went through a period of change during the late fifties, the accuracy of each philosophy was revealed. Critics who shared Greenberg’s viewpoint believed that the artists’ activ­ ities fostered academism, and they championed new art. Rosenberg and his supporters, by contrast, held Abstract Expressionism, to be the last serious moment in art „ Herein, they established a critical principle which, being conceptual, rather than visual, emerges as inflexible and contradictory <, I INTRODUCTION This thesis represents an effort to identify, class­ ify, and evaluate the dominant trends in critical writing pertinent to the recent American painting style, Abstract Expressionism. It will be demonstrated that such writing falls naturally into two categories, designated herein as histori'Cist-formal and revolutionist. These philosophies may be exemplified by the criticism of Clement Greenberg and Harold Rosenberg, who emerged as the leading critics of the movement. In this discussion, the historicist-formal method, as represented by Greenberg, will be proved the more instructive and less contradictory view of Abstract Expressionism. Such considerations as which painters can properly be called Abstract Expressionists, what stylistic quali­ ties their paintings share, and whether the movement should be known by a different title are still at issue. It is not the-purpose of this study to answer these par­ ticular questions. However, since consistent terminology is essential in discussing the critical aspect of this' period, certain assumptions must be made in order to pro­ vide a basis for commentary. 1 2 Abstract Expressionism is used here to refer to a style of painting which a small number of artists in New York evolved during and immediately after . World War II„ During the decade between 1950 and i960, Abstract Expres­ sionism became dominant in American painting and subse­ quently was accepted internationally. The term itself was first used in relation to American painting in 1946 by - - t_ Robert Coates, art critic for the New Yorker magazine. It is by no means a popular designation among the artists it identifies or the critics who supported them. However, Abstract Expressionism is at present the best-known title and, if the misleading or pejorative labels appended to past styles in art are any indication/ the most likely to 2 endure. The major artists who are usually considered Abstract Expressionists are Hans Hofmann, Arshile Gorky, Willem de Kooning, William Baziotes, Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell, Adolph Gottlieb, Mark Rothko, Clyfford 1, See "The Art Galleries," New Yorker, March 30, 1946, p, 75, 2, The term New York School derives from an exhibition of that name held at the Frank Peris Gallery in Los Angeles in 1951 and for the purposes of this essay may be considered synonymous with Abstract Expressionism, Action painting refers to a personal inter­ pretation of the style and thus cannot be employed inter­ changeably with the other categorizations. The concept of Action Painting will be considered in detail below, pp. 29-32, 3 Still, and Barnett Newman. Somewhat later, but also a part of the group, are Franz Kline, Philip Guston, and Jack Tworkov. This list is not complete; some important artists who came to prominence late in the development of the movement have been omitted. Also missing are artists who figured at an early date, but not prominently, and others who figured only peripherally. The painters listed have in common the fact that they were dominant in the critical literature which supported Abstract Expressionism from its beginning until its decline. With these broad definitions established, the emergence of the new painting and criticism from the milieu of American art in general may be observed. Prior to the popular acceptance of Abstract Expressionism a- variety of styles and influences comprised the art world of this country, and the critical apparatus was corres­ pondingly objective and catholic. The magic realism of ■Andrew Wyeth, the geometric purism of Burgoyne Biller, and the landscape abstractions of Karl Knaths exemplify only a i part of the variety which then existed in American paint­ ing. Such work continued to share most of the pictorial and literary space of Art News and Art Digest with that of the modern European masters and their Surrealist and School of Paris successors throughout the forties. 4 Museum officials conceived of their function as primarily educational and endeavored to bring before the public as wide a selection of styles as possible. As late as 1949, the Museum of Modern Art’s Alfred H. Barr Jr. still held this opinion: T,I do not think there is a single well-marked trend or direction in American art today „ . .freedom of choice among many styles I believe to be a good, not a bad thing.In the same article, Lloyd Goodrich of the Whitney Museum gave his affirmation to Sir Herbert Read’s contention that both abstract and representa­ tional art may be practiced simultaneously — even by the same artist — with equal validity.^ There is no better way to gain an overall .impres­ sion of the art criticism of the period than to survey the ’’box score of the critics” columns published in every issue of Art News until early 1950. .Arranged for compara­ tive purposes, these columns present diverse opinions on important new shows in New York by such leading newspaper critics as Howard Devree and Edward A. Jewell of the Times, Henry McBride of the Sun, and Emily Gqnauer of the World Telegramo The tone of these reviews, as one scans through them, whether criticizing Henry Varnum Poor, Josef Albers, . 3 o ”A Symposium: The State of American Art,” Magazine of Art, XLII (February, 1949), 85. 4. Ibid., p. 91«. or Salvador Dali, invariably leaves an impression of toler ance and restraint. In the eyes o f an English observer, Denys Sutton, the audience for contemporary art in New York in the late forties consisted of a small coterie centered around the Museum of Modern Art,, which assumed the attributes of a club or secret society. A converse evaluation of the Museum of Modern Art by an American critic writing at .approximately the same time pictured it as an authorita­ tive index of prevailing taste, reflected by sales in the fashionable 57th Street Galleries.^ What' sold best was Erench modernism; because of its "official" position in the museums, galleries, and. the eyes of collectors of contemporary art, the School of Paris continued to flourish well into the early fifties 7 ' out of proportion to its creative vigor. Yet the task of winning approval for modern European painting undertaken by the Modern Museum and by the progressive galleries did a positive.service to the young New York painters who were 5« "The Challenge of American Art," Horizon (London), XX-(October, 1949), 278. 6. Clement Greenberg, "The Present Prospects of American Painting and Sculpture," Horizon (London), XVI (October, 1947), 28. 7 o See Hilton Kramer, "The New American Painting, Partisan Review, XX (July-August, 1953), 421.