Displaying items by tag: abstract expressionism

The estate of Jackson Pollock’s lover, the artist Ruth Kligman, has renewed efforts to authenticate and sell a painting in its possession that it believes is a genuine creation of the late, great abstract painter. Armed with new forensic research, trustees have started showing the work to invited curators, collectors, scholars and artists.

This November, Christie’s will present an unrivalled selection of paintings and sculpture by some of the titans of twentieth century art. From Andy Warhol’s opulent Four Marilyns to Cy Twombly’s sublime Untitled, and Louise Bourgeois’ monumental Spider to Lucian Freud’s magnificent portrait The Brigadier –the very best examples of Pop, Minimalism, Abstract Expressionism and Conceptual Art are represented. The role of the collector is also honored, with a selection of Pop works from the Miles and Shirley Fiterman Collection, works of Arte Povera from the Collection of Ileana Sonnabend and the Estate of Nina Sundell, and an impressive grouping of works by Alexander Calder from the Arthur and Anita Kahn Collection.

Another veteran of the McKee, Philip Guston, joined in 1974, when his shift from Abstract Expressionist to figurative canvases, filled with bean-shaped heads, rogue limbs and light bulbs, was controversial. David and Renée McKee helped steer a reappraisal of Guston’s late work — now revered by artists and critics — after his death in 1980.

News of the gallery’s closing brought out a rush of suitors courting the Guston estate, which has just selected Hauser & Wirth to handle its representation worldwide.

The Denver Art Museum (DAM) announced today that it will have a major exhibition about female Abstract Expressionists in summer 2016. Titled “Women of Abstract Expressionism,” the show will feature more than 50 works by 12 artists. Following its run at the DAM, the show will travel to the Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the Palm Springs Art Museum in California.

Abstract Expressionism has long been defined by its male adherents—including Jackson Pollock, Clyfford Still, Franz Kline, and Barnett Newman, among others—whose fame greatly exceeds the women in the movement.

A century after his birth, on Jan. 24, 1915, Robert Motherwell occupies a middle rung on the reputation ladder of Abstract Expressionists. The names Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning, Barnett Newman, Clyfford Still and possibly others would now come sooner to many people’s minds on the topic.

But through the long arc and productive prime of his career, Motherwell was as important as anyone in shaping the transformative artistic mode of the mid-20th century.

Robert Motherwell, a major figure of the New York School best known for his eloquent abstract works, is being honored with a centennial celebration in Provincetown, Massachusetts. Hosted by the Fine Arts Work Center and the Provincetown Art Association Museum, in conjunction...

To continue reading about the Robert Motherwell centennial celebration, visit InCollect.com.

On May 7, 2015, New York’s Hollis Taggart Galleries will present the exhibition Audrey Flack, the Abstract Expression Years. Flack, a renowned painter and sculptor, is widely known as a pioneer of Photo Realism, but her beginnings in the vibrant downtown scene that gave rise to Abstract Expressionism are less documented. The show at Hollis Taggart Galleries marks the first time that Flack’s rare Abstract Expressionist works have been on view as a cohesive group.

A regular at the Eighth Street Artist’s Club and the legendary Cedar Tavern, Flack participated in the constant exchange of ideas and philosophies that dominated conversation at both haunts...

To continue reading this article about Audrey Flack's Abstract Expressionist Paintings at Hollis Taggart Galleries, visit InCollect.com.

Jackson Pollock, the master of Abstract Expressionism, reached an endgame with his groundbreaking drip paintings in 1950, and then experimented with a new technique, akin to drawing, of pouring thinned black enamel onto unprimed cotton duck.

“The power of Pollock’s allover drip paintings from 1947 to 1950 is so all-commanding that they’ve forced a blind spot in our ability to look at other aspects of the artist’s genius,” said Gavin Delahunty, senior curator of contemporary art at the Dallas Museum of Art. He began researching Pollock’s “black pourings,” made from 1951 to 1953, after conversations with artists including Wade Guyton, Jacqueline Humphries and Julie Mehretu, who discussed their influence.

Alchemy, a large-scale, sumptuously-textured painting by the Abstract Expressionist Jackson Pollock has returned to the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice after undergoing an extensive conservation. The work, one of Pollock’s earliest poured paintings, traveled to Florence’s Opificio delle Pietre Dure (Hard Stone Factory), where it underwent an analytical study, cleaning, and conservation. The painting’s surface, which features dense layers of enamel, alkyd, oil paint, twine, sand, and pebbles, had been dulled by dirt and grime that had accumulated over the years.

For the duration of the exhibition, Alchemy by Jackson Pollock: Discovering the Artist at Work, the painting is being presented without glass or plexiglas, providing an unprecedented look at the restored work’s astonishly vivid colors and sculptural surface. Visitors are guided through every technical aspect of the conservation process thanks to a multimedia installation that features video, 3D reproductions, touch-screens, interactive devices, and documentation and original items loaned from Pollock’s studio at the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center in Long Island.

London’s Royal Academy of Arts announced that it will present the first survey of California modernist Richard Diebenkorn’s figurative and abstract works to a UK audience in nearly twenty-five years. Diebenkorn, who rose to fame as the west coast ambassador of Abstract Expressionism, and later, helped establish the Bay Area Figurative movement, oscillated between abstract and representational painting during his sixty-plus-year career. Today, he is widely recognized as one of the most influential American artists of the post-war era. 

“Richard Diebenkorn” explores the three distinct phases of Diebenkorn’s career, beginning in the early 1950s, when Abstract Expressionism was gaining traction in New York.