Pollock, Rothko, de Kooning and others are the bad boys of abstraction.  Sometimes their cultural mileu of hard-drinking, smoking, angst-ridden New York painting seems centuries away.  Abstract Expressionism and the American Experience by Irving Sandler brings clarity into the sometimes confusing scene.

This is a beautiful volume. Each chapter is an essay on a different historical aspect of abstract expressionism, including field and gesture painting and the influence of mythic metaphors and WW2. I enjoyed the clarity of Sandler's observations over more than 50 years of direct cultural experience of the times-- he was born in 1925. Though younger than many of the painters, he was there.  His voice has a resonant authenticity that is far deeper than the art-speak of more recent criticism.

The book contains many gems. Motherwell describes the advantages of Pollock's horizontal, easel-free painting style, a revelation providing insight into the hidden deliberation of the drip paintings.  Gesture paintings were inspired by the improvisations of jazz.

Sandler writes: Like musicians, they radically reduced the distance between the composition and performance, extended the expressive range of their mediums, and aspired to find their own voices... Dave Brubeck mirrored the artists' thinking when he wrote, "I aim at the inspired moment; that is, the balance of human emotion, creativity, imagination, and a technical facility equal to the idea of the moment."

Inspired, and inspiring. Recommended.
 


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