Abstract Expressionism, Pop

Art, Postmodernism,
Deconstructivism

Hafenstrasse Development, Hamburg 1989. © Zaha Hadid Architects

POST MODERN ART

Dr. Bootheina Majoul
Abstract Expressionism1
"Abstract Expressionism" was never an ideal label for the movement, which developed in New York in the 1940s and 1950s. It was
somehow meant to encompass not only the work of painters who filled their canvases with fields of color and abstract forms, but
also those who attacked their canvases with a vigorous gestural expressionism. Still Abstract Expressionism has become the most
accepted term for a group of artists who held much in common. All were committed to art as expressions of the self, born out of
profound emotion and universal themes, and most were shaped by the legacy of Surrealism, a movement that they translated into a
new style fitted to the post-war mood of anxiety and trauma. In their success, these New York painters robbed Paris of its mantle as
leader of modern art, and set the stage for America's dominance of the international art world.
• Political instability in Europe in the 1930s brought several leading Surrealists to New York, and many of the Abstract
Expressionists were profoundly influenced by Surrealism's focus on mining the unconscious. It encouraged their interest
in myth and archetypal symbols and it shaped their understanding of painting itself as a struggle between self-expression
and the chaos of the subconscious.
• Most of the artists associated with Abstract Expressionism matured in the 1930s. They were influenced by the era's leftist
politics, and came to value an art grounded in personal experience. Few would maintain their earlier radical political views,
but many continued to adopt the posture of outspoken avant-gardists.
• Having matured as artists at a time when America suffered economically and felt culturally isolated and provincial, the
Abstract Expressionists were later welcomed as the first authentically American avant-garde. Their art was championed
for being emphatically American in spirit - monumental in scale, romantic in mood, and expressive of a rugged individual
freedom.
• Although the movement has been largely depicted throughout historical documentation as one belonging to the paint-
splattered, heroic male artist, there were several important female Abstract Expressionists that arose out of New York and
San Francisco during the 1940s and '50s who now receive credit as elemental members of the canon.

Main Artworks2

Jackson Pollock, Number 1A, 1948. Courtesy MoMA

In 1947, Jackson Pollock discovered a new mode of painting. The method consisted of flinging
and dripping paint onto an unstretched canvas, laid on the floor of his studio. The style became
known as drip painting. Drip painting allowed Pollock to work with improvisation, spontaneity,
movement and feeling. In his drip painting Number 1A, Pollock has added his handprints to the
composition’s upper right as an autograph. He moved away from traditional artist’s oil paints and
used commercial enamel paints for his drip paintings. Due to the fluidity of this paint, he was able
to directly capture the movements of his body over the canvas. Pollock chose to no longer give
his paintings evocative titles and began to number them instead, because numbers are neutral and
would allow people to experience the pure painting.

1 Retrieved from: https://www.theartstory.org/movement/abstract-expressionism/

2
Retrieved from: https://magazine.artland.com/abstract-expressionism/
 Mark Rothko, Untitled (Seagram Murals), 1958. Courtesy Tate
In 1958, Mark Rothko was commissioned to create a series of murals for the dining room at the Four Seasons
Restaurant in New York’s Seagram Building. He worked on the commission tirelessly for two years, creating
a series of deeply moving colour field paintings in dark reds, maroons and blacks that came to be known as
the Seagram Murals. Rothko stated that with his Seagram Murals, he had created a place. He eventually
withdrew from the commission and donated most of the paintings to the Tate Gallery in London. The
Seagram Murals exemplify the desire of the colour field painters to achieve spiritual transcendence and to
convey intense emotional experience.

Willem de Kooning, Excavation, 1950. Courtesy Art Institute of Chicago

Willem de Kooning’s Excavation was his largest painting up to that date, and exemplifies De
Kooning’s characteristic expressive brushwork and organisation of space into different sliding
planes. The artist took inspiration by an image of women working in a rice field in the 1949
Neorealist film Riso Amaro by Giuseppe de Santis. The tension between abstraction and
figuration is evident here, in the calligraphic lines which seem to define anatomical parts. De
Kooning’s intensive painting process included building up the surface and scraping down its paint
layers for months on end until he achieved the desired effect.

Watch and Learn More

Abstract Expressionism Abstract Expressionism & The New York School

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rP9k2xzrgx8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tsp6PC31YBs

Pop Art
Pop Art's refreshing reintroduction of identifiable imagery, drawn from media and popular culture, was a major shift for the direction
of modernism. With roots in Neo-Dada and other movements that questioned the very definition of “art” itself, Pop was birthed in
the United Kingdom in the 1950s amidst a postwar socio-political climate where artists turned toward celebrating commonplace
objects and elevating the everyday to the level of fine art. American artists Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, James Rosenquist and
others would soon follow suit to become the most famous champions of the movement in their own rejection of traditional historic
artistic subject matter in lieu of contemporary society’s ever-present infiltration of mass manufactured products and images that
dominated the visual realm. Perhaps owing to the incorporation of commercial images, Pop Art has become one of the most
recognizable styles of modern art.
• By creating paintings or sculptures of mass culture objects and media stars, the Pop Art movement aimed to blur the
boundaries between "high" art and "low" culture. The concept that there is no hierarchy of culture and that art may borrow
from any source has been one of the most influential characteristics of Pop Art.
• It could be argued that the Abstract Expressionists searched for trauma in the soul, while Pop artists searched for traces of
the same trauma in the mediated world of advertising, cartoons, and popular imagery at large. But it is perhaps more precise
to say that Pop artists were the first to recognize that there is no unmediated access to anything, be it the soul, the natural
world, or the built environment. Pop artists believed everything is inter-connected, and therefore sought to make those
connections literal in their artwork.
• Although Pop Art encompasses a wide variety of work with very different attitudes and postures, much of it is somewhat
emotionally removed. In contrast to the "hot" expression of the gestural abstraction that preceded it, Pop Art is generally
"coolly" ambivalent. Whether this suggests an acceptance of the popular world or a shocked withdrawal, has been the
subject of much debate.
• Pop artists seemingly embraced the post-World War II manufacturing and media boom. Some critics have cited the Pop
Art choice of imagery as an enthusiastic endorsement of the capitalist market and the goods it circulated, while others have
noted an element of cultural critique in the Pop artists' elevation of the everyday to high art: tying the commodity status of
the goods represented to the status of the art object itself, emphasizing art's place as, at base, a commodity.
• Some of the most famous Pop artists began their careers in commercial art: Andy Warhol was a highly successful magazine
illustrator and graphic designer; Ed Ruscha was also a graphic designer, and James Rosenquist started his career as a
billboard painter. Their background in the commercial art world trained them in the visual vocabulary of mass culture as
well as the techniques to seamlessly merge the realms of high art and popular culture.
Main Artworks
President Elect by James Rosenquist (1960-61)
Like many Pop artists, Rosenquist was fascinated by the popularization of political and cultural figures
in mass media. In his painting President Elect, the artist depicts John F. Kennedy's face amidst an
amalgamation of consumer items, including a yellow Chevrolet and a piece of cake. Rosenquist created
a collage with the three elements cut from their original mass media context, and then photo-realistically
recreated them on a monumental scale. As Rosenquist explains, "The face was from Kennedy's campaign
poster. I was very interested at that time in people who advertised themselves. Why did they put up an
advertisement of themselves? So that was his face. And his promise was half a Chevrolet and a piece of
stale cake." The large-scale work exemplifies Rosenquist's technique of combining discrete images
through techniques of blending, interlocking, and juxtaposition, as well as his skill at including political
and social commentary using popular imagery.

Drowning Girl by Roy Lichtenstein (1963)

In the early 1960s, Lichtenstein gained renown as a leading Pop artist for paintings sourced from the popular
comics. Although artists such as Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns had previously integrated popular
imagery into their works, no one hitherto had focused on cartoon imagery as exclusively as Lichtenstein. His
work, along with that of Andy Warhol, heralded the beginning of the Pop Art movement, and, essentially, the
end of Abstract Expressionism as the dominant style.
Lichtenstein did not simply copy comic pages directly, he employed a complex technique that involved cropping
images to create entirely new, dramatic compositions, as in Drowning Girl, whose source image included the
woman's boyfriend standing on a boat above her. Lichtenstein also condensed the text of the comic book panels,
locating language as another, crucial visual element; re-appropriating this emblematic aspect of commercial art
for his paintings further challenged existing views about definitions of "high" art.
As with the rest of Pop Art, it is often unclear whether Lichtenstein is applauding the comic book image, and
the general cultural sphere to which it belongs, or critiquing it, leaving interpretation up to the viewer. But in
Drowning Girl, the ridicule of the woman's situation (as is made clear by her ridiculous statement) is evident.

Campbell's Soup I by Andy Warhol (1968)

Warhol's iconic series of Campbell's Soup Cans paintings were never meant to be celebrated for their form or compositional
style, like that of the abstractionists. What made these works significant was Warhol's co-opting of universally recognizable
imagery, such as a Campbell's soup can, Mickey Mouse, or the face of Marilyn Monroe, and depicting it as a mass-produced
item, but within a fine art context. In that sense, Warhol wasn't just emphasizing popular imagery, but rather providing
commentary on how people have come to perceive these things in modern times: as commodities to be bought and sold,
identifiable as such with one glance. This early series was hand-painted, but Warhol switched to screenprinting shortly
afterwards, favoring the mechanical technique for his mass culture imagery. 100 canvases of Campbell's soup cans made up
his first solo exhibition at the Ferus Gallery in Los Angeles, and put Warhol on the art world map almost immediately,
forever changing the face and content of modern art.

Watch and Learn More

The Exploration of Pop Art: Documentary by Candace Mortier Andy Warhol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=no7Mjf02Ge0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_FGcnR6EUY

Postmodernism
Postmodernism is best understood by defining the modernist ethos it replaced - that of the avant-garde who were active from 1860s
to the 1950s. The various artists in the modern period were driven by a radical and forward-thinking approach, ideas of technological
positivity, and grand narratives of Western domination and progress. The arrival of Neo-Dada and Pop art in post-war America
marked the beginning of a reaction against this mindset that came to be known as postmodernism. The reaction took on multiple
artistic forms for the next four decades, including Conceptual art, Minimalism, Video art, Performance art, Institutional Critique,
and Identity Art. These movements are diverse and disparate but connected by certain characteristics: ironical and playful treatment
of a fragmented subject, the breakdown of high and low culture hierarchies, undermining of concepts of authenticity and originality,
and an emphasis on image and spectacle. Beyond these larger movements, many artists and less pronounced tendencies continue in
the postmodern vein to this day.
• Postmodernism is distinguished by a questioning of the master narratives that were embraced during the modern period,
the most important being the notion that all progress - especially technological - is positive. By rejecting such narratives,
postmodernists reject the idea that knowledge or history can be encompassed in totalizing theories, embracing instead the
 local, the contingent, and the temporary. Other narratives rejected by postmodernists include the idea of artistic
development as goal-oriented, the notion that only men are artistic geniuses, and the colonialist assumption that non-white
races are inferior. Thus, Feminist art and minority art that challenged canonical ways of thinking are often included under
the rubric of postmodernism or seen as representations of it.
• Postmodernism overturned the idea that there was one inherent meaning to a work of art or that this meaning was
determined by the artist at the time of creation. Instead, the viewer became an important determiner of meaning, even
allowed by some artists to participate in the work as in the case of some performance pieces. Other artists went further by
creating works that required viewer intervention to create and/or complete the work.
• The Dada readymade had a marked influence on postmodernism in its questioning of authenticity and originality.
Combined with the notion of appropriation, postmodernism often took the undermining of originality to the point of
copyright infringement, even in the use of photographs with little or no alteration to the original.
• The idea of breaking down distinctions between high and low art, particularly with the incorporation of elements of popular
culture, was also a key element of postmodernism that had its roots in the late-19th and early-20th centuries in the work
of Edgar Degas, for example, who painted on fans, and later in Cubism where Pablo Picasso often included the lyrics of
popular songs on his canvases. This idea that all visual culture is not only equally valid, but that it can also be appreciated
and enjoyed without any aesthetic training, undermines notions of value and artistic worth, much like the use of
readymades.

Main Artworks

Whaam! by Roy Lichtenstein, 1963, via Tate, London

The composition of the work Whaam! comes from a panel created by the comic artist
Irv Novick. This is part of the comic All-American Men of War (1962). In postmodern
art, there was also a recurring discussion of the two world wars that people had to
experience in the 20th century. Roy Lichtenstein’s piece is not a clear confrontation with
the Second World War. However, the choice of motif and the presentation of it in pop
aesthetics can be interpreted as an ironic commentary on the glorification of war.

Watch and Learn More

The Basics of Postmodernism in Art Art Appreciation: Postmodernism

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtmhqlEvQvc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzRtkkmVCEc

Deconstructivism3
A term used to describe a tendency in architecture that began in the 1980s and rejected the basic premises of modern architecture.
Architects who worked in this tradition spurned functionalist, anonymous aesthetics, instead focusing on complex geometries and
surface treatments. Inspired in part by the theories of semiotic analysis known as “deconstruction” developed by French philosopher
Jacques Derrida, they dissected standard modernist forms (such as the cube and right angles), often creating spaces with a
preponderance of angles (regarding the angularity of her designs, Zaha Hadid has commented, “There are 360 degrees, so why stick
to one?”). Deconstructivism is most closely associated with the architects Peter Eisenman, Frank Gehry, Hadid, Coop Himelblau,
Rem Koolhaas, Daniel Liebeskind, and Bernard Tschumi, largely due to the Museum of Modern Art’s 1988 exhibition
“Deconstructivist Architecture,” which first brought them together. Most of these architects, however, reject this association because
it implies a homogenous style or set of concerns. While there is disagreement as to the nature of deconstructivism, the architect
Philip Johnson (co-curator of the MoMA exhibition) has summarized it by saying, “It is the ability to disturb our thinking about
form that makes these projects deconstructive.”

Deconstructivism: Famous Artists and Artworks Watch and Learn More

https://arthive.com/styles/deconstructivism https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wzheHFmea8

3
Retrieved from: https://www.artsy.net/gene/deconstructivism