Greenberg and Self Criticism & Selz’s Gestural Abstraction
Clement Greenberg wrote an article on modern painting and self criticism. In it, he explains how many artists style of art has changed from more tradition to fit a certain medium, thus creating self-criticism among the works. Peter Selz’s introduction to gestural abstraction talks about how the dominant art mode during and after WWII had been labeled abstract expressionism in which artists from America and Europe, in search for their own identities, were displaying works that dealt with geometric shapes, cubes, and circles. The following paragraphs will explain why modern painting created self criticism among the artists according to Greenberg as well as three artists from both Greenberg’s article and Selz’s introduction that fit in that perception.
Modern paintings produce self-criticism according to Greenberg by claiming that the task of self-criticism eliminated the specific effects of each works of art and every effect that might be taken from or by the medium of other art that would be rendered pure and enlightenment. Modernism criticizes from the inside in the more philosophical sense, whereas enlightenment criticizes from the outside in the more accepted sense.
Edouard Manet, in Greenberg’s claims, became the first modernist artist whose virtues of the frankness by which his works were declared on flat surfaces on which they were painted. He abjured underpainting and glazes and left fact that the colors from the paint came from tubes and pots. His paintings often looked unfinished due to his loose brushstrokes and his inability to cover the whole canvas. He would often place colors side by side which allowed the eye to visually mix them rather than mixing them on a palette. Paul Cezanne sacrificed correctness to fit his works on canvas, the flatness alone was new to pictorial art. His planes of color and small brushstrokes built complex field of abstraction. He pretty much laid the bridge between Impressionism and Cubism. Helen Frankenthaler originated a stain-painting that caused light-colored pigments to flow directly on the primed canvas, integrating color and support in a single unit. Greenberg called her style post-painterly abstraction.
Selz found that David Smith was heavily influenced by European art and created a series of works that became increasingly abstract and universal in form and content. Smith’s work had a sense of freedom that balanced between intellectual and sensual. Jackson Pollock’s near mural sized work involved simply pouring paint on canvases he laid in the floor. His artistic decisions evolved from rhythm and action. Alberto Burri used old tattered paper sacks, wooden sheets, plastics, tin plates, and cellotex to create abstractions of war victims wounded bodies, as well as an unavoidable reference to the real world at the time.
In conclusion, I feel that self criticism in its own right produced some the most historical works of art. They all tell a story about the era it which they were produced. The artists involved were the rebels that went against tradition and found their own niches and styles. They were the pioneers that went beyond just paints and brushes, but involved everyday items such as metals and wood that they felt was crucial to getting their artistic visions across to their audience (or the critics).
Clement Greenberg wrote an article on modern painting and self criticism. In it, he explains how many artists style of art has changed from more tradition to fit a certain medium, thus creating self-criticism among the works. Peter Selz’s introduction to gestural abstraction talks about how the dominant art mode during and after WWII had been labeled abstract expressionism in which artists from America and Europe, in search for their own identities, were displaying works that dealt with geometric shapes, cubes, and circles. The following paragraphs will explain why modern painting created self criticism among the artists according to Greenberg as well as three artists from both Greenberg’s article and Selz’s introduction that fit in that perception.
Modern paintings produce self-criticism according to Greenberg by claiming that the task of self-criticism eliminated the specific effects of each works of art and every effect that might be taken from or by the medium of other art that would be rendered pure and enlightenment. Modernism criticizes from the inside in the more philosophical sense, whereas enlightenment criticizes from the outside in the more accepted sense.
Edouard Manet, in Greenberg’s claims, became the first modernist artist whose virtues of the frankness by which his works were declared on flat surfaces on which they were painted. He abjured underpainting and glazes and left fact that the colors from the paint came from tubes and pots. His paintings often looked unfinished due to his loose brushstrokes and his inability to cover the whole canvas. He would often place colors side by side which allowed the eye to visually mix them rather than mixing them on a palette. Paul Cezanne sacrificed correctness to fit his works on canvas, the flatness alone was new to pictorial art. His planes of color and small brushstrokes built complex field of abstraction. He pretty much laid the bridge between Impressionism and Cubism. Helen Frankenthaler originated a stain-painting that caused light-colored pigments to flow directly on the primed canvas, integrating color and support in a single unit. Greenberg called her style post-painterly abstraction.
Selz found that David Smith was heavily influenced by European art and created a series of works that became increasingly abstract and universal in form and content. Smith’s work had a sense of freedom that balanced between intellectual and sensual. Jackson Pollock’s near mural sized work involved simply pouring paint on canvases he laid in the floor. His artistic decisions evolved from rhythm and action. Alberto Burri used old tattered paper sacks, wooden sheets, plastics, tin plates, and cellotex to create abstractions of war victims wounded bodies, as well as an unavoidable reference to the real world at the time.
In conclusion, I feel that self criticism in its own right produced some the most historical works of art. They all tell a story about the era it which they were produced. The artists involved were the rebels that went against tradition and found their own niches and styles. They were the pioneers that went beyond just paints and brushes, but involved everyday items such as metals and wood that they felt was crucial to getting their artistic visions across to their audience (or the critics).
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