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Abstract Expressionists at Sea

“The American vanguard painter took to the white expanse of the canvas as Melville’s Ishmael took to the sea. On the one hand, a desperate recognition of moral and intellectual exhaustion; on the other, the exhilaration of an adventure over depths in which he might find reflected the true image of his identity.”

— Harold Rosenberg, writing about abstract expressionist painters in “The American Action Painters” in 1959.

Source:  Harrison and Wood, Art in Theory, 1900-1990.

Bay4

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American & European Art: Ball Brothers Foundation Gallery, Bay 4»

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