DENVER — The paintings in Women of Abstract Expressionism at the Denver Art Museum are rich with emotion, monumental in scale, and totally original.
Abstract Expressionism
When Painter Clyfford Still Sent Rubber Underpants to a Pulitzer Prize-Winning Female Art Critic
In 1952, years before she won the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism, art critic Emily Genauer received a pair of rubber underpants in the mail — the kind of underpants babies wore before the advent of disposable diapers.
‘Women of Abstract Expressionism’ Challenges the Canon But Is Only the Beginning
DENVER — The story goes like this. It is 1950. Virginia born painter Judith Godwin learns that dancer and choreographer Martha Graham will be in the region and all Godwin can think about is her desire for Graham to perform in Staunton at the all women’s school she attended, Mary Baldwin College.
Why Were So Many Women Excluded from the History of Abstract Expressionism?
In the fourth episode of the Hyperallergic Podcast we focus on the Women of Abstract Expressionism exhibition at the Denver Art Museum.
Clyfford Still’s Radical Repetitions
DENVER — The Clyfford Still Museum’s current exhibition, Repeat/Recreate, has been on the institution’s wish list for nearly 10 years, since well before it even opened.
The Elusive Painter Who Predicted Minimalism in the Mid 1950s
John Ferren did not so much work outside the mainstream as circle it continuously in a personal and highly meditative quest for meaning.
Finally, an Exhibition Devoted to the Women of Abstract Expressionism
The paradigm of the “overlooked female artist” is both a cliché and a truth.
Learning from an Artist’s Early Experiments with AbEx
For young painters today, Abstract Expressionism is ancient history; a few rooms in MoMA’s permanent collection galleries, a handful of images from the pages of Gardner or Janson, all set before a backdrop of a now mythical Downtown Manhattan of $200-dollar-a-month lofts.
Abstract Paintings that Reflect the Rhythms of Our Time
In terms of freewheeling, soul-bearing angst, Abstract Expressionism might once seemed to have had the final word.
Joyce Pensato’s Messy Imagination, Laid Bare
Joyce Pensato is best known for her stark, large-scale paintings of cartoon characters and in particular for her series of Batman paintings that depict the cape crusader’s iconic mask using splashy skeins of black and white paint.
A Native American Painter’s Modernist Exploits, Recognized at Last
ST. PAUL, Minn. — Modern Spirit: The Art of George Morrison, now on view at the Minnesota History Center in Saint Paul, Minnesota, is a disarmingly beautiful exhibition.
When Painting Was an Unreasonable Vocation
In our times, the sincerity and passion of Ab-Ex look pretty good again, especially when the formal strengths of the work add up to more than just stylistic adventuring. Elizabeth Harris Gallery’s current show is a case in point.