Abstract Expressionism and Other Modern Works: The Muriel Kallis Steinberg Newman Collection

Abstract Expression and Other Modern Works:  The Muriel Kallis Steinberg Newman Collection exhibit arts of Abstract Expressionist and Pop-Art movements from the 1940s to 1960s at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  The collection showcases notable paintings from world-famous artists:  Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Frank Kline, Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland.  Paintings of artists who have made their mark in modern art are exhibited here.  And they share a common theme— juxtaposed to one another— but otherwise displayed with coherence.



Robert Goodnough's Landscape

Walk onto the exhibition room, and it is where you find small-sized canvases divided on the left and onto your right.  The paintings that line on the left side of the museum’s wall hang rough sketching with simplified color-schemes—medium tones of pens and inks —limited in color range.  These works have been brushed with prominent lines—thick, visible brushstrokes —exemplary of gestural style painting, also known as “action-painting,” a primary technique from Abstract Expressionism.  The canvases hang and have been arranged for viewers to take in—simple calligraphic to complex, impasto in few color schemes.  Robert Goodnough’s Landscape, for example, has heavy, impasto, with neutral shades of white, black, brown, and grayish- blue.  Pale, muted colors, also neutral shades contrast against darker tones, highlighting his works, in contrary to primary colors commonly used in Pop-Art (e.g. Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol.)  Goodnough’s painting is unique at display from its curving horizontal lines and rough, violent brushstrokes, like hungry, undulating waves on high-tide.  

Willem de Kooning's Two Women

The right section by the entrance has art works by Willem de Kooning, and others that have figural or biomorphic forms.  Instead of using simple lines, these works use more shapes and forms.  De Kooning's Two Women is a subject-painting from Abstract Expressionism, where subjects are vaguely defined.  In contrast to the works on the left wall like that of Goodnough's action-painting from Abstract Expressionism, de Kooning's work focus on the subject matter at hand.  Two Women have forms of two women and the viewer can see visible figure of two shapes -- accompanied by their busts, legs, and navels.  Subjects are visible to the viewer.  This is not non-representational work.  Other works have surrealist influence, like Matta's Untitled, 1941, which has graphic shapes and emanates the horror of pursuit and fear of capture.

Matta's Untitled, 1941

The right section by the museum’s entrance has Willem de Kooning’s works and other works that have figural or biomorphic forms.  Instead of simple lines, the artists’ works have shapes and forms.  De Kooning’s Two Women illustrate a subject-painting from the Abstract Expressionist’s, in which subjects have been vaguely defined; on the contrary to Goodnough’s action-painting, de Kooning’s focuses on the subject matter itself.  Two Women have two women’s forms, where the viewer see two shapes—further amplified by their legs, busts, and navels.  Clearly presented to the viewers are the subjects; hence the works are certainly not non-representational.  Surrealist influence, specifically, Matta’s Untitled, 1941, has graphic shapes that emanate two themes in the human psyche:  the horrors of pursuit and fears of capture.



Jackson Pollock's Number 28

Conrad Marca-Relli's The Witnesses

Mark Rothko's No. 3

Catch larger-scale art works once you enter the main open-space.  Displayed along the right and left are paintings; next, few sculptures are conspicuously showcased in the middle of the room; and further, Jackson Pollock’s monumental Number 28  hangs openly at the midsection.  Paintings hung on the left uses paints heavily—Alfred Leslie’s The Lady’s Flowers and Phillip Guston’s Painting, to illustrate are paintings that utilize color as a focal point —and soft, light pastel colors like Frankenthaler’s acrylic pastels.  Conrad Marca-Relli’s The Witnesses form a collage-like impression, like a Synthetic Cubist work.  Characteristic of Mark Rothko’s, No. 3 is a good example of chromatic abstraction, also dubbed “color-field painting,” from Abstract Expressionism.  No.3 uses Rothko’s classic method:  two-large subdivision of color-field painting.  Red and silver, it evokes a somber feeling.  Pollock’s Number 28 utilizes gestural technique and more —drip and pour of Abstract Expressionist’s.  Number 28, a colossal art work, showcases Pollock’s primary drip.  How colossal?  You cannot miss a larger-scale of this size.

Clyfford Still’s looms on the right wall in the middle of the room; besides being an artist from the Abstract Expressionist’s, Still focuses on color like Franz Kline and de Kooning’s.  Franz Kline’s Nijinsky, typical of his work, uses thick, violent black strokes onto a white canvas.  De Kooning’s Attic uses fewer colors with angular lines and biomorphic forms.  The shapes, like human figures, take up the whole canvas, and viewers can see a contrast of space and form in this DeKooning’s work.  Robert Motherwell’s Elegy to the Spanish Republic, No. 35 has oval, round, black, shapes and thick curvature in its vertical lines shaped like lozenges paired with jail bars.  The brushstrokes have been clearly and actively used in the painting.

 

Clyfford Still's Untitled

Franz Kline's Nijinsky

Willem de Kooning's The Attic

Robert Motherwell's Elegy to the Spanish Republic, No. 35

Walking til the end of the exhibition room, you can see works of other artists:  Esteban Vicente, Helen Frankenthaler, Morris Louis, and Kenneth Noland.  Vicente’s Number One is an abstract collage—an amalgam of textures like newspapers and other modern art mediums are placed onto canvas.  The abstract, colorful painting, unlike DeKooning’s, does not use a subject matter as its focal point in the painting.  Frankenthaler’s and Louis’s works have been arranged side-by-side; similarly Frankenthaler influenced Morris Louis’s painting technique.  Louis’s canvases are grand and utilize poured paint technique, which gradually meshes with the color next to it.  Noland’s painting has clear outlines and polished look compared to other artist’s.  Noland’s geometric circles are an example of Op art.

 

Esteban Vicente's Number One

Frankenthaler's work

Find works with geometric forms, shapes, and impasto on the other side.  Giorgio Cavallon and Hans Hofmann’s works have geometric shapes which convey heavy textures.  Cavallon had been Hans Hofmann’s student; likewise the viewer can see Hofmann’s influence.  Hofmann’s Mecca has geometric shapes like Mondrian’s but without the hard-edged outlines.  Claes Oldenbur’s Soft Calendar for the Month of August, a classic work of Pop-Art, has everyday objects that people use.  Oldenburg’s is an enlarged blow-up calendar commonly sold at vintage stores.  Now that is representational art, would you not say?  Oldenburg’s work begs the question:  How is this abstract?

Hans Hofmann's Mecca

Claes Oldenburg's Soft Calendar for the Month of August

Hofmann's Mecca has Mondrian-like geometric shapes on canvas, sans the clear hard-edged outlines and forms.  Claes Oldenburg's Soft Calendar for the Month of August is a classic work from Pop-Art where everyday objects are used.  Oldenburg's work uses enlarged blow-up calendar that you can find at a vintage convenience store.  Now that is as much representational art as one would find.  Oldenburg's work makes you question, "How is this abstract?"

Ibram Lassaw's Monoceros

Philip Guston's Painting

Theodore J. Roszak's Firebird

 Intricate forms encompass sculptures at the exhibition and Ibram Lassaw’s Monoceros stands on its own.  Monoceros, Greek for unicorn, a small constellation of stars, consists of cube-like geometric shapes from the bottom to the top link and connects to each other.  The geometric shapes are sculptural representation of Philip Guston’s painting that hangs above Lassaw’s.  Philip Guston’s Painting also use cube-like shapes, but the shapes in the soft, warm colors and brushstrokes on canvas contrast to harsh, industrial metals in the sculpture.  Iron and brass in Lassaw’s Monoceros focus not on soft hues, but on complex geometric shapes.  Richard Sankiewicz’s Fish Lurking, composed of abandoned materials, gives a new take in artist’s works, riveting the viewer in its source.  One item is like a motor of an automobile or an outdoor appliance.  Industrial feel dominates this material.  Theodore J. Roszak’s Firebird prominently suspends in the room —harsh, sharp metal edges— evoking a dangerous feeling.  The figure’s shape is like a dangerous, prehistoric animal which the viewer has become familiarized with.  When has the viewer seen it before?  Once you entered the room in Roszak’s Study for Firebird.  The drawing’s figure is like a creature of an alien in hostile form, only the sculpture captures the enormity of the creature in its life form.  By the end of the collection, you can see a tag for Alexander Calder’s works.  Calder’s hanging mobiles suspends on the top at the ceiling in simple shapes and colors.  Contemporary works were confronted with criticisms when it had first emerged, and Calder’s works were not an exception.  Calder’s hanging mobile can first look like a work from children’s art class, but taking a closer look, it had been engineered with complexity — a kinetic movement stirs as the draft of wind blows into the room.

Alexander Calder's work

 

Smaller-scale works prepares the viewer for larger-scale works at the collection.  The curator has arranged simple drawings and rough sketches.  Begin with Philip Guston’s Untitled and walk further down the room to Guston’s larger and complex Painting.  The abstract works have been grouped accordingly (common in styles and themes):  violent, black strokes in Kline and Motherwell’s and poured shaped colors in Frankenthaler and Louis’s.  Shown to the viewer are abstract paintings that had vague subjects and gestural paintings from Abstract Expressionist’s.  Abstract Expressionist’s, not only known for one form, but comprise of many styles which has been exhibited in this collection.  Take a journey on wide range of techniques found in Abstract Expressionist’s works, thanks to Muriel Kallis Steinberg Newman collection.