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The Fifties

Explore the influential artists and movements of the 1950s art scene, from Abstract Expressionism to the Figurative Revival. Learn about key figures such as Josef Albers, Helen Frankenthaler, and more.

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The Fifties

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  1. The Fifties http://www.laurentianum.de/ldalbe03.gif

  2. FORMALISMJosef Albers (German-US,1888 -1976) selections from series, Homage to the Square: (top right) Ascending 1953; and (lower right) Atuned, 1958, both are oil on masonite.Émigré Bauhaus master, influential teacher at Black Mountain College (1933-1949) and Yale University (1949-1958) Albers’ 1963 Interaction of Color, a classic pedagogical text http://www.laurentianum.de/ldalbe03.gif

  3. Page from Albers’ Interaction of Color

  4. Helen Frankenthaler (US,1928 - 2011), Mountains and Sea, 1952, charcoal and oil on unprimed canvas, 7’2” x 9’9”“Post-painterly abstraction,” “Color Field painting”

  5. Helen Frankenthaler in her studio with Mountains and Sea, 1952, on the right.

  6. Helen Frankenthaler in 1950 on seeing Pollock's paintings, Autumn Rhythm and Lavender Mist: “It was as if I suddenly went to a foreign country and didn't know the language, but had read enough, and had a passionate interest, and was eager to live there. I wanted to live in this land. I had to live there, and master the language." Photograph: Jackson Pollock (far left) with Lee Krasner (far right), Clement Greenberg, unidentified child, and Helen Frankenthaler at the beach near Springs, Long Island. Unidentified photographer, ca. 1952.

  7. Helen Frankenthaler, Magic Carpet, 1964, 96 X 68 inches, acrylic on canvasColor Field Painting

  8. Morris Louis (US, 1912-1962), Tet, 1958, synthetic polymer on canvas, 8 x 13ft. Influence of Frankenthaler (1953 visit) and Clement Greenberg

  9. Kenneth Noland (US, 1924-2010) Turnsole, 1961, synthetic polymer paint on unprimed canvas, 7' 10 1/8" x 7' 10 1/8“ “Noland made his first completely individual statement when, as he said, he discovered the center of the canvas.” Visitor in front of Turnsole in 2004

  10. Ellsworth Kelly (US, b. 1923), Red Blue Green, 1963, c. 84 x 136 inches, oil on canvas, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego

  11. Ellsworth Kelly, Broad Contemporary Art Museum at LACMALos Angeles, February, 2008

  12. Figurative Revival of the Fifties What was formalist NY critic Clement Greenberg’s view of “the return to the figure”? (p. 156 Fineberg)

  13. Grace Hartigan (US, 1922-2008), Summer Street, 1956, oil on canvas

  14. New York School poet, Frank O’Hara and Grace Hartigan published together in Folder, a independent magazine (New York 1953-1956)

  15. (left, at table) Frank O’Hara, Larry Rivers, Grace Hartigan (and David Smith standing at far left) at the Five Spot, NYC 1957 (right) Larry Rivers, Jack Kerouac, David Amram, Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso“New York School”poets and Beat poets

  16. Larry Rivers (US painter, sculptor, printmaker, poet and musician,1923-2002)Portrait of Frank O’Hara,1954, o/c, 97"/ 53.” What does Fineberg say about this portrait’s “perverse irony”? (p. 158) Rivers and Frank O’Hara at work on collaborative lithograph, 1958

  17. Larry Rivers, Double Portrait of Berdie [mother-in-law],oil on canvas, 1954  Rivers was also a jazz saxophonist who had studied at Juilliard (Miles Davis was a classmate.)

  18. Larry Rivers, The Studio, 1956, oil on canvas, 6’10” x 16 ft, Minneapolis Institute of Art

  19. Alice Neel (Pennsylvania US, 1900-1984 active NYC),(right) Joe Gould, oil on canvas, 1933, 39 x 31 in. Tate Modern, London(left) Pregnant Maria, oil on canvas, 1964, 32x47 in., private collection http://www.aliceneel.com/home/

  20. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4mQCnhKCd4 David Amran and Alfred Leslie discussing 1959 independent artist film, Pull My Daisy, filmed by Robert Frank and Alfred Leslie, narrated by Jack Kerouac and featuring Allen Ginsberg (“Howl” was written in 1955), the Beat poets and New York Figurative painters, including Larry Rivers and Alice Neel.

  21. Clyfford Still (US, 1904-1980), 1951(right) Mark Rothko,1952Taught at the California School of Fine Art (now San Francisco Art Institute) Abstract Expressionist influence on Bay Area painters:David Park, Elmer Bischoff, and Richard Diebenkorn

  22. David Park (US, 1911-1960), (left) Seated Man in a T-Shirt, 1958, SFMoMA(right) Art, Nature & Civilization, 1934, WPA Mural, Hayes Valley (below right) ThreeViolinists and Dancers, 1935-37 WPA Social Realism Bay Area Figurative Expressionism

  23. David Park, Torso (detail, right) 1959, SFMoMa"David was keen about Abstract Expressionism as long as it had the immediacy and tangibility and goopy sensuous arrangement of forms, but when it got into the very serious 'views of the cosmos' he didn't go along with that." (Elmer Bischoff)

  24. Richard Diebenkorn, (1922-1993, born Portland, Oregon, active Bay Area), Coffee, 1958, oil on canvas. Bay Area Figuration

  25. Compare: (left) Edward Hopper, Morning Sun, oil on canvas, 1952(right) Richard Diebenkorn, Woman in Profile, oil on canvas, 1958

  26. Richard Diebenkorn, Cityscape I, (Landscape No. 1), 1963, oil on canvas, 60 × 50 in, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art

  27. Richard Diebenkorn, Ocean Park No. 54, 1972, oil on canvas, SFMOMA

  28. Elmer Bischoff (US, 1916 -1991),Two Figures on the Seashore, 1957, o/c(right) Orange Sweater, 1955. Bay Area Figuration

  29. Joan Brown ,Fur Rat, 1962, wood, chicken wire, plaster, string, raccoon fur, and nails; 20 x 54 x 14 in. University of California, Berkeley Art Museum. Bay Area Funk (Beat) and Figuration overlapped. Joan Brown was a student of Elmer Bischoff part of both movements. Exhibition of works from the early 70’s including cardboard sculptures (begun in her kitchen from household materials while her studio was under renovation) Joan Brown c.1960

  30. Joan Brown (US, 1938-1990), Bay Area Figuration, student of Elmer Bishoff(left) Wolf in Studio, enamel on masonite, 90 x 48”, 1972, Crocker MA, Sacramento(right) Self With Fish, 1970 Brown is second generation Bay Area Figuration

  31. Bruce Conner (US 1933-2008) St Valentine’s Day Massacre/Homage To Errol Flyn, 1960, mixed media. Collection SFMOMAConner moved to San Francisco in 1957 and wasa key figure in the Beat community, along with visual artists Jay DeFeo, Joan Brown, and Manuel Neri, and poets Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Michael McClure, and Philip Lamantia. Formed “The Rat Bastard Protection Association,” which included Joan Brown and Jay de Feo

  32. Bruce Conner, Snore, 1960, 36 1/2 x 15 x 20 inches, wood, fabric, nylon, string, metal vent, paint, metal can, etc., Collection The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

  33. A still from Bruce Conner’s first film, A Movie (1958), which was created by piecing together scraps of B-movies, newsreels, novelty shorts, and other preexisting footage. The university library has a DVD with two films by Bruce Conner: Crossroads and Looking for mushrooms America is Waiting: http://www.ubu.com/film/kitchen_conner.html

  34. Bruce Conner, life-sized photogram from the Angel series (1973-75), images of Conner's own body floating on a black background.

  35. Jay De Feo, The Rose, 1958-66, 129 x 92 x 11 in., oil on canvas with wood and mica, weighs over a ton. Whitney MAARelated work on view at SFMoMA

  36. A still from Bruce Conner’s film, The White Rose, 1967 (When painting was removed from her upstairs apartment out the window.)

  37. Cover of the influential anthology of writings by Dada artists and writers edited by Abstract Expressionist painter, Robert Motherwell, 1951(In 1951 “painter” was a synonym for “artist.”) (In 1951 “painter” was a synonym for “artist.”)

  38. (left) Italian Futurist music event, 1913, The music of chance and “noise,” including the sounds of urban life; (right) Hugo Ball performing Dada poem at the Cabaret Voltaire in Zurich, Switzerland, 1916 New York Dada In Advance of a Broken Arm by Marcel Duchamp, 1915 Sources for Neo-Dada of the 1950s Jean Arp, Collage Arranged According to the Laws of Chance, 1916. Dada

  39. John Cage (US, 1912-1992) early 1950s, prepared piano, aleatory (chance) music, Zen Buddhism and the I Ching (Book of Changes)"In the nature of the use of chance operations is the belief that all answers answer all questions.“ Don’t try to change the world, you’ll only make it worse. -Cage

  40. Allan Kaprow (US, 1927-2006), 18 Happenings in 6 Parts, Reuben Gallery, NYC, 1959 Art News, October 1958, published Allan Kaprow’s article, "The Legacy of Jackson Pollock,” which was an analysis of Pollock's work and a meditation on the meaning of Pollock’s death (1956) for the painting avant-garde.

  41. LACE (Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions) and artist Steve Roden reinvented 18 Happenings in 6 Parts (1959/2008) over five nights from April 22 through April 26, 2008.

  42. Allan Kaprow, Yard, Martha Jackson Gallery, NYC 1961; compare (right) Pollock painting, 1950 From “Action Painting” to performance art. Young artists of today need no longer say, "I am a painter" or "a poet" or "a dancer." They are simply "artists." All of life will be open to them. - Allan Kaprow, “The Legacy of Jackson Pollock,” 1958 (Artnews)

  43. Allan Kaprow, photograph from Household, a Happening commissioned by Cornell University, 1964. Open link below for 2008 re-enactment s of Happenings for the MoCA Los Angeles Allan Kaprow retrospective http://www.moca.org/kaprow/index.php/category/household/

  44. Jiro Yoshihara (Japan 1905-1972), Painting, 1960 founded Gutai (Gutai Bijutsu Kyokai - Concrete Art Association) in Osaka in 1954 When Jiro Yoshihara died in 1972 the Gutai Art Association was dissolved.

  45. Shozo Shimamoto (Japan 1928), (left) Ana (Holes), 1954, oil on layers of pasted newspapers, pierced, 46 x 36”, Tate London. Gutai movement(right) Painting, 1955, oil on paper, slashed and punctured

  46. Atsuko Tanaka (Japan,1932-2005), Electric Dress [as performance (left) and display as object (right)] 1956, Gutai http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdXcZq16yFc Blinking incandescent lights covered with red, blue, yellow, and green enamel paint. Flashing on a circuit, the shapes and colors of the figure wearing the costume changed constantly, giving the impression of a body in constant motion even when standing still. “I was seated on a bench at the Osaka station, and I saw a billboard featuring a pharmaceutical advertisement, brightly illuminated by neon lights. This was it! I would make a neon dress!” (Tanaka) The “dress” also references the traditional kimono and the nervous system of the body

  47. Atsuko TanakaElectric Dress performance photos, 1956, GutaiPresages the extreme and sometimes dangerous performances of the 1970s feminist movement.

  48. Saburo Murakami, Gutai perfomance: Smashing Through (21 panels of 42 papers) second Gutai exhibition, Tokyo, 1956 Internationally, performance art of the post-WW II era came out of painting.

  49. Kazuo Shiraga (Japan b. 1925), Challenge to the Mud, Gutai performance, 1955 Art as a marriage of concept and raw material: the Gutai notion of allowing the “cry of the material”

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