Synopsis

Clement Greenberg was one of the most influential art critics and teachers of the 20th century. His writings helped catapult the celebrity of artists such as Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Hans Hofmann and many other champions of Abstract Expressionism, a movement he preferred to call 'American-Type' Painting.

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Harold Rosenberg was one of the most influential art critics and teachers of the 20th century. His writings helped catapult the celebrity of artists such as Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Hans Hofmann and many other champions of Abstract Expressionism, a movement he called 'American-Type' Painting.

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In the 1940s and '50s, Schapiro delivered many lectures that were attended regularly by many of the well-known modern artists of the time. Schapiro was a huge proponent of modern art, as well as a close friend and adviser to many artists, such as de Kooning and Motherwell, among others, who benefited from Schapiro's vast knowledge of art history and theories on aesthetics and perspective.

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Leo Steinberg is one the 20th century's foremost historians and scholars on the works of Michelangelo, Leonardo and other Italian Renaissance artists. In addition to his scholarly work of Renaissance art, Steinberg is also a significant authority on 20th-century modern art, including the paintings and sculptures of Picasso, Jasper Johns's Flag series, and Willem de Kooning's Woman series.

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John Russell was an art historian and critic who wrote for the London Sunday Times from 1950-1974, then for the New York Times from 1974-1990, coming on board immediately after the departure of John Canaday. Although seldom cited in the annals of Abstract Expressionist history, Russell's work as a critic was crucial to the continued enthusiasm for modern art well into the 1970s and 80s.

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The famous critic Robert Hughes has admittedly struggled with living in a new world where there is no longer a definitive hotbed of artists living in one city, making one great thing after another. Hughes' views on modern art are fairly traditional, valuing formal training over instinctual gift, and he can be highly critical of art that is ostentatious or seems to cater to the art market.

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John Canaday was a conservative art critic and professor who did not care much for modernism, and was especially critical of Abstract Expressionism. Despite not being Modern art's greatest fan, he never shied from trying to understand it.

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Dore Ashton is one of the few remaining critics still alive from the Abstract Expressionist era. Her writing covers a rich history of the mid-century movement, combined with exciting first-hand knowledge of interactions with those who propelled Abstract Expressionism to wide acclaim.

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The critic Thomas B. Hess was an early proponent of the work of Willem de Kooning, a close confidant of Elaine de Kooning and Harold Rosenberg, and an integral member of the famed Artists' Club on East 8th Street.

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Rosalind Krauss has been a highly influential critic and theorist in the post-Abstract Expressionist era. Originally a disciple of the formalist Clement Greenberg, Krauss later became enthralled with newer artistic movements that she believed required a different theoretical approach, which focused on aesthetics that captured a theme or historical and/or cultural issue.

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Robert Rosenblum's career as a critic, teacher and curator was defined by his insistence on challenging accepted norms of Modern art. Rosenblum believed that Modernism had a much longer history than people assumed, and in offering this perspective, he significantly reordered the way in which most people studied art movements.

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Michael Fried is one the most established and reputable art critics and historians still alive today. His approach to criticism is closely linked with that of his mentor Clement Greenberg. One of Fried's notable contributions was his staunch opposition to what he observed as the lack of differentiation between the work of art itself and the experience of viewing it occurring in the 1960s, a phenomenon he described as "theatricality."

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Pivotal in the development of Abstract Expressionism, Hofmann's work was lively, full of color, geometric and gestural, yet retaining his unique style. His greatest achievement was as a teacher who inspired generations of great artists after him.

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Robert Motherwell's paintings, prints and collages feature simple shapes, bold color contrasts and dynamic relationships between formalism and expressionism. These works reflect not only a dialogue with art history, philosophy and new artistic concerns, but also a sincere and considered engagement with autobiographical content, contemporary events and the essential human conditions of life, death, oppression and revolution.

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Barnett Newman, a major post-war American artist, broadened the Abstract Expressionism aesthetic with his innovative work. He endowed deceptively simple lines and sprawling, monochromatic canvases with symbolic and spiritual meaning.

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Widely considered to be one of America's most influential 20th-century painters, Porter was also a critic, theorist and scholar. Porter was non-conformist in both his art and writing; his manner and style were closer to a late-19th-century European bohemianism than the 20th-century New York School.