Editing Color field (section)

== Overview ==

Color field painting is related to [[post-painterly abstraction]], [[suprematism]], [[abstract expressionism]], [[hard-edge painting]] and [[lyrical abstraction]]. It initially referred to a particular type of [[abstract expressionism]], especially the work of [[Mark Rothko]], [[Clyfford Still]], [[Barnett Newman]], [[Robert Motherwell]], [[Adolph Gottlieb]] and several series of paintings by [[Joan Miró]]. [[Art critic]] [[Clement Greenberg]] perceived color field painting as related to but different from [[action painting]].

An important distinction that made color field painting different from abstract expression was the paint handling. The most basic fundamental defining technique of painting is application of paint and the color field painters revolutionized the way paint could be effectively applied.

Color field painting sought to rid art of superfluous rhetoric. Artists like [[Barnett Newman]], [[Mark Rothko]], [[Clyfford Still]], [[Adolph Gottlieb]], [[Morris Louis]], [[Jules Olitski]], [[Kenneth Noland]], [[Friedel Dzubas]], and [[Frank Stella]], and others often used greatly reduced formats, with drawing essentially simplified to repetitive and regulated systems, basic references to nature, and a highly articulated and [[Color psychology|psychological use of color]]. In general these artists eliminated overt recognizable imagery in favor of abstraction. Certain artists quoted references to past or present art, but in general color field painting presents abstraction as an end in itself. In pursuing this direction of [[modern art]], these artists wanted to present each painting as one unified, cohesive, monolithic image often within series' of related types.

In distinction to the emotional energy and gestural surface marks and paint handling of abstract expressionists such as [[Jackson Pollock]] and [[Willem de Kooning]], color field painting initially appeared to be cool and austere. Color field painters efface the individual mark in favor of large, flat, stained and soaked areas of color, considered to be the essential nature of visual abstraction along with the actual shape of the canvas, which [[Frank Stella]] in particular achieved in unusual ways with combinations of curved and straight edges. However, color field painting has proven to be both sensual and deeply expressive albeit in a different way from gestural [[abstract expressionism]]. Denying connection to abstract expressionism or any other Art Movement [[Mark Rothko]] spoke clearly about his paintings in 1956:
<blockquote>I am not an abstractionist&nbsp;... I am not interested in the relationship of color or form or anything else.&nbsp;... I'm interested only in expressing basic human emotions — tragedy, ecstasy, doom and so on — and the fact that a lot of people break down and cry when confronted with my pictures show that I communicate those basic human emotions.&nbsp;... The people who weep before my pictures are having the same religious experience I had when I painted them. And if you, as you say, are moved only by their color relationships, then you miss the point!<ref>Rodman, Selden. ''Conversations with Artists'', 1957. Later published in "Notes from a conversation with Selden Rodman, 1956" in ''Writings on Art: Mark Rothko'' 2006, edited by López-Remiro, Miguel.</ref></blockquote>

=== Stain painting ===

[[Joan Miró]] was one of the first and most successful stain painters. Although staining in oil was considered dangerous to cotton canvas in the long run, Miró's example during the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s was an inspiration and an influence on the younger generation. One of the reasons for the success of the color field movement was the technique of staining. Artists would mix and dilute their paint in buckets or coffee cans making a fluid liquid and then they would pour it into raw unprimed canvas, generally [[cotton duck]]. The paint could also be brushed on or rolled on or thrown on or poured on or sprayed on, and would spread into the fabric of the canvas. Generally artists would draw shapes and areas as they stained. Many different artists employed staining as the technique of choice to use in making their paintings. [[James Brooks (painter)|James Brooks]], [[Jackson Pollock]], [[Helen Frankenthaler]], [[Morris Louis]], [[Paul Jenkins (United States painter)|Paul Jenkins]], and dozens of other painters found that pouring and staining opened the door to innovations and revolutionary methods of drawing and expressing meaning in new ways. The number of artists who stained in the 1960s greatly increased with the availability of [[acrylic paint]]. Staining acrylic paint into the fabric of cotton duck canvas was more benign and less damaging to the fabric of the canvas than the use of oil paint.
In 1970 artist [[Helen Frankenthaler]] commented about her use of staining:
<blockquote>When I first started doing the stain paintings, I left large areas of canvas unpainted, I think, because the canvas itself acted as forcefully and as positively as paint or line or color. In other words, the very ground was part of the medium, so that instead of thinking of it as background or negative space or an empty spot, that area did not need paint because it had paint next to it. The thing was to decide where to leave it and where to fill it and where to say this doesn't need another line or another pail of colors. It's saying it in space.<ref>De Antonio, Emile. ''Painters Painting, a Candid History of The Modern Art Scene 1940–1970'', P.82, Abbeville Press 1984, {{ISBN|0-89659-418-1}}</ref></blockquote>

=== Spray painting ===
{{Main|Spray painting}}
Few artists used the spray gun technique to create large expanses and fields of color sprayed across their canvases during the 1960s and 1970s. Some painters who effectively used [[spray painting]] techniques include [[Jules Olitski]], who was a pioneer in his spray technique that covered his large paintings with layer after layer of different colors, often gradually changing hue and value in subtle progression. Another important innovation was [[Dan Christensen]]'s use of a spray technique to great effect in loops and ribbons of bright color; sprayed in clear, calligraphic marks across his large-scale paintings. William Pettet, Richard Saba, and Albert Stadler, used the technique to create large-scale fields of multi-colors; while Kenneth Showell sprayed over crumpled canvases and created an illusion of abstract still-life interiors. Most of the spray painters were active especially during the late 1960s and 1970s.

=== Stripes ===

Stripes were one of the most popular vehicles for color used by several different color field painters in a variety of different formats. [[Barnett Newman]], [[Morris Louis]], [[Jack Bush]], [[Gene Davis (painter)|Gene Davis]], [[Kenneth Noland]] and David Simpson, all made important Series' of stripe paintings. Although he did not call them stripes but ''zips'' Barnett Newman's stripes were mostly vertical, of varying widths and sparingly used. In Simpson and Noland's case their stripe paintings were all mostly horizontal, while Gene Davis painted vertical stripe paintings and Morris Louis mostly painted vertical stripe paintings sometimes called ''Pillars''. Jack Bush tended to do both horizontal and vertical stripe paintings as well as angular ones.

=== Magna paint ===
{{Main|Magna paint}}
Magna, a special ''artist use'' [[acrylic paint]] was developed by [[Leonard Bocour]] and [[Sam Golden]] in 1947 and reformulated in 1960, specifically for Morris Louis and other stain painters of the color field movement.<ref>Henry, Walter. [http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/waac/wn/wn11/wn11-2/wn11-206.html palimpsest.stanford.edu – Technical Exchange] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081012002829/http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/waac/wn/wn11/wn11-2/wn11-206.html |date=October 12, 2008 }}. [[Stanford University]], Volume 11, Number 2, May 1989, 11–14. Retrieved December 8, 2007.</ref> In Magna pigments are ground in an acrylic resin with alcohol-based [[solvent]]s.<ref>Fenton, Terry. "[http://www.sharecom.ca/noland/materials Appreciating Noland] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210121041610/http://www.sharecom.ca/noland/materials |date=2021-01-21 }}". Retrieved April 30th, 2007.</ref> Unlike modern water-based acrylics, Magna is [[miscible]] with [[turpentine]] or mineral spirits and dries rapidly to a matte or glossy finish. It was used extensively by [[Morris Louis]], and [[Friedel Dzubas]] and also by Pop artist [[Roy Lichtenstein]]. Magna colors are more vivid and intense than regular acrylic water-based paints. Louis used Magna to great effect in his ''Stripe Series'',<ref>[http://stage.phillipscollection.org/research/american_art/artwork/Louis-Number182.htm ''Number 182'', Phillips Collection, Washington, DC., retrieved December 8, 2008]  {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090228113522/http://stage.phillipscollection.org/research/american_art/artwork/Louis-Number182.htm |date=February 28, 2009 }}</ref> where the colors are used undiluted and are poured unmixed directly from the can.<ref>[https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/10/AR2006111000266.html Blake Gopnik, "Morris Louis: A Painter Of a Different Stripe". ''The Washington Post'', retrieved December 8, 2008]</ref>

=== Acrylic paint ===
{{Main|Acrylic paint}}
In 1972, former [[Metropolitan Museum of Art]] [[curator]] [[Henry Geldzahler]] said:
<blockquote>Color field, curiously enough or perhaps not, became a viable way of painting at exactly the time that acrylic paint, the new plastic paint, came into being. It was as if the new paint demanded a new possibility in painting, and the painters arrived at it. Oil paint, which has a medium that is quite different, which isn't water-based, always leaves a slick of oil, or puddle of oil, around the edge of the color. Acrylic paint stops at its own edge. Color field painting came in at the same time as the invention of this new paint.<ref>De Antonio, Emile. ''Painters Painting, a Candid History of The Modern Art Scene 1940–1970'' Abbeville Press, 1984. 81. {{ISBN|0-89659-418-1}}</ref></blockquote>

Acrylics were first made commercially available in the 1950s as [[mineral spirits|mineral spirit]]-based paints called [[Magna paint|Magna]]<ref>Terry Fenton [http://www.sharecom.ca/noland/materials online essay] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210121041610/http://www.sharecom.ca/noland/materials |date=2021-01-21 }} about [[Kenneth Noland]], and acrylic paint, accessed April 30th, 2007</ref> offered by [[Leonard Bocour]]. Water-based acrylic paints were subsequently sold as "latex" house paints, although acrylic dispersion uses no [[latex]] derived from a [[Para rubber tree|rubber tree]]. Interior "latex" house paints tend to be a combination of [[Binder (material)|binder]] (sometimes acrylic, [[Polyvinyl chloride|vinyl]], [[Polyvinyl acetate|pva]] and others), [[filler (materials)|filler]], [[pigment]] and [[water]]. Exterior "latex" house paints may also be a "co-polymer" blend, but the very best exterior water-based paints are 100% acrylic.

Soon after the water-based acrylic binders were introduced as house paints, both artists – the first of whom were Mexican muralists – and companies began to explore the potential of the new binders. Acrylic artist paints can be thinned with water and used as [[wash (visual arts)|washes]] in the manner of watercolor paints, although the washes are fast and permanent once dry. Water-soluble artist-quality acrylic paints became commercially available in the early 1960s, offered by [[Liquitex]] and Bocour under the trade name of ''Aquatec''. Water-soluble Liquitex and Aquatec proved to be ideally suited for stain painting. The staining technique with water-soluble acrylics made diluted colors sink and hold fast into raw [[canvas]]. Painters such as [[Kenneth Noland]], [[Helen Frankenthaler]], [[Dan Christensen]], [[Sam Francis]], [[Larry Zox]], [[Ronnie Landfield]], [[Larry Poons]], [[Sherron Francis]], [[Jules Olitski]], [[Gene Davis (painter)|Gene Davis]],  [[Ronald Davis]], [[Georg Karl Pfahler]], [[Sam Gilliam]] and others successfully used water-based acrylics for their new stain, color field paintings.<ref>Junker, Howard. ''The New Art: It's Way, Way Out'', [[Newsweek]], July 29, 1968, pp.3, 55–63.</ref>

=== Legacy: influences and influenced ===

[[Image:Richard Diebenkorn's painting 'Ocean Park No.129'.jpg|thumb|[[Richard Diebenkorn]], ''Ocean Park No.129'', 1984. The ''Ocean Park series'' connects his earlier [[abstract expressionist]] works with Color field painting. The influence of both [[Henri Matisse]] and [[Joan Miró]] is particularly strong in this painting.]]
[[File:Henri Matisse - View of Notre Dame. Paris, quai Saint-Michel, spring 1914.jpg|thumb|left|[[Henri Matisse]], ''[[View of Notre-Dame]]'', 1914, [[Museum of Modern Art]]. The Matisse paintings ''French Window at Collioure'' and ''View of Notre Dame''<ref name="MoMA1">[http://www.moma.org/collection/browse_results.php?object_id=78863 ''View of Notre Dame, 1914''] at [[MoMA]], retrieved December 18, 2008</ref> both from 1914 exerted tremendous influence on American color field painters in general (including [[Robert Motherwell]]'s ''Open Series'') and on Richard Diebenkorn's ''Ocean Park'' paintings specifically.]]
The ''painterly'' legacy of 20th-century painting is a long and intertwined mainstream of influences and complex interrelationships. The use of large opened fields of expressive color applied in generous painterly portions, accompanied by loose drawing (vague linear spots and/or figurative outline) can first be seen in the early 20th-century works of both [[Henri Matisse]] and [[Joan Miró]]. Matisse and Miró, as well as [[Pablo Picasso]], [[Paul Klee]], [[Wassily Kandinsky]], and [[Piet Mondrian]] directly influenced the abstract expressionists, the color field painters of post-painterly abstraction and the lyrical abstractionists. Late 19th-century Americans like [[Augustus Vincent Tack]] and [[Albert Pinkham Ryder]], along with early [[American Modernism|American Modernists]] like [[Georgia O'Keeffe]], [[Marsden Hartley]], [[Stuart Davis (painter)|Stuart Davis]], [[Arthur Dove]], and [[Milton Avery]]'s landscapes also provided important precedents and were influences on the abstract expressionists, the color field painters, and the lyrical abstractionists. Matisse paintings ''French Window at Collioure'', and ''[[View of Notre-Dame]]''<ref name="MoMA1" /> both from 1914 exerted tremendous influence on American color field painters in general, (including [[Robert Motherwell]]'s ''Open Series''), and on [[Richard Diebenkorn]]'s ''Ocean Park'' paintings specifically. According to [[art historian]] Jane Livingston, Diebenkorn saw both Matisse paintings in an exhibition in Los Angeles in 1966, and they had an enormous impact on him and his work.<ref name="Jane6267">Livingston, Jane. "The Art of [[Richard Diebenkorn]]". In: 1997–1998 Exhibition catalog, [[Whitney Museum of American Art]]. 62–67. {{ISBN|0-520-21257-6}}</ref> Jane Livingston says about the January 1966 Matisse exhibition that Diebenkorn saw in Los Angeles:
<blockquote>It is difficult not to ascribe enormous weight to this experience for the direction his work took from that time on. Two pictures he saw there reverberate in almost every ''Ocean Park'' canvas. View of Notre Dame and French Window at Collioure, both painted in 1914, were on view for the first time in the US.<ref name="Jane6267" /></blockquote>

Livingston goes on to say "Diebenkorn must have experienced French Window at Collioure, as an epiphany."<ref>Livingston, Jane.  ''The Art of [[Richard Diebenkorn]]''. In 1997–1998 Exhibition catalog, [[Whitney Museum of American Art]]. 64. {{ISBN|0-520-21257-6}},</ref>

Miró was one of the most influential artists of the 20th century. He pioneered the technique of staining; creating blurry, multi-colored cloudy backgrounds in thinned oil paint throughout the 1920s and 1930s; on top of which he added his calligraphy, characters and abundant lexicon of words, and imagery. [[Arshile Gorky]] openly admired Miró's work and painted Miró-like paintings, before finally discovering his own originality in the early 1940s. During the 1960s Miró painted large (abstract expressionist scale) radiant fields of vigorously brushed paint in blue, in white, and other monochromatic fields of colors; with blurry black orbs and calligraphic stone-like shapes, floating at random. These works resembled the color field paintings of the younger generation. Biographer [[Jacques Dupin]] said this about Miró's work of the early 1960s:
<blockquote> These canvases disclose affinities – Miró does not in the least attempt to deny this – with the researches of a new generation of painters. Many of these, [[Jackson Pollock]] for one, have acknowledged their debt to Miró. Miró in turn displays lively interest in their work and never misses an opportunity to encourage and support them. Nor does he consider it beneath his dignity to use their discoveries on some occasions.<ref>Dupin, Jacques. ''[[Joan Miró]] Life and Work''. New York City: Harry N. Abrams, 1962. 481</ref> </blockquote>

Taking its example from other European modernists like Miró, the color field movement encompasses several decades from the mid 20th century through the early 21st century. Color field painting actually encompasses three separate but related generations of painters. Commonly used terms to refer to the three separate but related groups are [[abstract expressionism]], [[post-painterly abstraction]], and [[lyrical abstraction]]. Some of the artists made works in all three eras, that relate to all of the three styles. Color field pioneers such as [[Jackson Pollock]], [[Mark Rothko]], [[Clyfford Still]], [[Barnett Newman]], [[John Ferren]], [[Adolph Gottlieb]], and [[Robert Motherwell]] are primarily thought of as abstract expressionists. Artists like [[Helen Frankenthaler]], [[Sam Francis]], [[Richard Diebenkorn]], [[Jules Olitski]], and [[Kenneth Noland]] were of a slightly younger generation, or in the case of [[Morris Louis]] aesthetically aligned with that generation's point of view; that started out as abstract expressionists but quickly moved to post-painterly abstraction. While younger artists like [[Frank Stella]], [[Ronald Davis]], [[Larry Zox]], [[Larry Poons]], [[Walter Darby Bannard]], [[Ronnie Landfield]], [[Dan Christensen]], began with post-painterly abstraction and eventually moved forward towards a new type of expressionism, referred to as [[lyrical abstraction]]. Many of the artists mentioned, as well as many others, have practiced all three modes at one phase of their careers or another. During the later phases of color field painting; as reflections of the [[zeitgeist]] of the late 1960s (in which everything began to ''hang loose'') and the [[angst]] of the age (with all of the uncertainties of the time) merged with the gestalt of [[post-painterly abstraction]], producing [[lyrical abstraction]] which combined precision of the color field idiom with the ''malerische'' of the [[abstract expressionists]]. During the same period of the late 1960s, and early 1970s in Europe, [[Gerhard Richter]], [[Anselm Kiefer]]<ref>"[http://www.whitecube.com/artists/kiefer/ White Cube: Anselm Kiefer]".  White Cube. Retrieved December 15, 2008.</ref> and several other painters also began producing works of intense expression, merging abstraction with images, incorporating landscape imagery, and figuration that by the late 1970s was referred to as [[Neo-expressionism]].