American abstract expressionist painter, Robert Motherwell (1915 - 1991), preferred using the starkness of black acrylic paint as one of the basic elements of his paintings.

Biography Robert Motherwell (1915 – 1991) In 1940, a young painter named Robert Motherwell came to New York City and joined a group of artists — including Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Mark Rothko and Franz Kline — who set out to change the face of American painting. These painters renounced the prevalent American style, believing its realism depicted only the surface of American life. Their interest was in exploring the deeper sense of reality beyond the recognizable image. Influenced by the Surrealists, many of whom had emigrated from Europe to New York, the Abstract Expressionists sought to create essential images that revealed emotional truth and authenticity of feeling. Robert Motherwell was the youngest and most prolific of the group. Born in Aberdeen, Washington, in 1915, Motherwell first hoped to be a philosopher. His studies at Stanford and Harvard brought him into contact with the great American philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, who first challenged him with the notion of abstraction. What he took from Whitehead was the sense that abstraction was the process of peeling away the inessential and presenting the necessary. After moving to New York and becoming acquainted with a number of artists, Motherwell recognized in them similar desires. Living in Greenwich Village, he became part of an exciting group of young artists. Forming a community and living on what little they had, the Abstract Expressionists made daring experiments in painting and in the intellectual investigations surrounding it. Their break with the traditional art conventions often provoked the harshest criticism from the establishment. Despite this, these early years were an incredibly productive period for Motherwell — seeing him experiment in a range of media, from painting to collage. His work often expressed the actions of the artist through dramatic and bright brush strokes. Valued for their energetic imagery, they attempted a pure emotional response made real in paint. His collage also concerned itself with an awareness of the presence of the artist in a work. Using torn paper on minimalist backgrounds, he created work that was at once discordant and lyrical. No longer the black sheep of the art world, Motherwell began to enjoy the fruits of years of dedicated work. It seemed, however, for many of the Abstract Expressionists that the newly found appreciation could not counteract the turbulence of those early years—many dying young or taking their own lives. Though somewhat alone, Motherwell committed himself to producing highly experimental work of emotional depth for the rest of his life. Robert Motherwell died on July 16, 1991, at the age of 76. Curriculum Vitae Robert Motherwell 1915 Born on January 24 in Aberdeen, WA 1978 Received Grande Médaille de Vermeil in Paris, France 1983 Gold Medal of Honor 1983, National Arts Club, New York, NY 1989 Received National Medal of Art, Washington, D.C. 1991 Died in Provincetown, Massachusetts Selected Exhibitions 2003 Small Paintings & Works on Paper, Galerie Bernd Klüser, Munich, Germany 2002 Themes + Variations, Manny Silverman Gallery, Los Angeles, CA 1987 The Spontaneous Gesture: Prints and Books of the Abstract Expressionist Era, The Australian National Gallery of Art, Canberra, Australia 1983 Robert Motherwell, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY 1981 American Prints: Process & Proofs, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY 1980 The Painter and the Printer: Robert Motherwell's Graphics 1943-1980, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY 1978 Retrospective, Royal Academy of Arts, London 1977 Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris 1974 American Prints 1913-63, Riva Castleman, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY 1972 Robert Motherwell's A la pintura: The Genesis of a Book, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY 1969 Prints by Four New York Painters, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY 1965 Robert Motherwell: Works on Paper, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY 1946 Fourteen Americans, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY 1944 Peggy Guggenheim's Art of This Century, New York, NY Statement "To end up with a canvas that is no less beautiful than the empty canvas is to begin with." Article(s)   Novak_Art_-_Robert_Motherwell_paintings_1_.doc   Novak_Art_-_Robert_Motherwell_Art_1_.doc   Novak_Art_-_Robert_Motherwell_1_.doc