Since the early years of the twentieth century, Western abstract art has
fascinated, outraged, and bewildered audiences. Its path to acceptance
within the artistic mainstream was slow. This revised edition traces the
origins and evolution of abstract art, placing it in broad cultural
context.
Well-respected scholar Anna Moszynska examines the pioneering work of
Hilma af Klint, Wassily Kandinsky, Kazimir Malevich, and Piet Mondrian
alongside the Russian Constructivists, the De Stijl group, and the
Bauhaus artists, contrasting European geometric abstraction in the 1930s
and '40s with the emphasis on personal expression after World War II.
Op, kinetic, and minimal art of the postwar period is discussed and
illustrated in detail, and new chapters bring the account up to date,
exploring the crisis in abstraction of the 1980s and its revival--in
paint, fabric, sculpture, and installation--in recent decades.
The first edition of Abstract Art, published in 1990, was acclaimed by
reviewers. Revised with extensive updates, this book includes new
chapters on recent trends and offers fully global coverage of art
produced in North and South America, Europe, China, Korea, and the
Middle East. Now in full color and comprehensively revised, it will
serve as the best introduction to abstract art for a new generation.
