LYRICAL ABSTRACTION: HISTORY, CHARACTERISTICS AND AUTHORS - HISTORY - 2025

The lyrical abstraction was an artistic movement born after the Second World War in Paris. This movement prevailed from the year 1945 to 1995.

It was often characterized by gestural brush movements performed against an expansive background. This style was opposed to previous styles of modern art (including cubism, surrealism and geometric abstraction) and accepted the expression of emotion in search of the 'inner self'.

Yellow-Red-Blue-1925-Wassily Kandinski

Headed by artists such as Gérard Schneider, Georges Mathieu, Hans Hartung, and Pierre Soulages, the lyrical abstraction movement is commonly remembered for being the first to apply Vassily Kandinsky's fundamentals. Kandinsky was a painter and expert in art theory considered the father of abstraction.

Lyrical abstraction was not a specific school or movement, rather it was a trend within the so-called Art Informel.

It is a balanced and elegant style of abstract art that can be calming or lively, but is almost always loaded with content taken from the natural world.

The works done in this context often have bright colors and are quite harmonious. This is in contrast to the dissonant images full of anguish produced by groups like CoBrA or the Neo Expressionists.

Origin

This artistic movement was born in Paris, France after World War II. At that time, the artistic life of the city had been devastated after the Nazi Occupation, so when the War ended, artistic life began to resume. More specifically this occurred after the Liberation of Paris in mid-1944.

Although Vassily Kandinsky is regarded as the pioneer of the elegant combination of narrative, form and color (the foundations of Lyrical Abstraction), the trend emerged in an exhibition entitled L'Imaginaire shown at the Luxenburg Gallery in Paris in the year of 1847.

This exhibition featured the works of Hans Hartung, Wols, and Jean Paul Riopelle, among others. The term lyrical abstraction was created by the French painter and co-organizer of the exhibition, Georges Mathieu.

The other curator, Jose Jean Marchand, wrote that some of the works demonstrated 'a lyricism disconnected from all slavery…'.

This meant that the paintings were not derived from or influenced by some intellectual theory. Many experts saw this new movement as an attempt to recover the Parisian artistic life lost in the War.

Elements of lyrical abstraction

One of the most significant distinctions of other forms of abstract art is contained in its premise that it is 'lyrical'. This concept can be defined as the 'expression of the author's emotions'.

Although many works of abstract art focus on emotional content, lyrical abstraction primarily conveys a sense of a larger spiritual vision that an artist chooses to embody in his art.

It relates to mystical sensibility more than an 'action painting'. For example, Adolph Gottlieb's paintings convey a sense of encounter and confrontation with the elemental 'me' or 'being' beyond the plane of everyday reality.

Lyrical abstraction is a state of mind, a desire that seeks to communicate concepts, thoughts, ideas, and emotions in an abstract way. It goes beyond exploring the artistic principles of composition, tone, value, lines, textures, etc.

Although of course the best works of this movement incorporate these elements, their overall effect is more concerned with the 'self' approach to art.

characteristics

In theory, Art Informel was the mother movement that included numerous sub styles and sub groups such as Lyrical Abstraction, Forces Nouvelles, CoBrA, Tachisme, Art Brut and Art Non Figuratif.

All of these schools were abstract or at least semi-abstract and rejected geometric abstraction, as well as naturalism and figurative genres.

All sought to create a new spontaneous style of painting that had not been used by old and current conventions and theories of art.

Despite this many abstract painters of the time were members of one or more of these subgroups and as a result it is almost impossible to identify the exact paintings that belong to each of the movements.

To be considered as a work of lyrical abstraction, it must respond to the following elements:

• Contains emotional content.
• You have something important to communicate.
• It has a spiritually oriented basis.
• Represents aesthetic elements of design, color and composition.
• It is concerned with the exploration of ideas and states of mind, not with empty or superfluous 'dogmas of art'.

Popular artists

The main exponents of this movement include: Hans Hartung (1904-89), Wols (Alfred Otto Wolfgang Sculze) (1913-51), Jean-Michel Atlan (1913-60), Pierre Soulages (1919), Georges Mathieu, Nicolas de Stael (1914-55), and Jean-Paul Riopelle (1923-2002).

Additionally, the calligraphic painter Mark Tobey (1890-1976) and the American artist Sam Francis (1923-94) made important contributions to the movement.

Other exponents of lyrical abstraction include Patrick Heron (1920-99), Gustave Singier (1909-84), Jean Le Moal (1909-2007), and Pierre Tal Coat (1905-85).

American lyrical abstraction (1960-1970)

A movement that became known as lyrical abstraction emerged in the United States during the 1960s and 1970s. In this case, it emerged as a response to the growth of minimalism and conceptual art.

Many painters began to detach themselves from geometric, precise, hard and minimalist styles to give way to a more harmonious style that used rich and vivid colors.

His aim was to re-establish aesthetic principles instead of continuing with spontaneous socio-political iconography.

This American form of lyrical abstraction is illustrated in the works of Helen Frankhenthaler (1928) and Jules Olitski (1922-2007), among others. In 1971, an exhibition entitled Lyrical Abstraction was held at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

However during this period there were a number of similar variations of the second generation of Abstract Expressionism. While there were clear theoretical distinctions between Color Field Painting, Rigid Painting, and Lyrical Abstraction, among others, these differences are not obvious to the inexperienced eye.

Modern lyrical abstraction

Today lyrical abstraction still exists. Many young contemporary artists have recognized its potential and used what they have observed from the visual experiences that abstract artists have produced for more than half a century.

Today Marilyn Kirsch is one of the most visionary artists in this field; presents an introspective work that reflects the human condition of the late 20th century and a vision of what the future could be.

All modern painters of this movement fill their art with a poetic investigation of the world and like all artists of lyrical abstraction they never stray from the field of surrealism.

References

1. Lyrical abstraction as an artform. Recovered from artinsight.com
2. Lyrical abstraction (2015). Recovered from trendesignmagazine.com
3. Lyrical abstraction. Recovered from visual-arts-cork.com
4. Famous lyrical abstraction artists. Recovered from ranker.com
5. Lyrical abstraction. Recovered from abstract-art.com
6. Lyrical abstraction. Recovered from wikipedia.org