Abstract, 1947
Artist: Carl Robert Holty (American, 1900-1973)
Date: 1947
Dimensions:
H: 51 in. (129.5 cm); W: 42 in. (106.7 cm)
Medium: Oil on canvas
Classification: Paintings
Credit Line: Gift of the Woodward Foundation, by exchange
Object number: 2005.107
Label Text:"In breaking up the shapes or forms, it is imperative not to attempt to rejoin them because that leads to transformation only. By breaking them and keeping them broken, the forms, large and small, are simply densities in the rhythmic movement of color and shapes."
Carl Holty was a founding member of the pioneering American Abstract Artists (AAA) group in 1936, which laid the foundation for the Abstract Expressionists and the dominance of American gestural painting of a generation later. His style in the 1930s utilized geometric shapes and biomorphic forms (irregular, based on living organisms), but by the 1940s, his painting style began to loosen and become freer and more fragmented, as can be seen in Abstract, 1947.
Carl Holty was a founding member of the pioneering American Abstract Artists (AAA) group in 1936, which laid the foundation for the Abstract Expressionists and the dominance of American gestural painting of a generation later. His style in the 1930s utilized geometric shapes and biomorphic forms (irregular, based on living organisms), but by the 1940s, his painting style began to loosen and become freer and more fragmented, as can be seen in Abstract, 1947.
On view
In Collection(s)