Introduction to American Color Field Painting
By Kathleen Karlsen, MA
The extraordinary artistic movement known as American Color Field Painting both continued and challenged prior esthetic traditions. This relatively short-lived movement nevertheless influenced the entire world of art. Learn more.

Color Symbolism: New Meanings in Color Field Painting
By Kathleen Karlsen, MA
Historically speaking, color has traditionally embodied a fairly codified set of associative symbols. The use of color in contemporary works has often rejected these traditional meanings. Read more.

Cubism and Color Field Painting
By Kathleen Karlsen, MA
In spite of the almost undeniable links between Impressionism and Color Field painting, it is instead the connection between Cubism and Color Field painting that is most readily admitted by Color Field painters themselves. However, this is not to say that Color Field painters adopted the conventions of Cubism. Read more.

Color Field Painting and Abstract Expressionism
By Kathleen Karlsen, MA
The contemporary movement known as Abstract Expressionism greatly affected Color Field artists. In fact, many art historians refer to the Color Field painters in general as “second generation” Abstract Expressionists. The movements share two fundamental characteristics: the overall composition and a large scale. Read more.

Color Field Painting and Fauvism
By Kathleen Karlsen, MA
Fauvism, a short-lived approach to painting focused in France between 1905 and 1907, was characterized by inventive shapes and lines, a pictorial logic based on internal relationships rather than naturalism, and the use of bright, sensationalistic color. The central role of color in painting is the aspect of Fauvism most notably shared with the American Color Field painters. Read more.

Color Field Painting and Surrealism
By Kathleen Karlsen, MA
The artistic quest for liberation, focused in Fauvism on the authenticity of feeling created by color, became the more ambitious quest of the Surrealists for liberation from both logic and morality. Dreams were seen as the gateway to art, and melancholy and fear tok precedence over optimism and joy. Read more.

Jackson Pollack and Color Field Painting
By Kathleen Karlsen, MA
Of the three primary American Color Field painters, Frankenthaler was the most closely associated with Jackson Pollack. Frankenthaler, often accompanied by the prominent art critic Clement Greenberg, visited Pollack and his wife on their New York farm on number of occasions. Read more.

Piet Mondrian and Color Field Painting
By Kathleen Karlsen, MA
Piet Mondrian, an exceptional Dutch painter, arrived at abstraction via Cubism. Mondrian's work was based on a grid structure and the simplified color scheme of blue, yellow, red, black and white. Read more.