Neo-expressionism  

From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia

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Neo-expressionism was a style of modern painting that emerged in the late 1970s and dominated the art market until the mid-1980s. Related to American Lyrical Abstraction it developed in Europe as a reaction against the conceptual and minimalistic art of the 1970s. Neo-expressionists returned to portraying recognizable objects, such as the human body (although sometimes in a virtually abstract manner), in a rough and violently emotional way using vivid colours and banal colour harmonies. Overtly inspired by the so-called German Expressionist painters--Emil Nolde, Max Beckmann, George Grosz--and other emotive artist such as James Ensor and Edvard Munch. The popularity of the style, or partially even the style itself, was created by aggressive marketing and media promotion by the art dealers and galleries.

Neo-expressionism around the world

• Germany
  • Georg Baselitz (often considered the leading developer of the style)
  • Anselm Kiefer
  • Jörg Immendorff
  • Neo-expressionists were sometimes called Neue Wilde ('The new wild ones'; 'New Fauves' would better meet the meaning of the term).
• USA
  • Jean-Michel Basquiat
  • Eric Fischl
  • David Salle
  • Julian Schnabel
  • Edgar Yaeger
  • The style had many alternative names, such as new fauvism, punk art and bad painting, the latter one given by the critics of the style.
• France
  • Rémi Blanchard
  • François Boisrond
  • Robert Combas
  • Hervé Di Rosa
  • The style was sometimes called Figuration Libre.
• Italy
  • Francesco Clemente
  • Sandro Chia
  • Enzo Cucchi
  • The style was sometimes called Transavantgarde (beyond avant-garde).
• England
  • David Hockney
  • Frank Auerbach
  • Leon Kossoff
• The Netherlands
  • Menno Baars
• South Africa
  • Marlene Dumas
• Spain
  • Miquel Barcelo
• Australia
  • George Gittoes (War Artist)