AMERICAN ABSTRACT ARTISTS 1938
American Abstract Artists
[American Abstract Artists]: AMERICAN ABSTRACT ARTISTS 1938. New York: Metropolitan Printers, Inc. for American Abstract Artists, 1938. First edition. Quarto. Printed wrappers.. Unpaginated. 46 black and white plates. 11 essays. Covers lightly soiled and rubbed, with a chipped spine heel. Former owner signature to title page. Thumbnail size impression to upper edge of textblock, affecting neither artwork nor text. A nearly very good copy of this fragile production. Scarce.
6.25 x 9.25 softcover yearbook with 46 black and white plates and 11 essays. AAA Officers for 1938: Carl Robert Holty, Chairman; Harry Holtzman, Secretary; and Paul Kelpe, Treasurer.
Contents:
- Charles G. Shaw: A Word to the Objector
- Albert Swiden: On Simplification
- George L. K. Morris: The Quest for an Abstract Tradition
- Robert Jay Wolff: Toward a Direct Vision
- Harry Holtzman: Attitude and Means
- Alice Mason: Concerning Plastic Significance
- Rosalind Bengelsdorf: The New Realism
- Ibram Lassaw: On Inventing our Own Art
- Ralph Rosenborg: Non-Objective Creative Expression
- Frederick Kann: In Defense of Abstract Art
- Balcomb Greene: Expression as Production
Contains work by Beckford Young, Ibram Lassaw, Frederick Kann, Balcomb Greene, David Smith, Herzl Emmanuel, Warren Wheelock, Anna Cohen, A. N. Christie, Ilya Bolotowsky, Byron Browne, Charles G. Shaw, Vaclav Vytlacil, Leo Lances, Ray Kaiser, Jeanne Carles (also called Mercedes Carles, later Mercedes Matter), Robert Jay Wolff, Fritz Glarner, Josef Albers, Gertrude Greene, A. E. Gallatin, Agnes Lyall, Florence Swift, Esphyr Slobodkina, Janet Young, Harry Bowden, Rosalind Bengelsdorf, George L. K. Morris, Werner Drewes, Haaniah Harari, Ralph M. Rosenborg, Rupert Davidson Turnbull, Carl Robert Holty, Susie Frelinghuysen, Paul Kelpe, Albert Swiden, Dorothy Joralemon, Louis Schranker, Margaret Peterson, Wilfrid Zogbaum, Giorgio Cavallon, Rudolph Weisenborn, Harry I. Wildenberg, and Frederick J. Whiteman.
American Abstract Artists was founded in 1936 in New York City, at a time when abstract art was met with strong critical resistance. During the 1930s and early 1940s, AAA provided exhibition opportunities when few existed. Its publishing, panels and lectures provided a forum for discussion and gave abstract art theoretical support in the United States. AAA was a predecessor to the New York School and Abstract Expressionism, and contributed to the development and acceptance of abstract art in the United States. American Abstract Artists is one of the few artists’ organizations to survive from the Great Depression and continue into the 21st century.
Here is the Editorial Statement from American Abstract Artists 1938 Yearbook:
By the fact of their active existence and production, the American Abstract Artists express the authenticity and autonomy of the modern art movement in the United States. The word abstract is incorporated into our title as a provisional gesture so that we can be identified as a particular group in our effort to clarify growing and actively significant concepts of art.
Abstract, like so many other words, is too often used as an idiosyncratic suggestion, rather than as a concept which defines particular values. To understand abstract art is, in reality, no more a problem than understanding any and all art. And this depends upon the ability of the individual to perceive essentials, to perceive that which is called universally significant, and to evaluate the unity and relationship that is contained in any work.
As the first and only comprehensive organization of its type in the United States, we are faced with the familiar problem of a largely unsympathetic and biased criticism, a criticism which merely negates, condemns, or ridicules. There is, however, a more encouraging response to our exhibitions and lectures, a response that could be especially experienced only by the form and action of a representative and authentic organization. Individuals working and studying against the odds of isolation can now be articulate and related to others working in similar directions.
The membership of this group is homogeneous to the extent of its recognition of the mutual problems and limitations, and in its willingness to cooperate in the presentation and solution of these problems. We are, as in any group, heterogeneous and diverse in our concepts.
To place artistic, or any cultural effort on the level of a competition is to negate the method and meaning of knowledge. American Abstract Artists dedicates itself to the problems of the artist and student, presented in the terms of method and activity that define the artist; and limits itself accordingly for the purpose of clarification. As to the question of which aspects of life affect the artist in his effort, this is demonstrated by the character and efficacy of his activity and production; for this we present the individual artist.
No educated intelligence can draw the so-called line of national culture as an ambition and objective, without discerning its ambiguity. Beside being impossible, such a misconception is a negation of the very essence of cultural effort; the general heightening and application of knowledge. To make this negation may be politically expedient but it serves only to preserve and sway ignorance. While knowledge belongs to no nationality, particular nations do exist, and each nation has, and is, a peculiar and limited cultural development.
Considering the tempo of present political history and the importance of the various fields of knowledge in relationship to it, we can do nothing better than emphasize tha the contemporary must respect the interpretation and concatenation of all culture. True culture is recognizable when established from the standpoint of scientific thought and effort. For us it is established through the freedom to develop facilities and to maintain their proportional distribution, as civilized achievements, toward the enlivenment of existence—an unequivocal application toward the physical and psychic benefit of all humanity.
For these reasons, American Abstract Artists was formed in November of 1936. It has now attained a national scope and is more active in 1938. —The Editors