Motherwell, Robert Burns

Motherwell, Robert Burns (1915-1991), American painter, born in Aberdeen, Washington, one of the founders of Abstract Expressionism and one of its most prolific and articulate exponents. In 1941, he abandoned his literary and psychological studies to take up painting, working entirely in an abstract style. His first solo exhibition was in 1944 at the Art of This Century Gallery in New York. Thereafter Motherwell exhibited widely in the United States and Europe. He represented the United States at the Venice Biennale in Italy in 1950 and at the São Paulo Bienal in Brazil in 1961. His best-known works are The Crossing (1948, Rockefeller Collections, New York) and his large, powerful, nonrepresentational series of paintings in black and white, entitled Elegy to the Spanish Republic, consisting of more than 100 canvases inspired by the Spanish Civil War, and painted between 1949 and 1976. The use of large areas of colour characterize Motherwell's later work, often called the Window-and-Wall series.