The term Abstract Expressionism originally gained currency
during the 1920s as a description of Wassily Kandinsky’s
abstract paintings. It was first used to describe contemporary
painting by the writer Robert Coates, in the March 30, 1946,
issue of the New Yorker. Abstract Expressionism’s most
articulate advocates, the critics Harold Rosenberg and Clement
Greenberg, originated the names Action painting and American-
style painting, respectively. In the United States, Abstract
Expressionism (or simply Ab Ex or even AE) was the name that
stuck. The European variant was dubbed Art Informel by the
French critic Michel TapiÉ in his 1952 book Un Art autre
(Another art). Abstract Expressionism was the first art movement
with joint European-American roots, reflecting the influence of
European artists who had fled Hitler-dominated Europe (Max
Ernst, Fernand LÉger, Matta, and Piet Mondrian among them).
Abstract Expressionists synthesized numerous sources from the
history of modern painting, ranging from the expressionis