Surrealists in New York: Atelier 17 and the Birth of Abstract Expressionism

Interesting online lecture from ARTscapades on the effect of the Surrealists arriving in New York from Paris in the Second World War.

Charles Darwent, the author of a book on the subject, focused on the Atelier 17 set up by the English artists S.W. Hayter originally in Paris and later in New York and the artists who gravitated to it. I had never realised before that Abstract Expressionism had its roots in Surrealist ideas of the unconscious in art. I wouldn’t have classed Pollock and co as surrealists but this talk helped me understand those links.

I was particularly interested in the idea that when the French first arrived they couldn’t communicate with the American as many didn’t speak English but they congregate at the Jumble Shop restaurant where they started communicate via drawings and sharing works.