Grace Hartigan March 28 is the birthday of one of Abstract Expressionists' leading female artists: Grace Hartigan. She was well known for her gestural,
“MoMA included Hartigan in two major group exhibitions, 12 Americans (1956) and The New American Painting, a traveling exhibition that introduced Abstract Expressionism to Europe in 1958. She was the only female artist in that show. In May, 1957, Life magazine named her ‘the most celebrated of the young American women painters.’”
“Although an Abstract Expressionist painter, Hartigan never broke entirely with the figurative tradition. It was poet Frank O’Hara’s blending of so-called “high art” and “low art” in his poetry that inspired her to use more figuration and images from everyday life in her work. For this reason, these works are often considered precursors to Pop Art—a movement Hartigan herself actually did not like.“