The Postwar Figure
While both American and European artists were influenced by the postwar rhetoric of anxiety, alienation and disillusionment, the American school was also heavily influenced by Surrealism, and moved increasingly toward reductive abstraction and away from representing biomorphic forms as a means for pursuing the self-expression of the unconscious. Unlike American Expressionism, which was more abstract, many European painters maintained the primacy of the figure in their work. More concerned with the philosophical and cultural movement of Existentialism, European artists grappled with the meaning of the figure and its isolated, individual experience of the world. Existentialist themes often framed the work of figurative artists such as Francis Bacon , Lucian Freud, and Alberto Giacometti . Bacon and Freud were British painters who often painted expressive portraits that were noted for their psychological penetration. Giacometti was a Swiss painter and sculptor mostly known for his sculptures of isolated, attenuated figures. These figures were thought to reflect the postwar view that life was increasingly void of meaning.