Art Informel is a French style of abstract painting in the 1940s and 1950s. It is often considered to be the European offshoot of abstract expressionism. Sometimes referred also to as Tashism, Art Autre or Lyrical Abstraction, it was a type of abstraction in which form became subservient to the expressive impulses of the artist, and it was thus diametrically opposed to the cool rationalism of geometric abstraction. Term was coined in 1950 by the French critic Michel Tapi, primarily in relation to the work of Wols. Here are some of his pictures which marked the beginning of Art Informel movement:
Following the lead of Surrealist automatism, current in Surrealism, Art informel pictures were executed spontaneously and often at speed so as to give vent to the subconscious of the artist. Though embodying a wide range of approaches to abstraction, the brushwork in such works is generally gestural or calligraphic. Sometimes there is an emphasis on the texture or tactile quality of the paint, leading to a variant of Art informel referred to as Matter Painting.
Antecedents of this style were Vasily Kandinsky, Paul Klee and Jean Dubuffet and particularly Andre Masson. In its more precise historical sense its pioneers were artists based in Paris, such as Jean Fautrier and Hans Hartung. Hartung in particular was producing paintings with many of the features of Art informel by the mid-1930s.
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