Pattern and Decoration
Encyclopedia
Pattern and Decoration was an art movement
Art movement
An art movement is a tendency or style in art with a specific common philosophy or goal, followed by a group of artists during a restricted period of time, or, at least, with the heyday of the movement defined within a number of years...

 situated in the United States from the mid 1970s to the early 1980s. The movement has sometimes been referred to as "P&D" or as The New Decorativeness.
The movement was championed by the gallery owner Holly Solomon.
The movement was the subject of a retrospective museum show at the Hudson River Museum
Hudson River Museum
The Hudson River Museum, located in Trevor Park in Yonkers, New York, is the largest museum in Westchester County. The Yonkers Museum, founded in 1919 at City Hall, became the Hudson River Museum in 1948...

 which closed in January 2008.

Background

In the mid twentieth century "decorative" was a term only used to detract, in contemporary art parlance. Decorative was equated with trivial.

The prevailing negative view of decoration was one not generally shared by non-Western culture
Western culture
Western culture, sometimes equated with Western civilization or European civilization, refers to cultures of European origin and is used very broadly to refer to a heritage of social norms, ethical values, traditional customs, religious beliefs, political systems, and specific artifacts and...

s. Intricate and well-thought-out patterning is found in Islamic
Islamic art
Islamic art encompasses the visual arts produced from the 7th century onwards by people who lived within the territory that was inhabited by or ruled by culturally Islamic populations...

, Byzantine
Byzantine art
Byzantine art is the term commonly used to describe the artistic products of the Byzantine Empire from about the 5th century until the Fall of Constantinople in 1453....

, and Celtic
Celtic art
Celtic art is the art associated with the peoples known as Celts; those who spoke the Celtic languages in Europe from pre-history through to the modern period, as well as the art of ancient peoples whose language is uncertain, but have cultural and stylistic similarities with speakers of Celtic...

 art.

Development

Pattern and Decoration artists were reacting against minimalism
Minimalism
Minimalism describes movements in various forms of art and design, especially visual art and music, where the work is set out to expose the essence, essentials or identity of a subject through eliminating all non-essential forms, features or concepts...

 but they often retained the same "flattening grid" frequently employed by minimalist painters. Whereas minimalist paintings were austere, P&D paintings were boldly colored, and sometimes suggestive of floral patterns.

Some work fitting into the P&D movement could be considered applied art.
Some of the artists produced work other than paintings, such as tiles made by Joyce Kozloff.
There were also connections between the Pattern and Decoration movement and the Feminist art movement
Feminist art movement
The feminist art movement refers to the efforts and accomplishments of feminists internationally to make art that reflects women's lives and experiences, as well as to change the foundation for the production and reception of contemporary art. It also sought to bring more visibility to women within...

.

Participating artists

  • Cynthia Carlson
  • Brad Davis
  • Valerie Jaudon
  • Jane Kaufman
  • Joyce Kozloff
    Joyce Kozloff
    Joyce Kozloff, b. 1942, is an American artist commonly associated with the Pattern and Decoration movement of the 1970s - and with artists whose work is based on cartography since the early 1990s....

  • Robert Kushner
  • Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt
    Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt
    Thomas Lanigan-Schmidt is an American artist who is also a veteran of the Stonewall riots.Lanigan-Schmidt's artwork incorporates materials such as tinsel, foil, cellophane, saran wrap and glitter, embracing kitsch and intentionally tacky....

  • Kim MacConnel
    Kim MacConnel
    Kim MacConnel is an American artist who works with painting, sculpture, and mixed media-collage/fabric. MacConnel is a seminal figure in the Pattern and Decoration movement of the seventies, but overall MacConnel’s oeuvre has surpassed being categorized...

  • Sonya Rapoport
    Sonya Rapoport
    Sonya Rapoport is an American conceptual/digital artist and New media artist who has created computer-assisted interactive installations and participatory web-based artworks.-Early life:...

  • Tony Robbin
    Tony Robbin
    Tony Robbin is an American artist and author, who works with painting, sculpture and computer visualizations.He is considered part of the Pattern and Decoration art movement.-Work:...

  • Miriam Schapiro
    Miriam Schapiro
    Miriam Schapiro is a Canadian-born artist based in America. She is a pioneer of feminist art. She is also considered part of the Pattern and Decoration art movement....

  • Ned Smyth
  • Betty Woodman
    Betty Woodman
    Betty Woodman is an American artist.- Work and Influences :Internationally recognized as one of today’s most important sculptors using ceramics, Betty Woodman's career began in the 1950s as a production potter with the aim of creating beautiful objects to enhance everyday life...

  • George Woodman
    George Woodman
    George Woodman is an American ceramicist, painter, and photographer.-Biography:Woodman was born in 1932. He went to Harvard University and married Betty Woodman in 1953. After earning a master's degree in painting at the University of New Mexico, he taught painting and art criticism at the...

  • Robert Zakanitch
    Robert Zakanitch
    Robert Zakanitch is an American painter and was one of the founders of the Pattern & Decorative movement. His work is held in the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, among others....


External links

  • Slide show presented by the New York Times of several examples of "Pattern and Decoration" artworks.
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