The early American modernists may be usefully understood as the generation of artists born primarily between 1875 and 1890 who promulgated the new languages of modern art—fauvism, cubism, futurism, orphism, synchromism, expressionism, Dada—both in the United States and abroad. This remarkably small group constituted a true avant-garde; over the course of the twentieth century legions of artists would follow in their wake. Yet as the century unfolded, the contribution of these painters and sculptors to the history of modernism was at times illuminated and at other times obscured. A point of near total eclipse was reached after World War II, with the promotion of abstract expressionism as the ultimate “triumph” of American painting. During the last quarter of the twentieth century, a clearer vision emerged of the early American modernists’ crucial role in the development of a modernist culture both in America and Europe. The Shein Collection, consisting of twenty representative works by nineteen of the most important first-generation modernists, reflects this greater understanding.
