Expressionism was used for the first time in 1919 to explain the abstract paintings of the German Expressionists that did not have a figurative understanding. At the beginning of the 20th century, Paris was accepted as the center of art. The negative effects of the war in European countries during the Second World War and the restriction of freedoms caused many artists to immigrate to New York. Thus, New York has become the center of abstract art. American artists have made large-scale works under the name of the "Federal Art Project". These works created for a specific purpose hindered the creativity of the artists. Artists who were asked to make social realist works within the scope of this program, on the contrary, turned to abstract painting under the leadership of European artists. During this period, the action pointing style paintings of Jackson Pollock, who immigrated from Europe to America, became a good example for them. In the second half of the 1940s, it was seen that two pictorial styles were formed within abstract expressionism. The first of these is the paintings in which Willem de Kooning reflects the unconscious realities by using the female figure, and the second is the paintings that turn to the understanding of form in which all the details in the paintings of Mark Rothko disappear. In this study, scanning model was used as the research model. In the research, the necessary resources for the study were obtained by scanning the literature. As a result of the research, it has been seen that the place of abstract and concrete painting seen in the Abstract Expressionism art movement continues in the social and political understanding of the period.

Keywords: Abstract Expressionism, Figure, War, Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning