John Wilmerding's American Art attempts a fresh approach to this unevenly known subject, focusing primarily on the meaning of American images and forms from the beginning to the present day. While including essential biographical facts about artists and information about the development of their careers as well as on larger stylistic currents, this survey presents rather ideas for understanding works of a given period. Although American painting receives primary and full attention, sculpture, prints, and photography are also discussed-not as separate developments in themselves, but within a common broad cultural context. The author strives to illuminate the continuities in America art, including those that link the breakthroughs of Abstract Expressionism and subsequent contemporary movements to earlier traditions and artistic forms. From this effort the indigenous nature and qualities of American art emerge - its stress on practicality and inventiveness, its celebration of discovery, youth, and rawness, its vision of plenitude and optimism. By considering, sometimes anew, the interrelations among the various arts in America, as well as their evolving characteristics, the author provides both a broad survey and a probing interpretation of the American creative imagination.