Clement Greenberg is considered one of the greatest art critics of the xx century and whose work is related to the American Abstract Expressionist Movement.
Roger Eliot Fry was a painter and critic of British Art. He took sides in defense of Fauvism. Defender of contemporary French painting of the late nineteenth century.
What they had in common is that both did not believe that art could be measured by moral criteria, but that it should be evaluated according to the beauty of the form and lines.
Both were able to discuss art formally, without attributing any meaning to the deeper emotional meaning or overtures that underlie any painting. They believed that the success of art could be judged on the basis of its form rather than on the basis of its content, and that the form of a painting could not be interpreted significantly.
They were able to appreciate art strictly on the basis of its form, keeping the meaning of art at bay. Abstract art poses a peculiar problem for some viewers, since a recognizable image is absent and its criticism of formalism is based precisely on this absence of image.
