Greenberg had made a similar point in his “‘American-Type’ Painting” of 1955, referring to the “pallid French equivalent” of the “galaxy of powerfully talented and original painters” who had established New York as the center of western art. Critical accounts of many of the artists were also similar, with both writers describing the effects created by forms and colours. There were, however, some differences. Greenberg discusses Barnett Newman's “deep and honest” paintings in terms of hue and flatness, whereas Alloway sees them environmentally: the large size of the works means that, when other viewers come between you and the picture,

Lest the reader thought he might be seeing the works just environmentally, Alloway goes on to write that their ambient role, “combined with the spirit of gravity and momentousness which is Newman's reason for working, justifies such ambitious titles as Concord, Abraham, Adam (as well as the Onement series). His art is like a rock.” On his trip to the USA in 1958, Betty Parsons had driven Alloway to Bennington to see Newman's first retrospective that included eighteen works painted between 1946 and 1952. Greenberg had written the catalogue essay. Back in New York, Alloway visited Newman in his studio where he saw the artist's current work. The conversations with Newman had a major effect on Alloway: “The experiencing of knowing Barnett Newman had a great deal to do with my getting away from the formal outlook. Standing in front of a 17 or 18 foot painting, a long red painting, mainly red, Barney said, ‘I'm not really interested in red, you know.’ It was what red expressed, what it signified.” Alloway later wrote about the content of Newman's work in “The American Sublime” in 1963.