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Modern Masters Series #2
Willem De Kooning
About the Modern Masters
With informative, enjoyable texts and over 100 illustrations ― approximately 48 in full color &mdash this innovative series offers a fresh look at the most creative and influential artists of the postwar era. The authors are highly respected art historians and critics chosen for their ability to think clearly and write well. Each handsomely designed volume presents a thorough survey of the artist's life and work, as well as statements by the artist, an illustrated chapter on technique, a chronology, lists of exhibitions and public collections, an annotated bibliography, and an index. Every art lover, from the casual museumgoer to the serious student, teacher, critic, or curator, will be eager to collect these Modern Masters. And with such a low price, they can afford to collect them all.
With informative, enjoyable texts and over 100 illustrations ― approximately 48 in full color &mdash this innovative series offers a fresh look at the most creative and influential artists of the postwar era. The authors are highly respected art historians and critics chosen for their ability to think clearly and write well. Each handsomely designed volume presents a thorough survey of the artist's life and work, as well as statements by the artist, an illustrated chapter on technique, a chronology, lists of exhibitions and public collections, an annotated bibliography, and an index. Every art lover, from the casual museumgoer to the serious student, teacher, critic, or curator, will be eager to collect these Modern Masters. And with such a low price, they can afford to collect them all.
- GenresArt
128 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
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March 10, 2020
One of the qualities of this monograph on De Kooning is the reconstruction of his first period before the famous Women series, when the painter still played with the figures without indulging in realism. Abstract figures were destined to emerge by background, were unquieting the surface where the human anatomy is still present but as a ghostly figuration. After many explorations at the boundaries, De Kooning found his totem in a quirky, virulent exposition of the female disorder...In June 1950, De Kooning finished a painting titled Excavation, really beautiful but also light and moderate despite its interior movements. Woman I is an image completely different. It seems De Kooning was fascinated by this “ancient siren”, as Harry F. Gaugh wrote, that was appearing to him in different versions almost shaping an unfinished work. Siren or monster?
In any case, the influence of Picasso for my regard is evident. Not only for some resemblance but for the gesture and taste of freedom. “Oddly enough”, wrote Gaugh, “they are not erotic paintings, yet not because their subjects suffer any inhibitions”. These pictures are not “erotic”, it’s true. But they don’t belong quietly near some archetype or any ritual image of woman, like the critic supposed here. I guess that is a misunderstanding cultivated for many years by critics. Also if some influence of ancient figures of Venus may be suggested here, the inspiration probably exploded by the deep of predatorial life of the consumers in the late Fifties (Gaugh remember this when he write about De Kooning’s friendship with Meyer Schapiro). De Kooning attacked the American way of life and he transformed that in a masquerade like his Belgian colleague James Ensor – only style and era are different. Jackson Pollock was fascinated by Freud, but De Kooning was very direct like a boxer on a ring. Brushstrokes like form of revenge?
In any case, the influence of Picasso for my regard is evident. Not only for some resemblance but for the gesture and taste of freedom. “Oddly enough”, wrote Gaugh, “they are not erotic paintings, yet not because their subjects suffer any inhibitions”. These pictures are not “erotic”, it’s true. But they don’t belong quietly near some archetype or any ritual image of woman, like the critic supposed here. I guess that is a misunderstanding cultivated for many years by critics. Also if some influence of ancient figures of Venus may be suggested here, the inspiration probably exploded by the deep of predatorial life of the consumers in the late Fifties (Gaugh remember this when he write about De Kooning’s friendship with Meyer Schapiro). De Kooning attacked the American way of life and he transformed that in a masquerade like his Belgian colleague James Ensor – only style and era are different. Jackson Pollock was fascinated by Freud, but De Kooning was very direct like a boxer on a ring. Brushstrokes like form of revenge?
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