Willem De Kooning Attic History

Between 1946 and 1949 de kooning produced a series of highly abstract black and white paintings that culminated in attic in which angular thrusting forms collide with organic curvilinear ones to yield a high pitched expressive picture.

Willem de kooning attic history.

Most of the paintings in the exhibition resembled untitled compositions painted in black and white with vaguely recognizable shapes and complex plays of figure and ground. In 1943 he married painter elaine fried. Willem de kooning born april 24 1904 rotterdam netherlands died march 19 1997 east hampton new york u s dutch born american painter who was one of the leading exponents of abstract expressionism particularly the form known as action painting during the 1930s and 40s de kooning worked simultaneously in figurative and abstract modes but by about 1945 these two tendencies. Perhaps more than any of his contemporaries he developed a radically abstract style of painting that fused cubism surrealism and expressionism while many of his colleagues moved from figuration to.

De kooning was already forty four years old when he had his first solo exhibition at the charlie egan gallery in the spring of 1948. He was born in rotterdam and moved to the united states in 1926 becoming an american citizen in 1962. Even the artist s most abstract works says scholar richard shiff. Summary of willem de kooning.

One of the most prominent and celebrated of the abstract expressionist painters willem de kooning s pictures typify the vigorous gestural style of the movement. Driven by an acutely perceptive mind a strong work ethic and persistent self doubt coupled with the determination to achieve the charismatic de kooning became one of america s and the twentieth century s most influential artists. His father was leendert de kooning and his mother was cornelia nobel. Willem de kooning was born on april 24 1904 into a working class family in rotterdam the netherlands.

In the years after world war ii de kooning painted in a style that came to be. The show was little noticed in the press but it jolted the artists of the. Willem de kooning known as one of the most renowned abstract expressionist in the history of art has influenced numerous artists during his time and even years after his death. Figural elements punctuate the ambiguous space in attic 1949 one in a series of de kooning postwar black and white compositions.

The dense web of white shapes and black lines makes it difficult to sort out relationships between form. A tour de force of de kooning s gestural style easter monday bristles with energy. April 24 1904 march 19 1997 was a dutch american abstract expressionist artist.