From Library Journal
$35. art A straightforward, no-frills monograph on the life and work of one of the most important post-World War II artists. A prominent member of the New York School, de Kooning has, over 60 years, created a body of work that in its own way charts the development and direction of mid-20th-century American art. Selected works illustrate the evolution from figurative painting through the black-and-white period, the multiple studies and versions of the Woman series, the Hampton landscapes, the serious involvement with sculpture, and the current, open, essentially line and color paintings. The artist's relationships with contemporaries and with predecessors are examined. A sound contribution to this series. Paula Frosch, Metropolitan Museum of Art Lib., New York
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Kurzbeschreibung
Willem de Kooning arrived in the United States in 1926 as a twenty-two-year-old stowaway from Holland, soon to become a leading figure in the emergence of abstract expressionist painting in New York. This volume presents over 100 illustrations of every phase of de Kooning's artistic evolution, and explains the personal and art historical background behind his groundbreaking work and its critical reception.
Author Sally Yard details the progress of de Kooning's career, from his brief stint as a WPA painter, to his first one-person exhibition of abstract work in 1948, Five years later, an exhibition of women painted in aggressive, lashing gestures stunned contemporaries, not only for the vehemence of the artist's attack, but also for the reversal of direction from abstraction to figuration. The alternation and intertwining of these two genres remained fundamental to de Kooning's work over six decades.
Lavish illustrations and Sally Yard's accessible scholarly discussion make this book invaluable for anyone seeking to understand the work and impact of this twentieth-century master.
