It seems to me that Soutine’s complete lack of interest in the cubists’ desire for order was exactly what appealed to de Kooning.
Willem de Kooning
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A Long-Lost de Kooning Is Being Restored, But Will Always Bear the Scars of Its Theft
Willem de Kooning’s “Woman–Ochre” was missing for over 30 years. Now recovered, it shows signs of mishandling and amateur restoration that are difficult to fix.
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The Met’s Wrong Turn on Revisionism
When an exhibition is as puzzling as this one, it’s useful to step aside and reflect.
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An Ambitious Survey of the Titans of Abstract Expressionism
This expansive AbEx show is brash, irreverent, and unconstrained, just like the period it aims to express.
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From Michelangelo to Marden, Seven Fierce Fistfights from Art History
WASHINGTON, DC — In her ongoing series Le ‘NEW’ Monocle, Shana Lutker creates stage sets and performances based on the circumstances and philosophical undertones of fistfights instigated by Surrealists in Paris in the 1920s.
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The Triumph of Revisionism: The Whitney’s American Century
With America Is Hard to See, the exhibition inaugurating its luminous new Renzo Piano building, the Whitney has reclaimed its role among the city’s museums as the engine of the new.
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Afterlives of Mesopotamian Artifacts, from Flapper Fashion to de Kooning
After excavation, ancient artifacts embark on an afterlife of interpretation. From Ancient to Modern explores how the archaeology of Mesopotamia reflected fashions and academia of the 1920s and 30s, and influenced contemporary art.
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Midcentury Expressionist Drama, Novelized
PARIS — I recently met in my studio the writer Jake Lamar, a New York ex-pat living in Paris, and spoke to him about his new novel, Postérité (The original English title is “Posthumous”), that will be published today in French by Rivages.
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Mining the Art World
LONDON — The world of Gardar Eide Einarsson is one of resistance, negation, and opposition. His works are usually based on coded messages and decontextualized signs taken from various subcultures, hard-core punk, and criminality, with references to terrorists and murderers.
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America’s Grand Gestures Reign Supreme Again in Basel
BASEL, Switzerland — Fifty-five years ago, the exhibition The New American Painting arrived at the Kunsthalle Basel. It was the first stop on a yearlong tour that touted the work of seventeen Abstract Expressionists before eight European countries — the first comprehensive exhibition to be sent to Europe showing the advanced tendencies in American painting. All but five of the original artists from the show had work on view at last weekend’s Art Basel, where postwar American painting and sculpture dominated the halls.
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Flying Blind: de Kooning’s “Closed-Eye” Drawings
There are 24 charcoal drawings now on display at the Museum of Modern Art that Willem de Kooning did with his eyes closed. This was not an uncommon thing for de Kooning, who often liked to close his eyes, or avert his eyes, or use them to watch TV while he drew. This may sound like a gimmick, or some kind of dada or surrealist gambit, or an act of desperation from an artist running on fumes. But it was none of these.
Posted inOpinion
The Gallery of Lost Art
Although the art world — especially the contemporary one, where nearly everything has retail value — likes to preserve and maintain artworks as much as it can, it’s inevitable that some pieces get lost along the way.