Paulina Hatzioanidis Modern Art: Willem de Kooning 8 December

Introduction:

Willem de Kooning’s paintings integrate elements of cubism, surrealism, and ​ expressionism.1 De Kooning himself has emphasized on many occasions the importance of

Cubism, especially Picasso’s works. De Kooning states “Picasso is the man to beat.”2 While his reputation remains within the realm of abstraction, traditional subjects continuously arise within his work.3 Specifically looking at his women series, De Kooning’s work is distinctive because he continuously explored the tension between abstractionism and representation. The abstraction within his paintings, particularly in Woman (1952), Women Singing II (1966), Woman Sag ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Harbor (1964), Woman as landscape (1965–1966), and The Visit (1966-1967) is grounded by ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ “figurative innuendo”4 - the suggestion of figures. By dissolving the foreground into the background through the process of fragmentation, manipulation of perspective, and extension of limbs and flattening of bodies, de Kooning evokes both mysterious allure and sympathetic discomfort in the viewer.

1 "Willem de Kooning Biography, Art, and Analysis of Works." The Art Story. Accessed October 29, 2017. http://www.m.theartstory.org/artist-de-kooning-willem.htm. 2Exhibit-E.com. "Biography - The Artist." Willem de Kooning Foundation. Accessed October 29, 2017. http://www.dekooning.org/the-artist/biography. 3 "Oxford Art Online." Willem de Kooning . Accessed October 29, 2017. http://www.oxfordartonline.com/subscriber/article/grove/art/T021873pg1?q=willem de kooning&search=quick&pos=1&_start=1#firsthit. 4 Yard, Sally. "The Angel and the Demoiselle: Willem de Koonings "Black Friday"." Record of the Art ​ ​ Museum, Princeton University 50, no. 2 (1991): 2-25. doi:10.2307/3774720. ​

Artist’s Personal vision: ​ Even though de Kooning was considered one of the world's greatest abstract expressionist painters, abstraction on its own was not an aesthetic or practice he strived for.

Instead, he sought to express emotions and moods through non-literal and non-representational means. De Kooning said, "I'm not interested in 'abstracting' or taking things out or reducing ​ painting to design, form, line, and color. I paint this way because I can keep putting more things in it - drama, anger, pain, love, a figure, a horse, my ideas about space. Through your eyes it again becomes an emotion or idea."5 Here, de Kooning says that abstraction is not a mere technical exercise. He does not make his paintings ambiguous for the sake of ambiguity; instead abstraction is the result of de Kooning expressing the complexity of ideas and feelings; abstraction is a means to an end, rather than an end in itself. He goes on to say “...to come to the

‘abstract’ or the ‘nothing,’ [artists] needed many things. Those things were always things in life—a horse, a flower, a milkmaid, the light in a room through a window made of diamond shapes maybe, tables, chairs, and so forth…”6 Here, he is claiming that in order to reach abstraction, the artist has to first start with some sort of representation. This is why the tension between representation and abstraction is so prominent within his work.

5 "Willem de Kooning Biography, Art, and Analysis of Works." The Art Story. Accessed October 29, ​ 2017. http://www.m.theartstory.org/artist-de-kooning-willem.htm. 6 Exhibit-E.com. "What Abstract Art Means to Me - News - The Foundation." Willem de Kooning Foundation. Accessed October 29, 2017. http://www.dekooning.org/documentation/words/what-abstract-art-means-to-me.

Analysis of artwork:

Throughout his work, Willem de Kooning overly sxualizes women’s entire bodies. In

Woman (1952), he sexualizes the figure specifically through his depiction of a mouth. De ​ Kooning uses a female mouth taken from a fashion magazine and then paints a female figure surrounding the mouth. He removes the mouth from its original context to insert it into an entirely different context (one that is more sexual). De Kooning says: “I felt everything ought to ​ have a mouth...I think a mouth is a very funny thing...because you do everything with it. With your ears, you only hear. With your eyes, you don’t put some spinach in your eye… the mouth is a very strange thing to me and of course a woman’s mouth was very appealing..”7 He emphasizes the most important part of a female body to him, and then creates abstraction from there. By ​ blending in the woman's body into the background, abstracting it to the point of being barely visible, de Kooning expresses an underlying theme of sexual desire. It also has surrealist influences by bridging the unconscious desire to the conscious, by using the mouth to create desire even though the rest of the painting has been abstracted. Additionally, the torso of the figure stands out the most, and the breasts are drawn like eyes; we are automatically attracted to both. By doing this, the figure is overly sexualized. There seems to be a smile created by a simple black brushstroke where her pelvis is, drawing additional sexual attention. However, because the figure's legs are closed, the painting gives off a mysterious and contradictory allure, further drawing in the viewer.

7 Chromatichouse. YouTube. May 10, 2010. Accessed December 06, 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6kiVI_KNTY.

This tension between figuration and abstraction is seen in Women Singing II (1966), in ​ ​ which the figures are distorted and broken down into large simple gestural brushstrokes. These brushstrokes, along with the painting’s soft-toned colors, evoke a sense of diffused sensuality.

The suggested figures seem to be moving through the space, and the gestural brushwork gives a ​ sense of motion to a rather flattened pictorial abstracted space. The painting could also be read ​ like a cubist painting, a visual puzzle. The viewer needs to find clues as to where the figure really is in relation to the background. If the viewer locates an arm, his or her eye can put that part in relation to another part and to the rest of the figure and decode the painting. Art historian Richard ​ ​ Schiff has spoken to this effect: “...de Kooning's renderings of the human body test normative limits of optical and kinesthetic tolerance - limits set by the dulling accumulation of everyday experience.”8 De Kooning challenges our daily understandings of the human body by giving us unusual configurations of the female figure, but he also gives us enough spatial cues so that we can still read the existence of a woman’s figure in the painting. For example in Women Singing ​ II, even though the figures’ faces are difficult to decipher, the viewer can make out the figure’s ​ red lips and voluminous hair, thereby knowing that it is a woman. Once the painting has been decoded by the viewer, it evokes a sensation of mood and enjoyment through the artist’s brushwork and use of pastel colors. In conjunction with the title, the viewer gets a sense of joy by knowing that the women are singing. This is further enhanced by the upward movement of the brushstrokes, which give off the sense of a crescendo - an uplifting feeling. Along with the ​ ​ upward movement and soft pastel colors, the figures are in a non-frontal position and have no

8 Shiff, Richard . ""With Closed Eyes": De Kooning's Twist." Master Drawings 40, no. 1 (2002): 73-88. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1554555.

genitals exposed. Due to this, there is an unusual lack of sexual emphasis that is typically found in the rest of de Kooning’s paintings of women. Instead, it seems to emphasizes the softer side of female sexuaity: indirect, pleasant, and fliratious.

Unlike Women Singing II, in Woman Sag Harbor (1964) there is an unusual ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ juxtaposition of raw sensuality, sexuality, distortion, and claustrophobia, all of which combine to create an uncomfortable yet alluring feeling for the viewer. Here, the woman’s figure is overly dramatised to the point where she looks more like a peach-colored, giant creature than a real human. Even though the distortion of her figure takes away from her womanliness, the painting still retains a sexual nature. This is seen in the way in which the figure is positioned. She is standing still, naked, staring at the viewer. Similarly to Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, the ​ ​ ​ ​ figure’s stance expresses confidence. However, in de Kooning’s work, the figure’s facial expression is also horrifying, evoking fear. The artist creates additional discomfort through the incongruence of the painting’s soft, pastel colors, combined with violent gestural brushstrokes.

This discomfort is further heightened by the flattening of space in the painting, giving a sense of claustrophobia. This claustrophobia is emphasized by a "gravitational pull,”9 in which the figure is being forced into abstraction as opposed to becoming abstracted solely through the brush strokes. In Women Singing II, the woman is taking up the entire space and is aggressively being ​ ​ pushed back into abstraction. It is like the background is swallowing her whole. She seems to be frozen or just stuck in that position. It is this aggressive manipulation of the body into the background that gives the sense of claustrophobia. The figure’s stagnant pose along with her

9 Yard, Sally. "The Angel and the Demoiselle: Willem de Koonings "Black Friday"." Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 50, no. 2 (1991): 2-25. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3774720.

terrified facial expression gives a sense of anxiety and contradicts the sensuality that the colors imply.

Compared to the other paintings discussed above, Woman as landscape (1965–1966) is ​ ​ ​ ​ an even more grotesque painting. Not only has the woman’s figure been distorted and blended into the background by vicious brushstrokes, but her face is most terrifying. The difference between the women in Woman as Landscape and Woman Sag Harbor is that the figure’s face in ​ ​ ​ ​ the latter is terrifying, expressing great fear; as the viewer, you are afraid for her. On the other hand, in Woman as landscape, the figure's face is terrifying in a way in which the viewer is ​ ​ ​ ​ afraid of her not for her. Like in Woman Sag Harbor, the colors here again contradict the ​ ​ ​ turbulent emotions the viewer experiences when looking at this. While the light, pastel colors might inspire a sense of calm and happiness, the pained and aggressive look on her face provokes anger and discomfort in the viewer. Again, de Kooning's work is confrontational and experiential. Unlike the gentler Women Singing II, however, Woman as landscape aggressively ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ exploits the figure in a sexual manner. Her legs are wide open, exposing her genitals. While her body is broken down and blurred into the background, her face becomes the most expressive part. Her face is completely distorted with a huge nose and a lopsided head. She looks like she is yelling at the viewer and even seems to be completely uncomfortable with the situation. This puts the viewer in an uncomfortable and confrontational position where the figure in the painting evokes a sense of awkward and frightened engagement on behalf of the viewer. Perhaps the reason for such aggressive anger in the woman's face comes from de Kooning’s emotions himself. de Kooning has has stated that he sometimes incorporates feminine aspects of himself in

his paintings: "I was painting the woman in me.”10 Perhaps he is expressing his subconscious, ​ bringing out the “inherited...feminine in all men, no matter how masculine.” The female figure suggests de Kooning’s inner fight and fear to express his more feminine side.

In The Visit (1966-1967) the woman’s figure is primitive, and unlike the other de ​ ​ ​ ​ Kooning paintings, she carries a sense of confidence. Her body is depicted from the back as she is kneeling, but her torso and head are facing the viewer. This is a pose that is seen in Picasso’s

Les Demoiselles d’Avignon evokes the same confidence and mysterious danger of the femme ​ fatale. This creates a feeling of discomfort for the viewer because it is a physically unnatural pose. She is sexualized as a result of the flattening of her body, emphasizing her breasts. Her legs are overextended, stretched to the point that it just fades into abstraction. Her overall pose looks like a splayed-out rotisserie chicken; she has been objectified so much that she literally appears as a piece of meat. According to art historian Richard Shiff, De Kooning’s gestural brushstrokes extend the figure’s limbs to the point in which the viewer feels uncomfortable, causing the viewer to feel violated as a result:

“...Since you draw out a line or a passage of paint just as you draw out ​ (extend, spread) your arms or legs, to follow a movement of paint from a

distance with the eyes induces a feeling of movement in the limbs. So if a

line stretches a drawn limb too far, the naïve viewer may well feel a

sympathetic pain, a violation. Think of spreading your own body to its

maximum extension: it will help to imagine flattening yourself as much as

10 Landau, Ellen G. Reading abstract expressionism: context and critique. New Haven: Yale University ​ ​ Press, 2005. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt32bk1z.58.

possible against a resistant surface...This stretching or spreading makes a

sentient body very conscious of its existence as physical matter.”11

De Kooning’s extension and flattening technique makes the viewer fully aware of his or her body. By imaging being stretched out in such a way, the viewer can empathize with the pain that is causing the female figure so much discomfort. Additionally, the anger in The Visit comes from ​ ​ ​ ​ the immense distortion and spontaneous brushwork of the painter. De Kooning swirls the paint around on the canvas, leaving no space for the figure to end and for the background to begin; they seem to morph together. Butchering the female figure, yet sexualizing it at the same time, de Kooning incorporated surrealism by expressing the subconscious. According to de Kooning, ​ “..art must spring from the spiral and psychological depths of human experience..”12 To de

Kooning, tapping into the subconscious is how an artist can best express himself through art.

Therefore, in The Visit, de Kooning reflects on the idea of strong and independent femme fatales. ​ ​ He expresses the unconscious sexual desire of men while at the same time depicting the fear they ​ have for strong confident sexual women.

Conclusion

All in all, throughout Woman (1952), Women Singing II (1966), Woman Sag Harbor ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ (1964), Woman as landscape (1965–1966), and The Visit (1966-1967) the interplay between ​ ​ ​ ​ abstraction and representation creates a sense of mysterious allure and sympathetic discomfort in the viewers. Through fragmentation, grand brushstrokes, extension, and the flattening of ​

11 Landau, Ellen G. Reading abstract expressionism: context and critique. New Haven: Yale University ​ ​ Press, 2005. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt32bk1z.58. 12 Yard, Sally. "The Angel and the Demoiselle: Willem de Koonings "Black Friday"." Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 50, no. 2 (1991): 2-25. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3774720.

women’s bodies, de Kooning creates meaning and contradicting moods, all of which add to the complexity of his work. His work allows the viewer a glimpse into his unconscious and they continue to fascinate art lovers throughout the world.

Bibliography:

Landau, Ellen G. Reading abstract expressionism: context and critique. New Haven: Yale ​ ​ University Press, 2005. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt32bk1z.58. ​ ​

Shiff, Richard . ""With Closed Eyes": De Kooning's Twist." Master Drawings 40, no. 1 (2002): 73-88. http://www.jstor.org/stable/1554555. ​ ​

Yard, Sally. "The Angel and the Demoiselle: Willem de Koonings "Black Friday"." Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 50, no. 2 (1991): 2-25. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3774720. ​

Exhibit-E.com. "Biography - The Artist." Willem de Kooning Foundation. Accessed October 29, 2017. http://www.dekooning.org/the-artist/biography. ​ ​

Exhibit-E.com. "What Abstract Art Means to Me - News - The Foundation." Willem de Kooning Foundation. Accessed October 29, 2017. http://www.dekooning.org/documentation/words/what-abstract-art-means-to-me. ​

Yard, Sally. "The Angel and the Demoiselle: Willem de Koonings "Black Friday"." Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 50, no. 2 (1991): 2-25. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3774720.

Shiff, Richard . "Willem de Kooning. New York and Columbus." He Burlington Magazine 141, ​ ​ no. 1154 (1999): 315-17. http://www.jstor.org/stable/888402. ​ ​

Cateforis, David . "Review: Willem de Kooning." Art Journal 53, no. 4, 86-89. ​ ​ http://www.jstor.org/stable/777568. ​

Chromatichouse. YouTube. May 10, 2010. Accessed December 06, 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6kiVI_KNTY. ​

Hess, Thomas B. Willem de Kooning . The Great American Artists Series. New York, New ​ ​ York: George Braziller, INC., 1959.

Hess, Thomas B. Willem de Kooning. New York: Museum of Modern Art; distributed by New ​ ​ York Graphic Society. Greenwich, Conn., 1969.

Lieber, Edvard. Willem de Kooning: reflections in the studio. New York: H.N. Abrams, 2000. ​ ​