| Willem de Kooning (1904-1997) | ||
| Art Cyclopedia | De Kooning quit school when he
was 12 to apprentice with a firm of decorators and commercial artists. He studied at
the Rotterdam Academy before moving to the United States in 1926. Trained as a house
painter, de Kooning was schooled in simulating wood textures and marble patterns and was
able to produce a subtle range of colors. He painted murals for the Federal Arts Project of the WPA during the 1930s. A 1948 New York exhibit of abstract black-and-white paintings gained him recognition as a leading abstract expressionist. "Action painting" was first applied to his work. In the early 1950s he produced his best-known series Woman. He has managed to remain involved in the evolving art world by changing his style:
De Kooning has also produced lithographs and bronze figure sculptures. The Whitney Museum of American Art featured him in a 1983-84 retrospective. He attacked his canvas with a savage brush, allowing paint to run and drip.
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"Killer" de Kooning attacked his canvas.