In the early 1950s, Willem de Kooning's Woman I and subsequent
paintings established him as a leading member of the abstract
expressionist movement. His wildly impacted brushstrokes and heavily
encrusted surfaces baffled most critics, who saw de Kooning's monstrous
female image as violent, aggressive, and ultimately the product of a
misogynistic mind. In the image-rich Willem de Kooning Nonstop,
Rosalind E. Krauss counters this view with a radical rethinking of de
Kooning's bold canvases and reveals his true artistic practices.
Krauss demonstrates that contrary to popular conceptions of de Kooning
as an artist who painted chaotically only to finish abruptly, he was in
fact constantly reworking the same subject based on a compositional
template. This template informed all of his art and included a
three-part vertical structure; the projection of his male point of view
into the painting or sculpture; and the near-universal inclusion of the
female form, which was paired with her redoubled projection onto his
work. Krauss identifies these elements throughout de Kooning's oeuvre,
even in his paintings of highways, boats, and landscapes: Woman is
always there. A thought-provoking study by one of America's greatest art
critics, Willem de Kooning Nonstop revolutionizes our understanding of
de Kooning and shows us what has always been hiding in plain sight in
his work.
