Willem de Kooning (Dutch, American 1904 – 1997)
Woman, 1950's
charcoal on paper
signed (lower right)
image size 27 x 20 cm., frame size 58 x 50.5 cm.

Condition: Attached to the support in places, sheet slightly cockled and very slightly timestained along the edges, right edge unevenly cut with a tiny paper loss at the centre, few minor foxing spots in places, otherwise apparently in very good original condition, unexamined out of the frame. Framed behind glass.

Notes: The cycle of sketches made by De Kooning in the 1950s of the female figure has certainly contributed to what has eventually become the famous ‘Women’ series. The drawings bore witness to his artistic process and frequently served as a starting point for the paintings. They are often drawn on rapidly torn notepad sheets and consist of spontaneously outlined abstract V-shapes, arches, zigzags, jots and bows which combined evoke a figure of a woman. The sketches, like the paintings, are characterised by the dynamism and simplicity of the female form, where the eyes, breasts, mouth and hair, are the most discernible features. Without these, the images would devolve into incoherent scribbles.

The famous series of oil paintings created between 1950 and 1953 sparked an enormous controversy at its conception. Not only because of their inherent vulgarity but also due to their outdated figurative form of representation. At the peak of Abstract Expressionism, a return to the traditional form seemed like a regression, an insult to the Post-War era. However, the ‘Women’ series retains the abstract quality, agitation and tension of De Kooning's earlier work. It is not supposed to depict a particular model but rather function as a symbol of femininity in its rawest and most primal form.

Despite the criticism of his contemporaries, for De Kooning painting women was, in fact, a matter of advancement: ”It eliminated composition, arrangement, relationships, light - all this silly talk about line, color and form - because that was the thing I wanted to get hold of… Painting the Woman is a thing in art that has been done over and over - the idol, Venus, the nude.“ (Carter Redcliff & Edy de Wilde, 1983) His focus was not on realistic resemblance but on the semantics of the archetype. De Kooning’s women are not beautiful. They are grotesque, agitated, vulgar, mythological and revered. By now they are perhaps his best-known body of work. ‘Woman III’ was sold in 2005 for $137.5 million and at the time was the second most expensive painting in the world. Over the years, the Women series has become what it was always meant to be: an icon, a myth, an object of veneration.


Provenance:
Private Collection, Los Angeles.
Taylor Robison Collection, Columbus, Ohio (1986 - 2002).
Robinson Family Trust, Austin, Texas, 2002.
Albert Allen collection, Manitou Springs, Colorado, 2002 - 2009.
Vincent Vallarino Fine Art, New York.
Acquired at the above by the present owner in 2009.

Est: € 60000-80000