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Franz
Kline, born May 23, 1910, in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.
He took art classes at the Boston University Art Students
League from 1931 to 1935. In 1935 he went to Heatherley’s
Art School from 1936 to 1938 in London England. He settled
down in New York in 1939. During the 1930s and 1940s,
Kline painted cityscapes and landscapes of the coal-mining
district where he was raised as well as commissioned murals
and portraits.
At this time, he received awards in several National Academy
of Design Annuals. In 1943, Kline met Willem de Kooning
at Conrad Marca-Relli’s studio and within the next few
years also met Jackson Pollock. Kline’s interest in Japanese
art began at this time. His mature abstract style, developed
in the late 1940s, is characterized by bold gestural strokes
of fast-drying black and white enamel. Jackson Pollock
would emmulate much of his gestural style in his own works.
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