Willem
de Kooning was heavily influenced by the Cubism and Surrealism
movements. His work began to take form in 1938 with the
completion of his first series of Women, which would become
a major recurrent theme. During the 1940s, he participated
in group shows with other artists who would form the New
York School and become known as Abstract Expressionists.
De Kooning's first solo exhibition of black-and-white
abstractions was held in 1948, and by 1950 he had become
a key figure of abstract expressionism. He is best known
for a provocative series of paintings of women, whose
aggressive forms are rendered with slashing strokes and
dripping paint. Simultaneously ferocious and comical,
the meaning of these images is still disputed.
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