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The first biography of Elaine de Kooning, A Generous Vision portrays a woman whose intelligence, droll sense of humor, and generosity of spirit endeared her to friends and gave her a starring role in the close-knit world of New York artists. Her zest for adventure and freewheeling spending were as legendary as her ever-present cigarette. Flamboyant and witty in person, she was an incisive art writer who expressed maverick opinions in a deceptively casual style. As a painter, she melded Abstract Expressionism with a lifelong interest in bodily movement to capture subjects as diverse as President John F. Kennedy, basketball players, and bullfights. In her romantic life, she went her own way, always keen for male attention. But she credited her husband, Willem de Kooning, as her greatest influence; rather than being overshadowed by his fame, she worked "in his light." Nearly two decades after their separation, after finally embracing sobriety herself, she returned to his side to rescue him from severe alcoholism. Based on painstaking research and dozens of interviews, A Generous Vision brings to life a leading figure of twentieth-century art who lived a full and fascinating life on her own terms.
List of contents
- Contents
- About This Book
- Chapter 1: Drawing and Discovering
- Chapter 2: Life with Bill
- Chapter 3: Black Mountain, Provincetown, and the Woman Paintings
- Chapter 4: Illuminating Art
- Chapter 5 East Hampton, Pro Sports, and the Separation
- Chapter 6: Enchantment
- Chapter 7: Loft Life, Speaking Out, and European Vistas
- Chapter 8: Portraits as Moments and Memory
- Chapter 9: Painting JFK
- Chapter 10: Caretaking and Cave Paintings
- Acknowledgements
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
About the author
Cathy Curtis, a former staff writer at the Los Angeles Times, is a graduate of Smith College with a master's degree in art history from the University of California, Berkeley. A member of the board of directors of Biographers International Organization (BIO), Curtis is the author of Restless Ambition: Grace Hartigan, Painter (2015).
Summary
The first biography of Elaine de Kooning, A Generous Vision portrays a woman whose intelligence, droll sense of humor, and generosity of spirit endeared her to friends and gave her a starring role in the close-knit world of New York artists. Her zest for adventure and freewheeling spending were as legendary as her ever-present cigarette.
Flamboyant and witty in person, she was an incisive art writer who expressed maverick opinions in a deceptively casual style. As a painter, she melded Abstract Expressionism with a lifelong interest in bodily movement to capture subjects as diverse as President John F. Kennedy, basketball players, and bullfights.
In her romantic life, she went her own way, always keen for male attention. But she credited her husband, Willem de Kooning, as her greatest influence; rather than being overshadowed by his fame, she worked "in his light." Nearly two decades after their separation, after finally embracing sobriety herself, she returned to his side to rescue him from severe alcoholism.
Based on painstaking research and dozens of interviews, A Generous Vision brings to life a leading figure of twentieth-century art who lived a full and fascinating life on her own terms.
Additional text
Elaine de Kooning was one of the most important figures in the Abstract Expressionist movement, a fact that has been largely ignored historically. Cathy Curtis's A Generous Vision helps introduce this remarkable painter and writer to those who have never had the pleasure of encountering her, and reveals Elaine in greater depth to those who may have thought they knew her.
