Art - Willem de Kooning

De Kooning is one of the most important painter of the abstract-expressionist style.
The painter was born in Rotterdam in 1904. He took lessons at the Academy for Plastic Arts and Technical Science in Rotterdam. At that time he was influenced by the members of 'De Stijl', like Piet Mondriaan.
De Kooning moved to the United States, because the Netherlands became to small for him. He had several jobs in the United States, but this changed after he met fellow-painter Arshile Gorky. Willem de Kooning now openly rejected the ideas of 'De Stijl'. This period is characterized by financial problems, but this also changed after 1937, when he designed parts of the wall painting in the Hall of Pharmacy at the New York World Fair. De Kooning also designed the decor and costumes for the ballet 'Les Nuages' by the Ballet Russes.
He married Elaine Fried in 1943, who became the promoter of De Kooning's work and an influential critic. Her husband exhibited together with Jackson Pollock, Stuart Davis, John Graham and Lee Krasner in 1946; and was followed by a solo-exhibition which made him famous.
His style changed suddenly in 1950, when he started to paint a series of figurative-expressionist paintings beginning with 'Woman I'. A year later he won the Logan Medal and Purchase Prize for his painting 'Excavation', a landmark in the development of abstract-expressionist painting.
De Kooning became a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1960. There were exhibitions everywhere in Europe and the United States, also in his homeland - the Netherlands.
In the seventies, Elaine de Kooning had to earn the living, because the health of Willem became worse. There were signs of Alzheimer and he became an alcohol addicts.
His wife died in 1989 and De Kooning was looked after by his daughter. He died in 1997.