3.15.05

(Book Review)
de Kooning: An American Master

By Sarah Stodola

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de Kooning: An American Master
By Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan
Knopf, November 2004

It would be easy to paint the life of Willem de Kooning as an exercise in excessive self-involvement. The artist did, after all, sweep into New York City in his early twenties as an immigrant from Holland, evolve into a respected painter and then a famous one, neglect to return to his home country and family for decades, become a self-destructive alcoholic, and leave a string of heartbroken women in his wake, marrying one but refusing to be either faithful or available even to her.

It would also be easy to send up de Kooning as the epitome of the tortured genius, a man so brilliant that he couldn’t be held accountable to the exigencies of everyday, respectable life.

Lucky for us, Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan fall victim to neither of these tactics (for the most part) in their recently released biography of the artist, de Kooning: An American Master. Instead, we are given an engrossing account of a man who, from the humblest of beginnings, became one of the most renowned (and richest) American artists in history. A founder and leading figure in the New York School, de Kooning’s work continues to invite widespread praise and controversy today.

This biography is of general importance chiefly because it is, surprisingly, the first comprehensive biography of the artist. But it is also a highly enjoyable read – one might even say it’s a page-turner, if books of this genre are permitted to be labeled as such. As a non-artist, I went into reading this 633-page tome fully prepared to be bored silly. But the authors manage to make even the potentially tedious descriptions of the artistic process readable.

New Yorkers especially will be romanced by the expansive lives of the Abstract Impressionists, as they lived, worked, and played in their inexpensive downtown lofts and gathered almost nightly to drink at Cedar Tavern on University Place. Indeed, de Kooning’s world offers us a true glimpse of the downtown Manhattan that we pretend we still have.

After a difficult family life in Holland both emotionally and financially, de Kooning wandered from his hometown of Rotterdam to nearby European capitols and then back again, before finally securing illegal passage on a ship bound for the United States. It didn’t take long at all, once in New York, for him to find work as a draftsman. It wasn’t until his 30s that de Kooning gave up the professional life and committed himself to the difficult existence of an artist. It would take many more years for him to find success, but eventually he would become the rare artist who dies a rich man.

As with any biography, it feels like an unfortunate error that the man must die in the end, and de Kooning’s slow demise, from alcoholism and Alzheimer’s, is disconcerting to follow, especially given his estranged wife’s insistence that he keep painting – surely a calculated move given that she stood to inherit half of his wealth and assets. Despite this, Stevens and Swann have succeeded in the very difficult task of writing a biography that is both exhaustive and engrossing, whether the reader is familiar with the art world or not.

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Sarah Stodola is the Executive Editor of Me Three.  She can be contacted here.

© 2005 Me Three