Franz Kline

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New York, N.Y., oil on canvas by Franz Kline, 1953; in the … (credit: © Albright-Knox Art Gallery/Corbis)

(born May 23, 1910, Wilkes-Barre, Pa., U.S. — died May 13, 1962, New York, N.Y.) U.S. painter. He studied art in London before settling in New York City. He became one of the leading artists of the Abstract Expressionist movement and was known for his use of inexpensive commercial paints and large housepainter's brushes to build graphic networks of rough bars of black paint on white backgrounds. He achieved a sense of majesty and power in such large-scale works as Mahoning (1956). In the late 1950s he introduced colour into his paintings.

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(b Wilkes-Barre, PA, 23 May 1910; d New York, 13 May 1962). American painter. His first academic training was at Boston University from 1931 to 1935 and in London at the Heatherley School of Art from 1937 to 1938 as an illustrator and draughtsman. Two main tendencies emerged at an early stage that would later develop into a powerful contribution to the 'gestural' trend within ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM. Numerous small graphics, sketches and oils and the mural series Hot Jazz (Norfolk, VA, Chrysler Mus.), painted for a New York bar in 1940, reveal an interest in translating animated subjects into quick, rudimentary strokes. Kline admired and found inspiration in a wide range of artists notable for their fluency in handling paint, including Rembrandt, Goya, Manet, Sargent and Whistler. By contrast, an inclination to compose in terms of simplified areas was derived from academic training and perhaps also reflected Kline's memories of his native Pennsylvania's coal-mining region, with its stark scenery, locomotives and similar massive mechanical shapes to which the titles of his later abstract images sometimes referred. Nijinsky as Petrouchka (1948; Cedarhurst, NY, Mr and Mrs I. David Orr priv. col., see Gaugh, 1985 exh. cat., p. 66) and similar canvases marked the climax of this representational phase with their combination of vigorous brushwork and an angular substructure. But against the context of contemporary New York painting a move towards abstraction was inevitable.

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Franz Kline (1910-1962), American painter, was one of the foremost abstract expressionists. His best-known works are large calligraphic paintings.

Franz Kline was born to an immigrant family living in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. Following high school, Kline studied art at Boston University from 1931 to 1935, then spent a year at an art school in London. Upon his return to the United States, he worked for a brief period as a designer for a department store in Buffalo, N.Y. Then he moved to New York City, where in 1939 his work was "discovered" at an outdoor exhibition in Washington Square. He worked in 1940 for a scenic designer.

Kline developed into a significant artist during the 1940s. This growth was partially determined by his move from subject-oriented to nonrepresentational canvases. Sheridan Square (1940) suggests Kline's affinity with the treatment of cityscape found in works by painters in the group known as "The Eight" (sometimes called the Ashcan school), although Kline already shows considerable freedom in his application of pigment. His paintings of the mid-1940s include numerous landscapes of the Pennsylvania countryside.

Two works of 1946, Self-portrait Sketch and Studio Interior, are transitional pieces showing Kline's experimentation with a more direct, expressionist palette. The contrast between lights and darks is heightened, and greater liberties are taken in the degree of abstraction. Also in 1946 Kline took a further step toward abstraction in The Dancer. Here the subject is reduced to a series of abstract planar shapes suggestive of cubism. By 1947 Kline had achieved a true freedom from subject matter and was pushing large, curving black lines across the picture space.

In 1950 Kline had his first one-man show in New York. In his monumental Chief (1950) only the title suggests its connection with the train to which it refers. Instead, Kline seems to have embodied an expressive visual analog for the power and intensity associated with the subject. Although Kline's paintings look spontaneous, his black-and-white compositions are controlled and thoughtful presences that carefully merge positive and negative space to the picture plane.

Kline restricted himself to black and white for several years, and these paintings are distinguished by the differences that a line suggests when it is varied in attitude, thickness, or amount of pigment used. Thus, The Bridge (1955), although restrictive in palette, is distinctive in message because of its vertical orientation, the variation of line, and the playing off of dripped portions against white ground with black-and-black overlays. The variations on these charged gestures widened in the late 1950s, as Kline included other colors - dark greens, blues, purples, and reds. Orange and Black Wall (1959) shows clearly how the spatial relationships are affected by the introduction of color. No longer held to the picture plane, the figure and background relationships intertwine and merge with each other. Yet his introduction of color did not rule out a return to black and white. Riverbed and Caboose (both 1961) have the black-and-white theme.

Kline taught at Black Mountain College (1952), Pratt Institute (1953), and the Philadelphia Museum School of Art (1954). He died on May 13, 1962.

Further Reading

One of the most useful books on Kline for biography and illustrations is John Gordon, Franz Kline, 1910-1962 (1969). More critical interpretations of Kline's paintings can be found in Robert Goldwater's "Introduction" to the catalog for the Kline exhibition held at the Marlborough-Gerson Gallery (New York) in March 1967, and in the illuminating essay by Jules Langsner entitled "Franz Kline, Calligraphy and Information Theory" included in the catalog of the Dwan Gallery (Los Angeles) exhibition of Kline's work held in March 1963.

Additional Sources

Gaugh, Harry F., Franz Kline: Cincinnati Art Museum, New York: Abbeville Press, 1996?, 1985.

Franz Kline
Painting Number 2, 1954, The Museum of Modern Art
Born	May 23, 1910(1910-05-23) Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
Died	May 13, 1962 (aged 51) New York City, New York
Nationality	American
Field	Abstract Painting
Movement	Abstract Expressionism, Action Painting
Influenced by	Willem de Kooning, Japanese calligraphy
Influenced	Several generations of Abstract painters

Franz Kline (May 23, 1910 – May 13, 1962) was an American painter mainly associated with the Abstract Expressionist painters who were centered, geographically, around New York, and temporally, in the 1940s and 1950s; but not limited to that setting. He was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, attended Girard College, an academy for fatherless boys; attended Boston University; spent summers from 1956-62 painting in Provincetown, Massachusetts, and died in New York City of a rheumatic heart disease. He was married to Elizabeth Vincent Parsons, a British ballet dancer.

Contents 1 Career 2 Black and white and color 3 See also 4 References 5 Further reading 6 External links

Career

As with Jackson Pollock and other Abstract Expressionists, he was labeled an "action painter" because of his seemingly spontaneous and intense style, focusing less, or not at all, on figures or imagery, but on the actual brush strokes and use of canvas. For most of Kline's [mature and representative] work, however, as the phrase goes, "spontaneity is practiced". He would prepare many draft sketches – notably, commonly on refuse telephone book pages – before going to make his "spontaneous" work.

Black and white and color

Kline's best known abstract expressionist paintings are in black and white. Kline re-introduced color into his paintings around 1955, though he used color more consistently after 1959. Kline's paintings are deceptively subtle. While generally his paintings have a dynamic, spontaneous and dramatic impact, Kline often closely referred to his compositional drawings. Kline carefully rendered many of his most complex pictures from studies. There seems to be references to Japanese calligraphy in Kline's black and white paintings, although he always denied that connection. Bridges, tunnels, buildings, engines, railroads and other architectural and industrial icons are often suggested as imagery informing Kline's work.

Kline's most recognizable method/style derives from a suggestion made to him by his friend Willem De Kooning. In 1948, de Kooning suggested to an artistically frustrated Kline to bring in a sketch and project it with a Bell Opticon opaque projector he had at his studio. Kline described the projection as such:

"A four by five inch black drawing of a rocking chair...loomed in gigantic black strokes which eradicated any image, the strokes expanding as entities in themselves, unrelated to any entity but that of their own existence."

Kline created paintings in the style of what he saw that day throughout his life. In 1950, he exhibited many works in this style at the Charles Egan Gallery.

See also

• New York School
• Action painting
• Abstract expressionism

References

• Elaine de Kooning, "Franz Kline: Painter of His Own Life", ARTnews, Volume 61, November 1962
• Marika Herskovic, American Abstract Expressionism of the 1950s An Illustrated Survey, (New York School Press, 2003.) ISBN 0-9677994-1-4. p. 186-189
• Marika Herskovic, New York School Abstract Expressionists Artists Choice by Artists, (New York School Press, 2000.) ISBN 0-9677994-0-6. p.8; p. 12; p. 16; p. 25; p. 37; p. 202-205

Further reading

• ed. Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, et al. Franz Kline (1910-1962) (Skira) (ISBN 88-7624-141-8)
• Harry F. Gaugh Franz Kline (Abbeville Press)

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Franz Kline

• Official Website
• Franz Kline on the Artchive
• Photo
• Untitled, 1957 at the Phillips Collection with bio

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