Carolina QuotesIt is disastrous to name ourselves.
Willem de Kooning Connected to the Carolinas
Source
Quoted in 'A constant searching of oneself' in Abstract Expressionism, Barbara Hess, Taschen, p. 6 — short answer of Willem de Kooning in a panel discussion in 1950 when the former director of the New York museum of modern Art, Alfred H. Barr, Jr. demanded: We should have a name for which we can blame the artists – for once in history!
- year
- 1950
- locator
- p. 6
Cite this record
“It is disastrous to name ourselves.” Willem de Kooning. Carolina Quotes, record CQ-35C17676E2. https://carolinaquotes.com/quote/35c17676e2
More from Willem de Kooning
But I find, because of modern painting, that things which couldn't be seen in terms of painting, things you couldn't paint.. ..it is not that you paint them, bit is the connection. I imagine that Cézanne, when he painted a ginger pot with apples, must have been very grotesque in his day, because a still life was something set up of beautiful things. It may be very difficult, for instance, to put a Rheingold bottled beer on the table and a couple of glasses and a package of Lucky Strike [cigarets]. I mean, you know, there are certain things you cannot paintat a particular time, and it takes a certain attitude how to see those things, in terms of art.
The 'Women' [paintings] had to do with the female painted through all ages, all those idols, and maybe I was stuck to a certain extent; I couldn't go on. It did one thing for me: it eliminated composition, arrangement, relationships, light – all this silly talk about line, colour and form – because that was the thing I wanted to get hold of.
When, about fifteen years ago, I walked into Arshile's studio for the first time, the atmosphere was so beautiful that I got a little dizzy and when I came to, I was bright enough to take the hint immediately. If the bookkeepers think it necessary to make sure of where things and people came from, well then, I came from 36 Union Square [address of the studio of Gorky that time].. .I am glad that it is about impossible to get away from his powerful influence.