Franz Kline

Collection of the artist, New York
Maurice Bonnefoy, New York (acquired directly from the artist circa 1960)
Thence by descent to the present owner

New York, D'Arcy Galleries, Surrealist Intrusion in the Enchanter's Domain, November 1960 - January 1961(the present work was added to the exhibition after the catalogue was printed and therefore, is not illustrated in the exhibition catalogue or listed on the checklist)

Franz Kline was a relatively unknown artist who seemed to rise to the top of the art world from nowhere and without warning.  In the late 1940s, at which time the present work on paper was executed, Kline was still painting mildly expressionistic landscapes and somber portraits.  The black and white paintings for which he is best known didn’t evolve out of European modernism or under the influence of his peers.  Rather, they came from enlargements of Kline’s early drawings such as Untitled, circa 1947-1948.  He would select details from the drawings, then crop and enlarge them so that they became abstract.  Later in his artistic career, the brushstrokes themselves became the main focus of his work, monolithic forms divorced from any external reality. 

In the present work, Kline uses strong, vertical, linear forms with bursting energy at the upper quadrant of the composition with unyielding white gouache and structured forms of black ink at the low half.  The feeling of this energy is the essence of Kline’s work.  It comes from the handling of his material – knowing, but deliberately careless – and from the simplicity of his image.  Seemingly haphazard, every stroke is placed with care and thought.  “A stroke would be placed, Kline would step back to study it, then would come another.” (David Anfam, Franz Kline, Black & White 1950-1961, Houston, 1994, p. 26) 

In this work, as in many of his works, Kline attacks the idea of order and harmony in his determination to find new means of expression to replace outworn clichés.  He sought the destruction of planned things and exploited disorganization.  The white gouache in this work is used to destabilize the monochrome black, to avoid any sense of harmony, while at the same time creating a dichotomy of balance and energy.  Untitled, circa 1947-1948 is a perfect example of his search for collision and velocity.