Willem de Kooning: Abstract Landscapes, 1955–63

This book was published on the occasion of the exhibition Willem de Kooning: Abstract Landscapes, 1955–63 at Gagosian’s former gallery on West 23rd Street in New York. The selection of large-scale gestural abstractions by the leading Abstract Expressionist traces a stylistic trajectory that critic Thomas Hess characterized as a sequence from “Abstract Urban Landscape” and “Abstract Parkway Landscape” through “Abstract Pastoral Landscape.”

The catalogue reproduces the exhibition’s six paintings in color, along with the photograph Willem de Kooning in his Studio (1959) by Arnold Newman. An essay by Henry Geldzahler illuminates de Kooning’s practice, discussing these works in relation to his development as a painter and his move to Springs, Long Island.