The 37 Artworks of Franz Kline

Kline was married to a ballet dancer, Elizabeth Parsons, who, like the famous Russian dancer Nijinsky, suffered from schizophrenia. Kline made several portraits of Nijinsky during his early years, when he worked as a commercial illustrator. This work, however, does not depict the dancer. It is one o...

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Soon after it was made, this celebrated canvas was shown at the Whitney Museum Annual, and thereafter in almost every retrospective of Kline’s work. During his day, and for long after, Kline was considered a pre-eminent action painter, a key member of the New York School of Abstract Expressionism. T...

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Composed of broad, sweeping, and luscious strokes, Black, White, and Gray suggests unrestrained artistic spontaneity. Yet Kline’s process was quite methodical. He typically began with a sketch, which he projected onto a wall, transforming simple lines into magnified abstract forms, and then replicat...

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