Joan Mitchell

by Klaus Kertess

Joan Mitchell (1926-1992) was one of the most distinguished artists to be associated with the Abstract Expressionist movement. Winning a place for herself in the heavily male-dominated New York art world of the 1950s, she soon achieved recognition as a leading exponent of the gestural style. Yet her work is not as widely appreciated in the United States as it deserves to be, in part because she chose to live in France during the later decades of her life.
This volume is the first comprehensive presentation of Mitchell's work since her death. In her will, she directed that a longtime friend, Klaus Kertess, write the accompanying text. Kertess provides a richly textured account of Mitchell's life and work, tracing her evolution from her earliest efforts as a young artist in Chicago and her arrival in New York in the 1940s. He gives special attention to the array of gifted painters and poets in the legendary New York art scene of the 1950s, when Mitchell first made her mark, and discusses at length Mitchell's friendships with artists such as Willem de Kooning and Franz Kline and writers such as Frank O'Hara.

Genres: Art

204 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 1997

About the author

Klaus Kertess was an American art gallerist, art critic and curator (including of the 1995 Whitney Biennial). He grew up in Westchester County north of New York City, the second of three children. After graduating from Phillips Academy, he studied art history at Yale University and in 1966 founded the Bykert Gallery with his college roommate Jeff Byers. The gallery name was formed from a compound of both of theirs. At Bykert he showed a roster of artists which included; Brice Marden, David Novros, Barry Le Va, Alan Saret, Chuck Close, Bill Bollinger, Dorothea Rockburne, and many others.
Later as an independent curator he oversaw the 1995 edition of the Whitney Biennial. Then in 1998 he curated the exhibition DeKooning: Drawing/Seeing at the Drawing Center also in New York City.
Kertess suffered from Alzheimer's and died on October 8, 2016, after collapsing at his apartment. He was 76. He is survived by his longtime partner, the painter Billy Sullivan.

Reviews

[Kerfe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Unlike many in similar books, Kertiss; essay about Joan Mitchell puts the artist and her work at the center. Her biography, friends, influences, and world events spiral out from that center, and it gives both coherence and insight to the many plates illustrating the evolution of Mitchell's work over time. And excellent reference in all ways.

[Myles Curtis · Rating 3 out of 5]

kertess intro'd me to some new mitchell influences and contemporaries and had some good anecdotes about her brilliant mixture of not-giving-a-damn and complete immersion in emotional landscapes (bjork's "hunter" kept playing in my head when a painting wowed me). but dude was too hung up on where her work stood in relation to others, whether she invented something new, which paintings counted as "masterpieces", adjectives like "majesterial" - which doesn't seem at all right for mitchell's practice or attitude and made me suspicious of the selection. a book that focused on her pastels was more what i was looking for - less intrusive, more focused on her idioms.