Willem de Kooning

Willem de Kooning was a Dutch-American artist born in Rotterdam in 1904 and who died in East Hampton, New York, in 1997. He immigrated to the United States in 1926 and settled in New York, where he developed much of his career. He is considered a central figure of abstract expressionism and the so-called New York School.

His painting is characterized by gestural energy, intense use of color, and the tension between abstraction and figuration. Throughout his career, he worked on figures, landscapes, and abstract compositions, always with a free and dynamic brushstroke. His series of women, begun in the early 1950s, is one of the most recognized of his production.

His works are part of collections such as MoMA, Tate, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Guggenheim Museum, Whitney Museum of American Art, and National Gallery of Art. His accolades include the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1964, the Edward MacDowell Medal in 1975, the National Medal of Arts in 1986, and the Praemium Imperiale for Painting in 1989.