On View
On viewObject number2019.1
Portrait of Elaine de Kooning
Artist
Mary Abbott
(American, 1921 - 2019)
Date1948
Mediumoil on canvas
Dimensionsframe: 43 × 37 1/2 in. (109.2 × 95.3 cm)
canvas: 38 × 31 in. (96.5 × 78.7 cm)
canvas: 38 × 31 in. (96.5 × 78.7 cm)
Credit LineJim Bridenstine Acquisition Fund
Exhibition History"The Expressionist Figure," at the KIA (January 19 - May 5, 2019).
"Unveiling American Genius," KIA Permanent Collection Exhibition, Traditional, Markin, Nay and Groos Galleries (March 1, 2021 - December 31, 2023).
"Legendary Voices: Art for the Next Century," KIA (September 7 - February 18, 2025)Label TextMany of Mary Abbott’s (1921-2019) figural paintings present her sitters with expressive and gestural brushstrokes using unexpected colors. In Portrait of Elaine de Kooning, Abbott depicts a fellow artist and close friend seated with an open book and cat on her lap. The chair she sits on is defined but barely detailed—just a few simple shapes of brown paint. Is she seated in an interior, in front of a large picture window, or outdoors in a garden? The overlapping forms of color that make up the abstracted background give viewers few clues as to her exact location. Like many abstractionists and abstract expressionists of the 1940s and ‘50s, Abbott created a relationship between the central figure and the space they occupy, often grounding her figures in their settings. The figure and the background receive the same technical and stylistic treatment of broad, overlapping brush strokes heavy with paint. The unusual coloring of de Kooning’s skin shrouds her personality in mystery. As a painter whose career spans various styles of modern painting, Abbott focused on creating a mood or atmosphere, rather than a realistic rendering of a figure or scene. This image is somewhat flat and lacking in visual depth, leaving the viewer confronted with the figure starkly in the foreground. Portrait of Elaine de Kooning demonstrates Abbott’s skillful ability to combine the more traditional genre of portraiture with the more emotive and energetic work of expressionism. In the 1940s, when this work was created, Abbott was in her twenties studying art in New York City at the Art Students League. There she met avant-garde artists who brought her into the heart of New York’s art scene. She became one of the few women members—alongside Elaine de Kooning—of the community’s elite Artist’s Club. Abbott stayed and worked in New York for decades. While art history may not regard her as prominently as some male abstract expressionists like Mark Rothko or Jackson Pollock, she experienced great success in New York, and has since been included in major publications about the movement and its women pioneers. In the 1950s, she had several exhibitions in the major New York City galleries and was included in an exhibition of contemporary work at the Museum of Modern Art in 1956. During this same period, while traveling in Haiti, Abbott spent a significant amount of time painting works influenced by the country’s tropical setting. In the 1970s, the artist moved to teach painting at the University of Minnesota. Almost a decade later, she returned to New York to live and work. Prior to her death in August of 2019, Mary Abbott was still actively painting in the New England area. This important recent acquisition demonstrates our renewed commitment to telling a more inclusive and equitable story of American art and artists. [Collection Highlight]
