For this assignment I decided to go with one of Willem de Kooning’s untitled paintings from 1976. This painting was done as an oil painting on newspaper mounted on paper, then mounted on linen. I think part of what is so inspiring about Kooning’s paintings is the unfamiliarity with distorted images. This painting seems to contain multiple parts. From one angle, this appears as a pained face. From a different angle though, it looks like the busy streets of New York City whipping by a cab window, all of the images distorted by streaking rain at high speeds.
It seems that this painting invokes a hurried, anxious feeling that many poets can probably relate to. This painting also seems to express a sense of being alone in a city of millions. It seems that the pained face in the foreground is larger than the landscape, creating a feeling of being on top of the world. I’m sure that for some of the New York poets this painting, like many other paintings of this nature, leant itself to the anxious, lonesome, creative feeling of not being able to create unity in the busy city life.
I think that Kooning’s painting was influential because of the angst that it invokes upon the viewer. It is like being trapped in a vacuum, spinning a million miles per hour, and trying to scream. Life just happens and it must be seen.
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