Willem de KooningAmerican, 1904–1997Litho #2 (Waves #2)
May one see it?
Yes, receiving visitors
Art Institute of Chicago
Room124AChicago, United States
On public display.
- Checked
- 4 hours ago
- In this state since
- Sep 28, 2026
- Source
- The museum's own collection data
Particulars
- Accession number
- 1996.331
In the catalog
Sources
- Art Institute of Chicago: the museum's own open data · fetched 4 days ago
- Image: Art Institute of Chicago — © the artist or rights holder
Meanwhile, in the life of Willem de Kooning
The whole life1948–1966
Fourteen solo exhibitions
From 1948 to 1966 De Kooning had 14 solo exhibitions, many in New York but also nationally and internationally, among them the Egan Gallery, the Sidney Janis Gallery, the Martha Jackson Gallery, the Allan Stone Gallery and museums such as the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Smith College Museum of Art. There were two a year in 1953, 1964 and 1965.
1950s
The path of “figurative abstractions”
In the 1950s De Kooning followed a path of primitivisation and developed so-called “figurative abstractions”: a solitary female figure, under furious, pasty “blow-like” brushstrokes, turns into a painterly totem open to radical Freudian readings.
late 1950s
From female figures to abstraction
In the late 1950s De Kooning’s work shifted away from the figurative images of women, though he returned to the subject on occasion, and began to show an interest in more abstract, less representational imagery.
11 July 1959 – 11 October 1959
Exhibition: Documenta II
13 March 1962
Becomes a U.S. citizen
On 13 March 1962 De Kooning became a U.S. citizen.
