Mountains and Sea 1952

Helen Frankenthaler made 'Mountains and Sea' with oils on canvas. Looking at the watery blues and grassy greens, I can picture Frankenthaler staining the canvas, almost like she's dyeing it. I wonder, what was she thinking as she built up these layers? Did she have a landscape in mind, or did the forms emerge intuitively, through colour and gesture? There's something so freeing about her method. She's part of a conversation with painters like Pollock, but she takes it somewhere new. I see the legacy of Matisse in her approach to colour. That swooping red gesture there – it’s so delicate, yet it holds so much energy. It's like she’s breathing life into the canvas. She opens up the possibilities of what paint can do, and I am inspired to go and play with paint myself!