Untitled c. 1950s

This is a Franz Kline painting, made with ink on paper. Just look at those marks! I imagine Kline making them, quickly, intuitively, responding to the emerging forms as much as directing them. The paint is thin, washy in places, pooling and clotting in others. It's hard to believe such a limited palette could be so expressive, but the black ink sings against the stark white paper. It’s a song of contrasts and tensions, of heavy strokes and delicate lines, that create a dynamic visual rhythm. I bet Kline was thinking about architecture, scaffolding, or maybe even just the urban landscape. But he probably wasn't trying to literally depict anything. More like, he was after something felt, something sensed, and the painting became a record of that search. Like a lot of abstract painters he was improvising, in conversation with folks like de Kooning, trying to get something new down on paper. Painting is like this on-going dialogue. Artists build on each other’s ideas, challenge assumptions, and keep the conversation alive. Each painting becomes part of a larger history of mark-making, thinking, and feeling.