Franz Kline

American Abstract Expressionist Franz Kline is famed for his large black-and-white paintings featuring abstract motifs. Initially, a realist with a fluid style honed during academic training that led him to appreciate Old Masters, Kline's artistic journey shifted after he moved to New York and encountered Willem de Kooning. This encounter marked the beginning of his signature abstract style.

Biography of Franz Kline

Franz Kline hailed from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, a modest coal-mining town that offered little in the way of artistic exposure. His upbringing was marked by a complex relationship with his parents. Tragically, his father, a saloon keeper, took his own life in 1917 when Kline was merely seven years old. Following this loss, his mother remarried and sent him to a facility for fatherless boys, a place Kline referred to as "the orphanage."

Determined to forge his path, Kline engaged in cartooning for his high school newspaper, striving to break free from his small-town confines. He succeeded in leaving for Boston University's School of Art, attending from 1931 to 1935. Boston proved transformative for Kline, offering a plethora of opportunities. 

Following his time in Boston, Kline briefly studied at the Art Students League in New York before journeying to England, where he enrolled in the Heatherly's School of Art in London. During that time, he encountered his future wife, Elizabeth V. Parsons, who was a ballet dancer and working as an artist's model at the school. Together, they returned to New York in 1938. However, their journey together was not without hardships, as Parsons would later face a mental breakdown and undergo treatment in mental health institutions.

Upon his return to New York, Franz Kline encountered challenging circumstances. He found himself taking on various odd jobs, from painting murals in bars to selling illustrations to magazines. During this period, his artistic vision was largely influenced by his admiration for Old Masters like Rembrandt. However, everything changed in 1943 when he crossed paths with Willem de Kooning, leading him to frequent the Cedar Bar where he mingled with Jackson Pollock and Philip Guston.

By around 1947, inspired by de Kooning's influence, Kline began a significant departure from figuration. He delved into large-scale experimentation with a gestural, abstract technique. The catalyst for this transformation was de Kooning's black-and-white paintings from 1946-49. The resulting artworks from this revelation debuted at the Charles Egan Gallery in New York in 1950, marking a pivotal moment in Kline's career and solidifying his reputation in the art world. 

Continuously exhibiting in the USA and internationally, Franz Kline was notably selected to display his works at the 1960 Venice Biennale alongside artists like Hans Hofmann, Philip Guston, and Theodore Roszac. Additionally, in 1961, his pieces were featured in "American Vanguard," an exhibition organized by the United States Information Agency, touring various European countries. 

Tragically, Franz Kline passed away unexpectedly from heart failure on May 13, 1962. 

Franz Kline's Art Style

Franz Kline is renowned primarily for his black-and-white abstractions, which have drawn comparisons to New York's urban landscape, the rural Pennsylvania scenery of his childhood, and Japanese calligraphy. Kline started exploring a stark black-and-white palette in a series of ink-on-paper sketches. He translated this technique onto canvases, employing house-painting brushes to craft bold strokes of black intersecting white backgrounds.

By 1955, Kline ventured into color experimentation, employing planes painted in various hues to evoke a more intricate sense of space. His style evolved towards a looser form, evident in works such as "Red Painting" (1961), where some pieces were nearly monochromatic by the early 1960s. At this juncture, Kline had firmly established himself as a leading figure in Abstract Expressionism. 

When pressed to elucidate the meaning behind his work, Kline resisted, preferring viewers to interpret the compositions without external guidance. He underscored the non-symbolic essence of his pieces, emphasizing what he termed "painting experience."