Lee Krasner (68 page)

1. JPCR, vol. 4, 241, D73, Stella Pollock to Frank Pollock, postmarked December 11, 1947.

2. 1977-Diamonstein-1.

3. Grace Hartigan to the author, 3-30-2007, and earlier, 1979-Hartigan.

4. Grace Hartigan to the author, 3-30-2007, and earlier, 1979-Hartigan.

5. Grace Hartigan to the author, interview of 3-30-2007.

6. 1989-Naifeh, 565. Grace Hartigan to the author, interview of 3-30-2007.

7. Grace Hartigan to the author, interview of 3-30-2007. Hartigan's marriage to Harry Jackson lasted only a year.

8. See Harry Jackson's own account on his Web site: http://www.harryjackson.com/biography.cfm.

9. JPCR, vol. 4, 242.

10. LK to the author, many times.

11. 2002-Harrison, 80. Artist friends who settled in Springs or on eastern Long Island included Nicolas Carone, Costantino Nivola, Charlotte and Jim Brooks, John Little and his wife Josephine, Balcomb Greene and his wife Gertrude “Peter” Greene, Ibram Lassaw, and Perle Fine.

12. Vita Petersen to the author, interview of 3-1-2010, says that she studied with Hofmann later than Lee and Mercedes, since she only arrived from Germany in 1938 and entered the Hofmann School after the birth of her daughter in 1942.

13. Vita Petersen to the author, interview of 3-1-2010.

14. Vita Petersen to the author, 3-11-2010.

15. Vita Petersen to the author, 3-11-2010. This photograph remains in the collection of PKHSC and was cited in 2007-Landau, 20. See cover of
Mercedes Matter,
2009.

16. Vita Petersen to the author, 3-12-2010.

17. Vita Petersen to the author, 3-12-2010.

18. “House that ‘Lives' Theme of Exhibit,”
NYT,
September 20, 1948, 22.

19. “House that ‘Lives' Theme of Exhibit,”
NYT,
September 20, 1948, 22.

20. Ann Pringle, “Modern Houses Inside and Out,”
New York Herald Tribune,
September 20, 1948, 22, and “House That ‘Lives' Theme of Exhibit,”
NYT,
September 20, 1948, 22.

21. Aline B. Louchheim, “Gallery, Decorator and Work of Art,”
NYT,
September 26, 1948, X9. Aline Bernstein Louchheim was later known as Aline B. Saarinen after her 1954 marriage to architect Eero Saarinen.

22. Ann Pringle, “Modern Houses Inside and Out,”
New York Herald Tribune,
September 20, 1948, 22.

23. “House that ‘Lives' Theme of Exhibit,”
NYT,
September 20, 1948, 22.

24. LKCR 225 notes Krasner's dismay at Schaefer's decision to ask Alexander Styne to transform this painting into the top of a black wood coffee table.

25. LKCR, 103, note for CR 212, identifies “interstitial ‘images' in
Abstract No. 2
[that] resemble trap symbols from paleolithic caves,” which she thinks Krasner got from the book they owned: G. Baldwin Brown,
The Art of the Cave Dweller
(1931).

26. Frederick Gutheim, “Arts and Architecture at Work in Two New Exhibitions,”
New York Herald Tribune,
October 3, 1948, AAA, reel 3776, frame 1012.

27. 1977-Diamonstein-1.

28. 1973-Friedman, 32.

29. 1968-Ossorio.

30. 1968-Ossorio.

31. JPCR, vol. 4, 243.

32. JPCR, vol. 4, 243, D76, Stella Pollock to Charles Pollock, letter of January 10, 1949.

33. 1964-Seckler.

34. 1964-Seckler.

35. JPCR, vol. 4, 243, D77, Stella Pollock to Charles Pollock, letter of mid-April 1949.

36. JPCR, vol. 4, 245, D79, Stella Pollock to Frank Pollock, letter postmarked June 15, 1949.

37. Others in this show were Gina Knee, Julien Levy, Ibram Lassaw, David Burliuk, Ray Prohaska, and Lucia (Mrs. Roger Wilcox, who showed with Sidney Janis).

38. Stuart Preston, “New Group Exhibitions: Out of Town,”
NYT,
July 17, 1949, X6.

39. Robert Alan Aurthur, “Hitting and Boiling Point, Freakwise at East Hampton,”
Esquire,
June 1972.

40. Though a couple, Picasso and Gilot were not legally married.

41. Stuart Preston, “By Husband and Wife,”
NYT,
September 25, 1949, X9.

42. 1964-Seckler.

43. 1958-Time, 64.

44. JPCR, vol. 4, 246, D82, Stella Pollock to Frank Pollock, letter postmarked 12-22-1949.

45. LK to Alfonso Ossorio, letter of 1950, quoted in JPCR, 247.

46. 1985-Potter, 121–22.

47. 1985-Potter, 122.

48. Stuart Preston, “Chiefly Modern,”
NYT,
June 4, 1950, X6.

49. 1973-Nemser, 45.

50. Others included were Gina Knee and George Sakler.

51. “Guild Hall to Open Season with Abstract Art Show,”
East Hampton Star,
June 29, 1950, Lee Krasner Papers, AAA, reel 3780, frame 396-A.

52. This point has been argued by 1996-Wagner, 164.

53.
Life,
August 8, 1949, 42–45.

54. 1985-Potter, 114.

55. JPCR, vol. 4, 247. This letter was published in the
New York Times
and in the
Herald Tribune
.

56. Recently, 2009-Sandler, 229, made the inexplicable comment: “Had she wanted to she could have been included among the Irascibles in their photograph in
Life,
but she did not.” Sandler never tells us how he knows this; perhaps he imagines that LK could just have invited herself to join in after the fact of being passed over by Newman when he phoned, but this is not credible.

57. 1981-Langer.

58. For example, 1996-Wagner, 122–23.

59. For example, she taught the author a few of her favorite recipes.

60. 1950-Roueché, 16.

61. 1950-Roueché, 16.

62. 1950-Roueché, 16.

63. 1985-Potter, 200. 1989-Naifeh 750 erroneously places this event in 1955.

64.
Time,
November 20, 1950. JPCR, 253.

65. 1985-Potter, 130.

66. 1985-Potter, 130–31.

67. Josephine Little to Andrea Gabor, taped interview, claims that they were not present for this incident.

68. Reported by Peter Blake quoted in 1985-Potter, 131.

69. 1985-Potter, 133.

70. They were originally shown with numbers rather than these titles.

71. 1973-Friedman, 42.

72. 1985-Potter, 134.

73. Marvin Jay Pollock to Frank Pollock, letter of December 3, 1950, JPCR, 255.

74. 1985-Potter, 134–35.

75. Howard Devree, “Artists of Today: One-Man Shows Include Recent Paintings by Jackson Pollock and Mark Tobey,”
NYT,
December 3, 1950, X9.

76. Robert M. Coates, “Extremists,”
The New Yorker,
December 9, 1950, 110.

77. See B.K. [Belle Krasne], “Fifty-seventh Street in Review,”
Art Digest,
December 1, 1950, 16, who called the work “richest and most exciting.”

78. “The Year in Review: 1950,”
Art News,
reprinted in 1977-Diamonstein-2, 207.

79. JPCR, vol. 4, 257, D94, letter of late January 1951, JP to Alfonso Ossorio.

1. 1972-Gruen, 232–33.

2. 1985-Potter, 114.

3. JPCR, vol. 4, 257, D93, letter of January 6, 1951, JP to Alfonso Ossorio and Ted Dragon.

4. JPCR, vol. 4, 257, D94, letter of late January 1951, JP to Alfonso Ossorio, responding to Ossorio's offer to pay for a painting with monthly installments of $200.

5. LKCR, chronology, 310, erroneously reports that Pollock was already seeing the “Sullivanian” therapist Ralph Klein, but in fact that treatment began several years later. 1999-Hobbs, 116, repeats this error. On Fox's approach see, 1974-Blum, 174–75, 245.

6. 1998-White, 226, 229. Dr. Ruth Fox became the medical director of the National Council on Alcoholism.

7. 1974-Blum, 174–75.

8. Linda Lindeberg quoted by 1975-Nemser-2, 7.

9. Ruth Fox, M.D., “The Alcoholic Spouse,” 158–59.

10. 1956-Fox, 151–52.

11. 1974-Hutchinson.

12. 1979-Novak.

13. JPCR, 259–60, C96, C97.

14. Among the other women artists in this show were: Perle Fine, Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, Anne Ryan, Sonia Sekula, Day Schnabel, and Jean Steubing. Most artists, including Krasner, were identified by surnames only.

15. JPCR, vol. 4, 261, D99, letter of late June 7, 1951, JP to Alfonso Ossorio and Ted Dragon.

16. 1985-Potter, 139.

17. 1979-Novak.

18. 1973-Nemser, 45.

19. 1973-Nemser, 45.

20. 1973-Nemser, 45.

21. 1965-Friedman, 11. LKCR, 123.

22. 1967-Seckler.

23. See LKCR, 124, CR252. The catalogue raisonné does not associate this quotation with this work, though the link seems clear.

24. John Bernard Myers, “Anne Ryan's Interior Castle,”
Archives of American Art Journal,
vol. 15, no. 3 (1975), 8–11.

25. See 1972-Holmes quoted in Chapter 17: The Feminist Decade, 1970–79, 392.

26. Stuart Preston, “Among One-man Shows,”
NYT,
October 21, 1951, 105.

27. Stuart Preston, “Among One-man Shows,”
NYT,
October 21, 1951, 105.

28. See 1996-Wagner, 166–167, who argues strongly for Rice Pereira and 1983-Rose, 66, who argues for Mondrian. LKCR ignores 1972-Holmes, where LK says she knew Rice Pereira's work.

29. Robert Goodnough, “Lee Krasner,”
Art News,
November 1951, 53, photocopy given to the author by LK with her notations.

30. Dore Ashton, “Lee Krasner,”
Art Digest,
November 1, 1981, 59. Krasner remained proud of these reviews, copies of which she gave me for my files.

31. Emily Genauer (1911–2002) [initials handwritten by LK seem to be E. G.], “Abstract and Real,”
New York Herald Tribune
, unidentified newspaper clipping, LK papers, AAA, roll N6867, frames 123–33. LKCR attributes this review to Eugene Goosen, which seems impossible. According to his obituary, he was then “an art and theater critic for
The Monterrey Peninsula and Herald
in California before joining the faculty of Bennington College in 1958.” See
Judith Dobrzynski, “Eugene Goosen, 76, Art Critic,”
NYT,
July 18, 1997. The author discussed Krasner with Genauer on several occasions during the late 1970s.

32. Emily Genauer [initials handwritten by LK seem to be E. G.], “Abstract and Real,” newspaper clipping, LK papers, AAA, reel N6867, frames 123–33.

33. 1987-Soloman, 196; 2002-Harrison, 76.

34. Betty Parsons gave Alfonso Ossorio solo shows at her gallery in 1951, 1953, and 1956, but she had already given him shows when she worked at the Wakefield Gallery in 1941 and 1943 as well as at the Mortimer Brandt Gallery in 1945. He also helped to support her gallery.

35. Greenberg, “Art Chronicle: Feeling Is All,”
Partisan Review,
January 1952, reprinted in 1993-Greenberg, 105–06.

36. Clement Greenberg interviewed by James T. Valliere, in 2000-Harrison, 255.

37. 1985-Potter, 146.

38. 1985-Potter, 145.

39. 1985-Potter, 145.

40. JP quoted in 1985-Potter, 156. See also 2000-Harrison, 29.

41. 1985-Potter, 150.

42. JPCR, vol. 4, 267, D103, letter of March 30, 1952, JP to Alfonso Ossorio.

43. 1985-Potter, 145.

44. 1952-Warner, copy inscribed on the half title page in the artist's hand: “Alfonso Ossorio '52 East Hampton,” collection of the author.

45. Constance J. S. Chen, “Transnational Orientals Scholars of Art, Nationalist Discourses, and the Question of Intellectual Authority,”
Journal of Asian American Studies,
vol. 9, no. 3 (2006), 215–42.

46. Benjamin Rowland, Jr., “Langdon Warner, 1881–1955,”
Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies,
vol. 18, no. 3/4, December 1955, 450. Warner served in the United States Army's Antiquities Division in World War II and became something of a legendary hero in Japan, where he was credited with saving the culturally rich cities of Nara and Kyoto from nuclear destruction.

47. Daisetz T. Suzuki,
Introduction to Zen Buddhism
(Kyoto: The Eastern Buddhist Society, 1934). New York artists were more likely to have read the edition published in 1949 by the New York Philosophical Library.

48. 1952-Warner, 101.

49. 1952-Rosenberg, 22.

50. JPCR, vol. 4, 271, D107, letter of October 20, 1952, Sidney Janis to JP.

51. 1972-Gruen, 238.

52. Langer-1981.

53. Cynthia Navaretta to the author, 3-5-2010.

54. Cynthia Navaretta to the author, 3-5-2010.

55. See chapter 17: LK certainly believed that the stories of JP's affairs were true. 1989-Naifeh, 211, dismissed rumors and claims by JP that he had slept with Rita Benton, who later told Gene Thaw that she initiated the young JP (author's interview with Thaw, 4-1-2010). Rita's conversation with Thaw took place in Chilmark on Martha's Vineyard after Thomas Hart Benton's death in 1975.

56. Cynthia Navaretta to the author, interview of 3-5-2010, recalled that George McNeil's wife, Dora, who was the head designer at Simplicity Patterns and the mother of two young children, found out about her husband's affair with Mercedes. Her other affairs are documented in many published sources. On Mercedes's “playing the field though married” sex life, see Ellen G. Landau, “To Be an Artist Is to Embrace the World in One Kiss,” in
Mercedes Matter
(New York: Mark Borghi, 2009), 75, note 104.

57. For a description of this behavior, see Gail Levin,
Becoming Judy Chicago,
111–12.

58. See journal pages at Getty, box 57, folder 3. This journal is dateable because he noted “Wednesday Memorial Day” on May 30, which was on a Wednesday in 1951.

59. Harold Rosenberg journal for May 29 and 30, 1951, Getty.

60. Harold Rosenberg journal for June 16, Getty.

61. Paul Brach discussed JP and Rosenberg and told stories of the abstract expressionists with the author in many conversations. 1989-Naifeh, 706, missed the larger implications in what Brach intuited about Rosenberg's motive. Matter used her closeness to and admiration for JP to provoke Rosenberg's jealousy.

62. Harold Rosenberg, journal for Wednesday, June 6, 1951, written on page printed for June 8, Getty.

63. Harold Rosenberg, journal for Thursday, June 7, 1951, written on page printed for June 8, Getty.

64. 2004-Stevens, 576.

65. 2004-Stevens, 346.

66. LK to the author, countless times in conversation.

67. Their open marriage is well documented in 2004-Stevens and in 1993-Hall. LK to the author.

68. The young boy in the photograph, who is much too young to be Greenberg's son from his first failed marriage, is probably the child of the unknown photographer.

69. Morris Louis to James McG. Truitt, “Art-Arid D.C. Harbors Touted ‘New' Painters,”
Washington Post
, December 21, 1961, A20. The interviewer was then married to artist Anne Truitt, a friend of both Greenberg and Louis.

70. Sidney Janis quoted in 1972-Gruen, 247.

71. Clement Greenberg to James Valliere, unpublished interview, March 1968, noted in 1987-Solomon, 236.

72. Howard Devree, “Ingres to Pollock,”
NYT,
November 15, 1952, X9.

73. Clement Greenberg, “Jackson Pollock,” quoted in 1997-Rubenfeld, 163. The show took place November 17–30, 1952.

74. 1997-Rubenfeld, 164.

75. 1997-Rubenfeld, 164.

76. Freas to Brenson, December 11, 2001.

77. Freas to Brenson, December 11, 2001.

78. Jean Freas to Michael Brenson, interview, December 11, 2001. As Jean Pond, she published a memoir,
Surviving
(New York: Farrar, Staus & Giroux, 1978).

79. After her divorce from David Smith, Jean Freas Smith worked as a TV reporter in Washington, D.C. She left television in 1969 and moved to NYC after marrying NBC on-air reporter Geoffrey Pond, from whom she was later divorced.

80. Freas to Brenson, December 11, 2001.

81. Freas to Brenson, December 11, 2001.

82. Freas to Brenson, December 11, 2001.

83. Clement Greenberg, “Jackson Pollock,” quoted in 1997-Rubenfeld, 163.

84. Clement Greenberg, “Jackson Pollock,” quoted in 1997-Rubenfeld, 163.

85. Clement Greenberg to Don Casto, letter of February 14, 1964, in response to Casto's questions, CG papers, Getty.

86. 1987-Soloman, 237.

87. Copy in LKP, AAA, roll 3777, frames 99–105.

88. 1979-Novak.

89. 1952-Rosenberg, 22.

90. 1952-Rosenberg, 23.

91. 1952-Rosenberg, 23.

92. 1952-Rosenberg, 48.

93. 1952-Rosenberg, 49.

94. 1985-Potter, 169.

95. Harold Rosenberg, “Painting Is a Way of Living,”
The New Yorker,
February 1, 1963; reprinted as “De Kooning: 1. Painting Is a Way,” in Harold Rosenberg,
The Anxious Object Art Today and Its Audience
(New York: Horizon Press, 1966), 90.

96. Clement Greenberg to Don Casto, letter of February 14, 1964, in response to Casto's questions, CG papers, Getty.