Franz Kline: The Vital Gesture

Franz Kline

Franz Kline

Franz Kline

Franz Kline

Franz Kline

Franz Kline

Franz Kline

Franz Kline began his career as a figurative painter, but in the late 1940s, he used a projector to enlarge one of his drawings of furniture onto the wall. Kline was intrigued by the resulting abstraction: “A four by five-inch black drawing of a rocking chair -- loomed in gigantic black strokes which eradicated any image, the strokes expanding as entities in themselves, unrelated to any entity but that of their own existence.” 

From this moment on, Kline would dedicate himself to creating large-scale, black-on-white abstract works. “I paint the white as well as the black,” he once said, “and the white is just as important.”

The dynamic curves and slashes of his works may seem totally spontaneous, but many of his so-called action paintings, were carefully reproduced from preliminary studies. Many of Kline’s works, though non-representational, seem to suggest through their titles and through the stark, pulsing compositions the bridges, railroad tracks, and machinery of America. Kline’s material of choice -- inexpensive, low-viscosity house paints -- also points to the artist’s interest in industry and consumerism.