Book of the Week: 'De Kooning: An American Master'

'De Kooning: An American Master' by Mark Stevens and Annalyn Swan (Knopf, 2004), has everything you need in the biography of an artist: lots of interesting detail about his early life (Holland, poverty, apprenticeship, emigration); glamorous bohemian poverty in the New York of the 1940s; making it as an artist, getting drunk and fighting in the Cedar tavern in the Greenwich Village of the 1950s; multiple marriages, infidelities, a final descent into dementia; and lots of great work.

The authors tell all this at great length, yet always at a level that sustains your interest. The following extract is part of their introductory summary to De Kooning's life:

Introduction, p. xvi

Surprisingly, this was the first major biography of De Kooning in English, even though it came out in 2004. I bought and read it then, and its glorious picture of the artistic milieu of post-war New York still stays with me. (Buy it here.)

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Restoring my Printing Press

I've just finished restoring and assembling my large etching press -- a six week process involving lots of rust removal, scrubbing with steel wool, and repainting. Here is a photo of the same kind of press from the Chicago Printmakers Collaborative: And here is a short YouTube video of me testing the press, making sure the motor still works after nearly seven years of lying in storage:

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Brancusi in Plastic

Artist Mary Ellen Croteau is showing these columns made from recycled plastic cartons and lids in the window of the Columbia College bookstore on Michigan Avenue. They are a playful homage to Brancusi's "Endless Columns", with a serious environmental message for our times: Image copyright Inhabitat.com and Mary Ellen Croteau Mary Ellen also runs a wonderful experimental art gallery in a window space in west Chicago, called Art on Armitage . I will be exhibiting a mixed media piece there during August 2012.

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How to etch a linoleum block

Linoleum as a material for printmaking has been used for nearly a hundred years now. Normally, you cut an image out using special gouges similar to woodcut tools, cutting away the lino around the image you want to print. This is called relief printmaking, because if you look at the block from the side, the material that remains stands up in relief from the backing material. You then roll ink with a brayer over the surface of the block, place paper over it, and either print by hand or run it through a press. You can do complex things this way (for example, reduction linocuts), but the beauty of the process is that it is quick, simple, and direct. Incised lino block, from me.redith.com Etched lino block, from Steve Edwards A few years ago, I saw some prints that were classified as coming from etched linoleum blocks, and I loved the textures I saw in them. In the last few months, I've been trying to use this technique in my own studio, learning about it as one does these d...

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